Fairfax County’s Board of Supervisors Tuesday formally adopted a new budget that would add an average of $304 to annual homeowner tax bills and steer much of that money toward giving teachers raises and lowering class room sizes in county schools.

Board Chairman Sharon Bulova (D) called the 2017 fiscal year budget “a booster shot to ensure our quality of life,” a reference to the worries in Virginia’s largest municipality that underscored heated negotiations over county spending in a tepid economy that has not kept up with increasing demands for services.

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Fairfax’s population of 1.1 million people has seen more elderly and low-income residents in recent years, adding extra burden on schools and social service programs at a time when the effects of the 2008 recession and more recent federal spending cuts have hampered county tax revenues.

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The new budget will give an extra $88.4 million to the school system’s operating budget next year, or about $30 million more than county officials initially proposed earlier this year before school advocates warned that repeated shortfalls in funding have placed the nation’s 10th largest public school system in jeopardy of losing quality.

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The 2017 spending plan raises the residential property tax rate by 4 cents to $1.13 per $100 of assessed value.

“This transfer will provide sufficient funding for the schools to be able to move forward with teacher compensation, class size issues and other things that were a priority this year,” Bulova said before the board approved the property tax increase 7 to 3.

Supervisors Pat Herrity (R-Springfield), John Cook (R-Braddock) and Linda Smyth (D-Providence) opposed the increase, reflecting arguments by anti-tax groups that the tax increase will be too burdensome for lower-income homeowners in one of the country’s most expensive regions.

Those arguments are likely to continue as the county looks for firmer fiscal ground in the years to come. County budget officials already project that they will be about $75 million short for the 2018 fiscal year.

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