Gov. Greg Abbott’s new property tax proposals are a masterstroke of political strategy — not necessarily because he can push them through the 2027 Texas Legislature. He may not.
But politically, they’re golden. For the next year of his reelection campaign, he can point to his plan in every speech and every TV ad and count on applause. Few things set a Texan’s hair on fire like property taxes.
There’s one glaring flaw, though: Abbott doesn’t explain how school districts will make up the lost revenue. And if the gap is big enough, one phrase may soon return to the conversation: sales tax increase.
Could 8.25% get doubled to 16%? Of course, no income tax could be enacted. That doesn’t leave many choices.
Focus groups
To me this sounds like a plan driven by focus groups. Gather Texans in a room and ask them what concerns them the most?
I can hear those Texans, whoever they may be, shouting out “property tax” when asked about their concerns.
So what do you do? Release the governor’s plan right after the recent election.
Like I said, great political strategy.
And by not proposing how to pay millions of dollars for school districts, Abbott gets to stick with the headline – fighting property tax for you. For now, he can avoid the nitty gritty details.
A war between governments
Before we peek at the nitty gritty, let’s call this for what it is – a continuation of the war between state leaders working to lower appraisals, only to find local elected officials devising ways to raise property taxes.
I’ve tried to get taxpayers to show up at local government meetings to argue for lower budget increases, but people don’t like to leave the comfort of their homes.
Abbott’s plan makes it harder to increase local government budgets, a surefire way to lower costs. Gotta love those focus groups.
Not anti-government
If I sound anti-government, I’m not. I just believe the current taxing system is unfair and difficult for Texans to navigate.
How did I develop skepticism about government? Two stories I’d like to share helped form my thoughts on local government spending.
Story No.1: Back in 2012, Keller City Manager Dan O’Leary fired himself. Why? As he explained at the time, “It’s a little unusual for a city of our size to have three city managers. There was a time that was needed, but at this point in time, I don’t think we need three city managers.”
His $176,000 annual salary was wiped off the books.
But the savings evaporated. The money didn’t go back into the city budget. Instead it was divided into pay raises for remaining top city managers.
The city council gave the replacement manager a $39,000 raise, bringing his salary up to $169,000.
The assistant city manager was promoted to deputy and given a $15,000 raise to $145,000. The police chief was bumped up $15,000 to $145,000.
O’Leary said his intentions were misunderstood. His goal wasn’t to save money. “We had too many upper-level managers in terms of workload,” he said.
Which leads us to story No. 2. When I started covering Texas governments 32 years ago, it was easy to interview a school superintendent, or a city manager. Now they are sometimes shielded. Here’s what I mean.
I randomly picked a well-run, fast-growing school district as an example. According to Northwest ISD’s district website, it has a rather large communications department.
There’s an executive director of communications, a communications coordinator, a community relations coordinator, a communications and multimedia specialist, two communications specialists, a communications and web specialist, a community relations specialist, a graphic design specialist and, finally, an administrative assistant.
That’s 10 jobs, where in the past the district employed maybe two or three for its communications department. To be fair, the communications jobs have expanded to include daily updates on websites, a social media presence and district newsletters. Northwest has 35 campuses.
Similarly, I picked a city at random – Lubbock.
According to a 2022-2023 salary survey by the Texas City Management Association, Lubbock had a city manager (earning $341,000), an assistant manager ($172,000), another manager ($186,000) and a deputy manager ($219,000).
Why does this matter? Let’s say you have a trash problem in your city and you want to speak directly to the city manager. More likely you get sent to a deputy manager in charge of trash, not the top manager.
The proliferation of deputies and assistants in cities and school districts is one reason budgets keep going up.
Abbott’s tax proposals
Back to the governor’s proposals. He promises to stop “spiking appraisals and local government tax hikes.”
His fix: link local government spending to size of population plus inflation, or a 3.5% budget increase, and use the lesser of the two. I like that it’s tied to population and inflation. That makes it less arbitrary.
The governor wants to make it harder to impose higher taxes. His solution? Require two-thirds voter approval on all local property tax increases.
That’s a steep hill to climb. Elected officials are going to have to campaign fiercely to get their voters to approve tax increases. I like that, because anytime voters get involved it really becomes the people’s government as it should be.
Abbott wants to give Texans a way to lower their taxes. Under his plan, if 15% of registered voters in a local area sign a petition, they can force a rollback election to lower rates. I like this, too.
You know how it seems that for many of you every year the taxable value of your property goes up 10%? That’s the allowed limit for your home, and appraisal districts make the most of it by pushing right up to the cap.
Abbott wants to cap that at 3%. That decrease of what is called “the homestead appraisal cap” surely would put a dent in your tax bill.
Abbott wants to expand the cap to all properties, which he hopes will help renters and businesses.
He also proposes the end of school district property taxes on homeowners. That’s the most significant of his proposals, but he fails to say how he intends to do it.
His final proposal is that properties should be reappraised every five years. This, he promises, will bring predictability to the process.
Come 2027, if he’s reelected, he’ll have to work out details with lawmakers.
I can hear critics fretting about how this could hurt governments’ duties. How will cities have enough money to fix potholes when they already struggle with that and many other problems? How will school districts survive?
These are real concerns that deserve honest debate. But the driving force behind Abbott’s proposals is simple: cutting taxes so Texans aren’t priced out of their homes.
Still, if he truly wants a fairer system, he should take a harder look at appraisal districts and their inconsistencies. No two counties operate alike, and the process badly needs clearer standards and statewide guidance.
Another negative that needs to be addressed is these changes could spell the end of mass property/appraisal protest hearings.
These changes could effectively wipe out the need for protest hearings. Many homeowners may simply shrug and ask, “Why bother?”