For every biennium, the Director of the Department of Housing and Community Development (DHCD) is required to prepare a biennial report to the Governor, General Assembly, and other specified state agencies regarding the activities and other information deemed appropriate by the Director concerning Planning District Commissions (PDCs) and their compliance with their duties established in the Regional Cooperation Act (§15.2-4200 et seq). In order to comply with this reporting requirement, DHCD requires each PDC to submit an annual report by September 1st of each year regarding the activities for each PDC during the most recent fiscal year. This annual report collection process was revised during the FY 2019-2020 biennium to refine the data collection process and is utilized again for the FY 2023-2024 biennium.

Planning District Commissions were established to encourage and facilitate local government cooperation and state-local cooperation in addressing, on a regional basis, problems of greater than local significance. The Regional Cooperation Act lists 12 specific duties related to this overall purpose. In support of this effort, the Commonwealth of Virginia funds PDCs, largely based on population size. This funding is significantly leveraged with additional support at the local, state, federal, and other levels. At the median level, state funding is leveraged and multiplied more than 20 times over through PDC efforts to access other funding opportunities from a variety of sources.

Based on the data provided in their annual reports for FY 2023 and FY 2024, the PDCs have demonstrated compliance with the duties of the Regional Cooperation Act. They have done extensive work in formulating regional strategic plans, including the identification of significant priority topic areas for their regions. Furthermore, they have met the obligation of their duties in a variety of functional areas, particularly Transportation, Environment, and Economic Development. It should be noted that the Regional Cooperation Act does not require that each PDC conduct activities in every functional area. Rather, each PDC is challenged to tailor its services to meet the diverse needs of its member localities. Nevertheless, for each duty listed in the Regional Cooperation Act, all or nearly all PDCs had some level of activity with respect to that duty during FY 2023 and FY 2024.

The PDCs should be commended for the value that they bring to addressing regional issues. A sampling of highlights for each PDC that demonstrate this value are included near the conclusion of this report.