{"id":400841,"date":"2026-08-08T03:02:18","date_gmt":"2026-08-08T03:02:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/400841\/"},"modified":"2026-08-08T03:02:18","modified_gmt":"2026-08-08T03:02:18","slug":"lone-star-college-system-trustees-ok-balanced-fy-2026-27-budget-2-employee-raises-lake-houston-humble-kingwood","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/400841\/","title":{"rendered":"Lone Star College System trustees OK balanced FY 2026-27 budget, 2% employee raises | Lake Houston – Humble – Kingwood"},"content":{"rendered":"

On Aug. 6, Lone Star College System<\/a>\u2019s board of trustees unanimously approved a balanced $577.5 million budget for fiscal year 2026-27, which features 2% raises for full- and part-time employees.<\/p>\n

The gist<\/p>\n

According to Aug. 7 meeting documents, the FY 2026-27 budget featured employee pay raises of:<\/p>\n

2% increase for all full-time employees hired on or before March 312% bump for part-time hourly, non-instructional employees, except for student assistants and college work-study participants2% more for adjunct faculty, who are paid per contact hour<\/p>\n

Diving in deeper<\/p>\n

LSCS\u2019 FY 2026-27 budget features $577.5 million in both revenues and expenditures, according to meeting documents<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"chart<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re very thankful that this budget is built on strong financial foundations,\u201d said Kristy Vienne, LSCS chief financial officer and vice chancellor of finance and administration, via the Aug. 6 news release. \u201cThis balanced budget maintains our operational needs while positioning the system to invest in initiatives that will advance student success, workforce development, employee excellence and long-term institutional resilience.\u201d<\/p>\n

According to LSCS budget documents, some of the largest differences when comparing last year\u2019s FY 2025-26 budget<\/a> to the FY 2026-27 budget include:<\/p>\n

$18.5 million in additional funding from local taxes for FY 2026-27$7 million more in state revenue for FY 2026-27<\/p>\n

Looking ahead<\/p>\n

The preliminary total tax rate for FY 2026-27 is $0.1058 per $100 valuation, which is $0.0002 lower than the current FY 2025-26 total tax rate of $0.106, according to Aug. 6 budget workshop<\/a> documents. Therefore, some taxpayers within the Harris Central Appraisal District<\/a> are expected to see a drop in the LSCS portion of their annual property tax bill for FY 2026-27 compared to FY 2025-26.<\/p>\n

However, some taxpayers within the Montgomery Central Appraisal District<\/a> and the San Jacinto County Appraisal District<\/a> are expected to see higher FY 2026-27 property tax bills, since the median property value increased year over year, according to meeting documents.<\/p>\n

\"chart<\/p>\n

Vienne said, via an Aug. 6 email statement, that even though LSCS’ preliminary tax rate is lower, taxpayers could still have a higher tax bill if:<\/p>\n

The taxpayer\u2019s home or land value increasesThe taxpayer loses a property tax exemptionThe property value has exceeded the 10% appraisal cap<\/p>\n

LSCS trustees are slated to consider the FY 2026-27 total tax rate in October, Vienne said during the Aug. 6 meeting.<\/p>\n

Some context<\/p>\n

On April 2, trustees approved unchanged tuition rates<\/a> for the 2026-27 school year, as previously reported by Community Impact. LSCS\u2019 rates are:<\/p>\n

$111 per credit hour for in-district students$249 per credit hour for out-of-district students$313 per credit hour for out-of-state\/international students$43 per credit hour for dual credit students<\/p>\n

LSCS last raised the fees<\/a> in March 2024, as previously reported. The new tuition rates were expected to bring in an additional $10.1 million in revenue.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"On Aug. 6, Lone Star College System\u2019s board of trustees unanimously approved a balanced $577.5 million budget for…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":400842,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[53507,56,58,57,140665,48886,140655,140659,140654,140657,140660,140656,140658,140661,140662,140663,140664],"class_list":["post-400841","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-houston","tag-harris-central-appraisal-district","tag-houston","tag-houston-headlines","tag-houston-news","tag-kristy-vienne","tag-lone-star-college-system","tag-lsc-fiscal-year-2026-27","tag-lscs-2026-budget","tag-lscs-board-of-trustees","tag-lscs-budget","tag-lscs-employee-raises-2026","tag-lscs-fy-2026-27","tag-lscs-fy-2026-27-budget","tag-lscs-taxes-2026-27","tag-lscs-taxpayer-bill-2026","tag-montgomery-central-appraisal-district","tag-san-jacinto-county-appraisal-district"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/400841","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=400841"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/400841\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/400842"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=400841"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=400841"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=400841"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}