Virginia Beach City Council Meeting - December 10, 2025
Virginia Beach City Council Meeting - December 10, 2025
This was the last meeting of the year for the Virginia Beach City Council. The main agenda items included the presentation of the Fiscal Year 2025 audited financial statements, discussions on citizen engagement and the Virginia Beach National Golf Course RFP, approval of the consent agenda, a closed session for contract and personnel matters, and multiple votes on routine items.
Consent Calendar
- Approved 13 ordinances and resolutions on consent by a vote of 10–0, including:
- Designations of property tax exemptions for Rays of Healing, Food Bank of Southeastern Virginia, Maverick Learning Center, Philippine Nurses Association of Virginia, Protection Plus Peril, Quality of Life Inc., and one additional organization (item 7).
- An amendment to the FY 2025-26 Capital Improvement Program for flood protection, transferring funds among projects.
- Authorization for a five-year lease of city-owned property (DeWitt Cottage at 1113 Atlantic Avenue) to Back Bay Wildlife Guild Inc.
- Direction to implement changes to oceanfront parking and authorize one full-time position in the parking enterprise fund.
- Amendments to city code sections on metered parking and traffic calming at Timberlake Drive.
- Elimination of local repayment obligations for loans provided to volunteer rescue squads before November 2024.
- Adoption of the 2025 Disaster Recovery Plan.
- Withdrawal of Ashton Builders 1 LLC's appeal to the Historical Review Board decision regarding vinyl fencing at 2508–2524 Peaceful Lane.
- Approved seven planning items on consent by a vote of 10–0 (with Mayor Dyer abstaining on item 7):
- Variances, conditional use permits, zoning changes, and a zoning ordinance amendment pertaining to nonconformities.
Discussion Items
- FY25 Audit Presentation: Interim Finance Director Wendy Yu, along with Shelby Brown (Cherry Beckard audit manager) and City Controller Kevin Cabaza, presented the audited financial statements for the fiscal year ending June 30, 2025. The audit received an unmodified (clean) opinion with no material weaknesses in internal control and no instances of noncompliance. The city's total net position was $4.7 billion, with $1.8 billion in cash citywide. General fund revenues exceeded budget by $40.4 million (2.7%) and expenditures were $148 million under budget (9.1%), resulting in a $74.1 million increase in fund balance. The unassigned fund balance stood at $178.4 million (11.5% of FY26 revenue), within the city's 8–12% policy range. Enterprise funds (water & sewer, stormwater, etc.) were all reported as financially sound.
- Citizen Engagement and Golf Course RFP: Councilmember Barbara Henley reported that constituents feel left out of early planning and expressed concerns about the Virginia Beach National Golf Course RFP process. She urged greater early and meaningful public participation, especially for upcoming comprehensive plan updates. Councilmember Josh responded that early engagement can sometimes leave questions unanswered, and he clarified that the RFP was a response to unsolicited proposals and a transparent way to bring the matter into the public view. He affirmed that the golf course remains a valued community asset and that the First Tee lease will be honored.
- Capital Improvement Program Flood Protection Transfer: Councilmembers Henley and Michael discussed the transfer of funds within the flood protection CIP to advance construction in Windsor Woods, Princess Anne Plaza, and the Lakes. Henley expressed concern about delaying other projects in southern watersheds and requested monthly reports to track progress. Michael thanked the community and staff for prioritizing these neighborhoods, noting the urgent need following storms.
- Other Council Comments:
- Councilmember Jackson Green announced a District 7 job fair on December 20 at Kempsville Rec Center, funded privately, to provide hope to job seekers.
- Councilmember Michael reported on his attendance at the 2025 North American Summit Against Anti-Semitism, noting Virginia Beach's strong position and urging continued unity against hate.
- Councilmember Michael also announced a town hall on December 17 focused on affordability, co-hosted with Councilmember Cummings and Delegate Tata.
