The Gloucester County Board of Supervisors is expected to approve an ordinance next month that will exempt surviving spouses of first responders killed in the line of duty from paying real estate taxes.

The board held a March 6 public hearing on the matter, but another draft of the ordinance (and public hearing) is needed to make the exemption retroactive to Jan. 1, 2017, which is the year of which the state-enabling legislation was enacted.

During the public hearing, Michelle Dermyer, the widow of fallen Virginia State Trooper Chad Dermyer, asked the board to support the ordinance, which is allowed by state code, and to make it retroactive.  

Chad was killed in 2016 while on duty in Richmond. “That day forever changed the lives of myself and my two children … 11 and 13, when I had to tell them that their father had been shot and killed,” Dermyer said. “That was, by far, the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do in my life.”

She said the f...