Mayor Rants Against Property Tax Reform

At the last city council workshop, Jack Daly, assistant to the city manager reported on proposed legislation that would affect Georgetown. At the end of the presentation the Mayor started ranting about the proposed property tax changes. See the video here at the 11:00 minute mark.

The Mayor indicated that if this proposed bill were the current law, the average Georgetown taxpayers bill would have increased $10 instead of the $48 under existing law.

The Mayor clearly does not understand what is happening to the taxes paid by the average property taxpayer in Georgetown.

Lets look at the actual numbers:

The tax receipts collected by the city of Georgetown have been increasing at a 10.06% compound annual rate over the last 5 years. A previous post has shown that population growth plus inflation has grown at a 7.1% annual rate over the last 5 years.

Why is the city collecting property taxes at a rate 3% above population plus inflation?

This is not a recent phenomenon as the same trend has existed for over 10 years when population growth was less and inflation was about the same.

What the Governor and legislature are trying to do is give the authority to increase property taxes more than 4% year over year to the taxpayer by letting them vote automatically on any proposed increase over 4%. If there is a strong case for higher taxes, then let the taxpayers/voters decide if that is in their best interests.

The bottom line from the workshop was that city staff was to continue to oppose legislation that would impact the city's ability to raise taxes without a vote of the taxpayers.

So your taxpayer dollars are being used by the city to lobby against your best financial interest so that the city will not be constrained by the state of Texas.