- Councilmembers shared positive remarks about the holiday parade, military appreciation events, and the city being named the "most caring city" in the U.S.
Key Outcomes
- The council certified the closed session (10–0) and approved the minutes of the November 25, 2025 meetings (9–0, with Councilmember Lucci abstaining).
- All items on the consent agenda were adopted by a vote of 10–0.
- The FY25 audit report was formally received; no additional vote was required.
- Staff will review proposals from the golf course RFP and brief council in closed session. Council expects the course to remain a public golf facility and First Tee's lease to be protected.
- Councilmember Henley will receive monthly reports on flood protection CIP transfers to ensure no project is permanently delayed.
- Vanessa Christie was appointed to the Military Economic Development Advisory Committee (10–0).
- The meeting adjourned, with wishes for a merry Christmas and happy new year.
Meeting Transcript
Welcome one, welcome all to uh our last meeting of the year. Um, this will be a good one. Um, Mr. Dehaney, we're ready to go. So, Mr. Most exciting presentation of the year. This will be the big reveal of the city's um annual audited financials, and the presentation will be kicked off by Wendy Yu, who is our interim finance director, and then Cherry Beck, our Cherry Beckard, who is the audit um firm that did the audit will also follow up after Wendy, followed by um Shelby Brown with Cherry Becker will be Kevin Cobasa, the city controller, who'll give an overview of the city's um overall finances. So the next voice you hear will be Wendy Yu, interim finance director. Welcome. Good afternoon, Mayor, Vice Mayor, and member of City Council. As uh I'm Wendy Who, Internal Finance Director. It is a pleasure to be here today to present the audit, the result of FY25 audit. With me, we have Shelby Brown, Audit Manager Fund Charlie Becker, and also Shannon LaWard, uh senior associate fund Chelle Becker, and also uh Kevin Cabaza, City's controller. We will begin with Ms. Brown's presentation, followed by Kevin Kabasa's overview of FY25. Audit financial result. Before we start, I want to sincere thank everyone to make this audit successful. First, I would like to thank for this city council for your continued leadership on waiving support of a strong financial policy to the city audit office. Thank you for your partnership and for your thoughtful oversight. You provide us through all the audit process. Before you is a city's FY25, comprehensive annual report. Producing this 276 document is significant undertaking. It reflects the outer standing dedication and also expertise of finance department staff. In the interest time, I'm not going to read each name. And also I want to recognize City Department for your cooperation and support during this audit process. With that, um please turn over to Ms. Braun. Hello. Thank you for having. Oh, thank you for having me here today. Um, my name is Shelby Brown. I'm an audit manager at Cherry Beckard, and I manage the City of Virginia Beach Fiscal Year 25 annual audit. So we have audited the financial statements of the City of Virginia Beach for the fiscal year ending June 30th, 2025. And we have issued an unmodified opinion on the financial statements. Um our report was issued December 4th, 2025. An unmodified opinion is the best opinion that you can receive on your audit. It is a clean opinion. We also um performed our audit under government auditing standards and the Commonwealth of Virginia's auditor of public accounts specifications for audits of counties, cities, and towns. And we are happy to report that we identified no instances of noncompliance required under either of these standards. We also identified no material weaknesses and internal control over financial reporting. Um regarding this uh uniform guidance audit. The single audit is currently in process. The OMB compliance supplement was issued at the end of November. Um, so we will issue our single audit once we are able to complete those procedures. We plan to issue a report on the compliance for each major federal program. Um and the report will be on the um internal control for compliance in accordance with the uniform guidance. We are happy to report that we encounter no difficulties during our audit, no and no disagreements with management as we performed our audit procedures. We did not have any instances that required us to seek outside counsel to perform our audit procedures. And we have requested certain management representations in our uh representation letter, which is dated December 4th, 2025, which is the same date of our audit report. Um, additionally, we are not aware of any instances in which management um sought outside council for the audit procedures, and any um discussions that we had were in the normal course of business with management as we um progress through our audit.
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