Arlington’s next property tax rate is still unclear, but city council members limited how high it could go.
With a 6-3 vote Tuesday, council members approved a tax rate ceiling of 63 cents per $100 valuation. The ceiling is at the no-new-revenue rate, which means the city would bring in the same amount of revenue from property taxes as last year.
Council members Bowie Hogg, Long Pham and Raul Gonzalez voted against the ceiling, signaling support for keeping last year’s tax rate of roughly 62 cents per $100 valuation.
City Manager Trey Yelverton reiterated his belief that Tarrant Appraisal District’s property value freeze and consequently lower taxable home values are forcing Arlington’s hand on whether to hike the tax rate to increase services.
“The rubber meets the road in all of those investments,” Yelverton told the council, referring to investments that could be made with a higher tax rate. “Those decisions (about whether to make further investments in city services) are not being necessarily made here, but they’re forcing you to make that decision by making this rate adjustment.”
The proposed Arlington budget is balanced, with a roughly $3 million surplus to go into its reserve funds. The budget was based on maintaining the same tax rate.
Council members were required to determine the tax rate ceiling this week. Texas law requires taxing governmental entities to publish their proposed tax rate at least five days before the first public hearing. From there, council members can decide to lower the tax rate from its initial proposal but cannot raise it once the hearing is set.
Budget townhalls
The city of Arlington will host two budget town halls leading up to its adoption in September:
6 p.m. Aug. 13 at Dr. Theron L. Bowman Police South District Service Center, 1030 SW Green Oaks Blvd.
6 p.m. Aug. 26 at Arlington City Council Chamber, City Hall, 101 W. Abram St.
Officials previously said the taxable value in the city dropped by 1.23% over the past year, the second-largest dip in value this century.
If the council maintains last year’s tax rate, the average homeowner would pay $1,500 in city of Arlington property taxes. The average taxable home value is $238,180.
Raising the tax rate to roughly 63 cents would mean that the average homeowner’s tax bill would increase $16.
The current tax rate was instituted as city officials last year fought a $25 million budget shortfall. Pham said roughly $18.7 million of that shortfall came after the Tarrant Appraisal District voted to freeze property valuations across the county.
After cutting open positions and scaling back operating hours at services such as the animal shelter, the shortfall shrank to around $11 million before raising the tax rate by 3 cents.
“We had no choice but to either increase the property tax or to cut extremely critical services for our community,” Mayor Jim Ross said.
Much of this year’s tax rate debate has focused on how changes could impact future budgets.
The proposed budget features a few projects that were cut last year, such as animal shelter hours and the annual employee picnic. But roughly $15 million worth of projects were left out, Yelverton said.
The no-new-revenue rate would net the city an extra roughly $2.2 million more than what is proposed in the upcoming budget, Yelverton said.
Ross said he’s hesitant to include future projects with recurring costs into the budget because of the uncertainty around future property tax revenue.
He added that convincing him to adopt anything above last year’s tax rate would be difficult, since he doesn’t know what changes the Texas Legislature could make to tax exemptions or the future of Tarrant Appraisal District policy.
Gonzalez agreed with Ross, saying he was glad city officials took proactive steps to balance last year’s budget and avoided situations like the staff hiring freeze in Fort Worth and staff furlough in Dallas.
“I think we really need to be a little more hesitant this year, because, like the mayor said, who knows what’s going to happen?” Gonzalez said.
Council member Brittney Garcia-Dumas said she wants to hear residents’ thoughts on the tax rate at the upcoming budget town halls. She also signaled support for reconsidering projects that were tabled, such as enhanced homelessness services and transportation funding.
“Ultimately, the reason I want to set that ceiling there is to ask the residents, give them the opportunity to see what they say, and if they come back and say, ‘We hate it,’ then cool, we have the current proposed tax rate, and we go from there,” Garcia-Dumas said.
Council member Tom Ware said adopting the current rate for next year could send an adverse message to the Tarrant Appraisal District.
“If we say, ‘OK, we can do what we want to do with the same amount of money as last year, or with less money than last year,’ then we are patting them on the back almost and saying, ‘You’re right. We had too much,’” Ware said. “Lord knows we cut a bunch last year and didn’t scream enough. So I think we have to at least go to the no-new-revenue rate.”
Chris Moss is a reporter for the Arlington Report. Contact him at chris.moss@arlingtonreport.org.
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