Henderson County Judge speaks out against senate bill limiting local taxes
Smith County Commissioners Court schedules public hearings to discuss tax rates
Senate Bill 9 would lower the amount that most counties and city's can raise taxes without voter approval from 3.5% to 2.5%. McKinney testified against the bill in a public meeting of the Texas Senate's Local Government Committee that was livestreamed on Aug. 1. His full testimony can be seen in the video at the top of this article.
McKinney said that the county's population has grown by 6% since 2020 and that the county has been able to continue funding its services by trying to bring in as much revenue as it can.
'We are debt-free, by the way, have been since 2014,' McKinney said. 'We have 17 volunteer fire departments, 18 police departments, three school districts, depending on our emergency communication system that we just put into place three years ago at a cost of $7.2 million. We have done this by trying to leverage every other revenue that we can bring in.'
McKinney explained that the county makes money from keeping federal inmates at their newly expanded jail, but they rely on the regular 3.5% tax increase to keep up with their recurring costs.
'We expanded our jail by 250 beds at $49,000 a bed in 2007. We are now reaping the benefits of that because we are warehousing federal inmates at not so much profit, but at a good new revenue stream,' McKinney said. 'It's always about the cash flow and we have leveraged that to continue to provide these services and continue to expand what we can. But we have relied on the 3.5% to meet our recurring costs. This is how we've been able to build out our capabilities by expanding our other revenue lines.'
According to McKinney, they're able to build new facilities, but without the 3.5% they won't be able to actually afford to staff those facilities.
The Latest: US import taxes hit levels not seen in nearly 100 years
'What's happening to us is that our 3.5% is now getting to the point where we can build anything, but we can't staff,' McKinney said.
SB 9 passed the Texas Senate on Wednesday in an 18 to 3 vote after it passed out of the committee in a 4 to 1 vote. The bill's House companion is called House Bill 9, which was filed on Monday but won't get a vote unless the Texas House regains a quorum.
The bill was authored by the chairman of the local government committee, State Senator Paul Bettencourt of Houston. Bettencourt issued a statement on Wednesday saying the bill's intent was to bring property tax rate increases in line with the rate school districts use.
'Simply put, cities and counties have been raising property tax bills 3 times faster than schools, even after we reformed the system in 2019,' Bettencourt said. 'SB 9 closes that gap to make property tax rates go down as values go up, saving taxpayer money to deliver real, lasting property tax relief.'
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