Texas Municipal League is Crying the Blues

After many years of getting their way with effectively lobbying the state legislature for the benefit of cities and against the best interest of tax payers, the Texas Municipal League(TML) has run into significant resistance. Texas Tribune

This tax payer funded organization of Texas cities has always supported legislation that increased the power of cities at the expense of its citizens. Now they are tracking over 150 bills that diminish a city's power and authority from baning plastic bags to controlling a residents ability to rent their home for short periods.

Nowhere has the lack of cooperation been more evident this session than on the issue of property tax reform, a top imperative for the state’s top three Republicans leaders.

The bill, which aims to slow the growth of rising property tax bills, makes a host of changes designed to make the tax system more transparent and accessible. But it includes one provision — widely disliked by city and county officials — that requires local governments to hold an election before raising 3.5% more property tax revenue than the previous year. Currently, residents must petition for an election if the property tax levy surpasses 8%, a rate set during a period of high inflation in the 1980s. 

Municipal leaders say the proposal could hamstring local budgets while providing only a marginal dent in most homeowners’ bills. While they successfully defeated similar proposals to constrain revenue growth last session, their respite was short-lived. By the time the Legislature reconvened two years later, the legislation had been resuscitated — and it came back with terms considered more punitive than before.

Mayor Ross's opposition to property tax reform was previously chronicled, Mayor Adler and Ross and presumably TML was also lobbying against limiting city's taxing authority without voter approval. Georgetown is a dues paying member of TML.