Tax Hike - Have Your Voice Heard!

The District's financial advisor made a presentation at the September 17th meeting explaining why we needed to consider raising our tax rate. I suppose most of you know that we are not the only taxing entity having to do so.  

Current tax rate is $1.34/$100 value of property, out of which 85 cents is dedicated to debt service and 49 cents is for operations and maintenance (O&M) of the District. The total 2010 HCAD appraised value for the district is $241,322,069 but the taxable value is only $208,602,094 because of homestead, senior citizen, and disabled person's exemptions. The amount under protest by homeowners on their personal appraisals is $11,296,713, which if successful would lower the overall taxable value to $197,305,381.

Here's the facts:

• Taxable value of homes decreased by 11% between 2008 & 2009 according to HCAD. This meant a loss of $19.9 million in the tax base.
• Every penny of tax levy equals approximately $21,000 of tax revenue for the District.
• The annual operating expenditures are approximately $2,400,000 while debt service requirements are $2,750,000 for a total annual expenditure of roughly $5,150,000.
• Tax rate collection is typically in the 98% range.

The financial advisor recommended we raise the debt service tax rate to $1.04 and set the O&M tax rate to 40 cents for an overall tax rate of $1.44/$100 value of property. After much discussion, we decided to set a total rate of $1.39/$100 with $1 for debt service and 39 cents for O&M.


The public hearing for the 2010 tax rate will be held at the beginning of the next District meeting at 11:30AM on Tuesday, October 19, 2010. The new meeting place is the Frost Bank Bldg. located at 6750 West Loop South, Suite 250, Bellaire, TX. Free parking is available.