## Facts

- The General Assembly created the Northern Virginia Transportation Authority (NVTA) as a regional “political subdivision” to plan and fund transportation projects in designated Northern Virginia localities.
- NVTA’s governing board consisted of various local and state officials, but members were not elected to the NVTA board as such.
- A 2007 statute authorized NVTA to impose seven specified regional taxes and fees and to issue bonds secured by those revenues.
- The statute gave NVTA “sole discretion” to decide whether to impose the taxes and fees (within statutory parameters) and whether to issue bonds.
- NVTA voted to impose the taxes and fees and to issue bonds, then filed a bond-validation action in the Circuit Court of Arlington County seeking confirmation of the bonds and the underlying revenue authority.
- Citizen-taxpayers and Loudoun County opposed validation, arguing the statute (1) unconstitutionally delegated legislative taxing power to a non-elected body and (2) violated Article IV, § 12 of the Virginia Constitution.
- The circuit court upheld the statute and validated the bonds; the challengers appealed.

## Issues

1. Whether the Virginia Constitution permits the General Assembly to delegate to a non-elected regional political subdivision the discretionary power to decide whether to impose taxes and fees.
2. Whether the transportation act violated Article IV, § 12 of the Virginia Constitution (including single-object and reenactment requirements) in a manner requiring invalidation.

## Decision

- The Supreme Court of Virginia reversed the circuit court’s judgment.
- The Court held unconstitutional the statutory provisions authorizing NVTA, a non-elected regional authority, to exercise “sole discretion” to impose the specified taxes and fees.
- Because the bond program depended on those revenue sources, the Court invalidated NVTA’s bond authority to the extent it relied on the unconstitutional taxes and fees.
- The Court did not invalidate the statute on Article IV, § 12 grounds for purposes of resolving the appeals, treating the delegation issue as dispositive.

## Legal Principles

- Under the Virginia Constitution’s structure, the General Assembly may not delegate the fundamental legislative decision whether to impose taxes to a non-elected political subdivision.
- Delegation of administrative or ministerial aspects of taxation can be permissible, but delegation of discretionary taxing authority is not when exercised by a body that is not itself elected and directly accountable to voters for that taxing decision.
- The fact that some members of a regional authority’s board may hold elected offices elsewhere does not satisfy the requirement that the taxing entity itself be an elected governing body.

## Conclusion

The court invalidated the statutory scheme insofar as it allowed NVTA, a non-elected regional authority, to decide whether to impose regional taxes and fees and to issue revenue-backed bonds, holding that discretionary taxing power must remain with constitutionally accountable, elected bodies.


Marshall v. N. Va. Transp. Auth., 275 Va. 419, 657 S.E.2d 71 (Va. 2008)