{"id":106793,"date":"2025-07-31T05:52:16","date_gmt":"2025-07-31T05:52:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/106793\/"},"modified":"2025-07-31T05:52:16","modified_gmt":"2025-07-31T05:52:16","slug":"virginia-officials-blame-fairfax-co-leaders-for-losing-out-on-800-jobs-leaders-respond","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/106793\/","title":{"rendered":"Virginia officials blame Fairfax Co. leaders for losing out on 800 jobs, leaders respond"},"content":{"rendered":"

FAIRFAX COUNTY, Va. (7News) \u2014 Virginia lost a bid to bring the headquarters of a power company to Fairfax County because of the county\u2019s lack of competitive economic incentives, according to Governor Glenn Youngkin\u2019s Commerce Secretary.<\/p>\n

Secretary Juan Pablo Segura stated that the company would have brought nearly 800 engineering and high-paying jobs to Fairfax County, which pay an average of more than $150,000.<\/p>\n

\u201cFairfax County needs these jobs,\u201d said Segura. \u201cThere are a lot of people moving out of Fairfax County because there’s not enough opportunity in Fairfax. And so these are the kinds of situations where we need a business-friendly Board of Supervisors. We need business-friendly leadership in Fairfax County, and we\u2019re just not seeing that from Jeff McKay and the current Board of Supervisors in Fairfax County.\u201d<\/p>\n

PREVIOUS | Virginia officials criticize Fairfax County for lacking business incentives<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

McKay fired back.<\/p>\n

\u201cI look forward to the continued, successful work that has made Fairfax County into what we all know it as; the economic engine of the Commonwealth of Virginia,\u201d McKay told 7News. \u201cWe always work with all our partners to protect and grow our economy. That said, I remain hopeful that the Youngkin administration is mindful of and will at some point take action to address the unprecedented, direct attacks on Virginia\u2019s economy occurring daily in Washington, D.C.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is disheartening to learn of a missed opportunity to have a company relocate its headquarters to Fairfax County that would have brought more than 800 high-paying jobs, helped fill the County’s empty commercial office space, and diversify our tax base,” County Supervisor Pat Herrity said. “Rather than increasing county spending and then blaming the County’s budget woes on state and federal actions, Chairman McKay should be aggressively pursuing these types of opportunities with incentives and some sense of urgency to strengthen our local economy and diversify our tax base.\u201d<\/p>\n

State and local leaders are having this debate as the unemployment rate rises in Fairfax County year over year.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have started to see some real effects to the unemployment rate,\u201d said Ana Lucia Murillo, the Money Reporter for the Washington Business Journal. \u201cFairfax County saw about a 35% increase in its unemployment rate year over year. Just recently, in May, 3.3% of workers in the county are unemployed right now.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cEveryone knows somebody who is out of work right now, either because of a federal layoff or a layoff due to a government contractor making cuts in the region,\u201d added Murillo. \u201cOur economy here is so reliant on the federal government for direct employment.\u201d<\/p>\n

Following 7News\u2019s story on Tuesday, McKay\u2019s staff sent 7News the following statement:<\/p>\n

\u201cFairfax County officials involved in this matter are under a binding Non-Disclosure Agreement and are unable to discuss the matter further,\u201d McKay told 7News in a statement on Wednesday. \u201cI understand the Commerce Secretary has stated we were not selected for the bid. It\u2019s unfortunate that any elected or appointed official would comment on this matter undermining its confidentiality. At this time, we are not aware of any additional developments and all incentives are being coordinated through the state\u2019s own Virginia Economic Development Partnership (VEDP). Should there be any specific requests or engagement needed, we respectfully suggest that the Commerce Secretary coordinate directly with our local Economic Development Authority (EDA) for appropriate consideration. The EDA oversees the implementation of countless economic opportunities it regularly receives and announces them on a frequent basis. As a County, we are the economic engine of the Commonwealth of Virginia and are committed to supporting economic growth across the Commonwealth.\u201d<\/p>\n

Fairfax County\u2019s EDA may talk to the VEDP, but Fairfax County does not participate in the VEDP\u2019s COF<\/a>, according to the Commerce Department:<\/p>\n

7News reached out to the other Fairfax County Supervisors and asked if they think it\u2019s time for the county to work with the state to provide incentives to bring more jobs and industry to the county. <\/p>\n

Following 7News\u2019 story on Tuesday, McKay\u2019s staff sent 7News the following statement:<\/p>\n

\u201cFairfax County officials involved in this matter are under a binding Non-Disclosure Agreement and are unable to discuss the matter further,\u201d McKay told 7News in a statement on Thursday. \u201cI understand the Commerce Secretary has stated we were not selected for the bid. It\u2019s unfortunate that any elected or appointed official would comment on this matter undermining its confidentiality. At this time, we are not aware of any additional developments and all incentives are being coordinated through the state\u2019s own Virginia Economic Development Partnership (VEDP). Should there be any specific requests or engagement needed, we respectfully suggest that the Commerce Secretary coordinate directly with our local Economic Development Authority (EDA) for appropriate consideration. The EDA oversees the implementation of countless economic opportunities it regularly receives and announces them on a frequent basis. As a County, we are the economic engine of the Commonwealth of Virginia and are committed to supporting economic growth across the Commonwealth.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"FAIRFAX COUNTY, Va. (7News) \u2014 Virginia lost a bid to bring the headquarters of a power company to…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":106794,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[64,68456,61377,68457,68458,420,68459,2179,67,132,68,906],"class_list":{"0":"post-106793","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-jobs","8":"tag-business","9":"tag-economic-incentives","10":"tag-fairfax-county","11":"tag-governor-glenn-youngkin","12":"tag-jeff-mckay","13":"tag-jobs","14":"tag-tax-base","15":"tag-unemployment-rate","16":"tag-united-states","17":"tag-unitedstates","18":"tag-us","19":"tag-virginia"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114946293427560152","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106793","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=106793"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106793\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/106794"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=106793"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=106793"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=106793"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}