Remember the key is your property taxes have been growing 8 or 9 a year. Were going to cut that down by half or more so over the lifetime of living in a home its $1000s of dollars of savings and the same holds true for businesses."
AUSTIN Texas (Texas Insider Report) The Property Tax Caps are the key because we have to slow the growth of property taxes. So before homeowners were capped at 10 increases. If your property taxes have been going up 8 or 9 theyre now going to be capped at 3.5 in terms of what your local City & County can grow their revenues. If they want more they have to ask for an election.
Basically youre going to be saving half or more on how much your property taxes grow in the future said Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick summarizing the 2019 Legislative Sessions accomplishments.
And by the way dont let your Cities & Counties tell you that they have to cut police officers or fire fighters. We (the State Legislature) havent cut them. Weve said you can only grow at 3.5 plus any growth you have. And if you need more (as a local taxing authority) you have to go to the people for a vote which the people have never had before to control their property taxes.
On school taxes were capping them at a hard 2.5 because the states picking up the difference (in what will now be reduced revenues compared to those ISDs raised in the past without a 2.5 cap.)
So your school taxes which are half your bill and have been growing 7 or 8 9 or 10 a year because of appraisal values were basically taking appraisals out of the picture of being used as a weapon against your property tax Patrick told WFAAs Jason Whitely.
You want your appraisal to go up… So were going to be cutting the (tax rate) growth significantly.
We also put $5 billion (of state dollars) in this session that will cut current school property taxes about 10. And that will increase a little bit more as each year goes by.
Its your cities your counties and your school districts that levy the tax so theyre the only ones that can cut the tax. But we (the State Legislature) stepped up with about $5 billion to cut those taxes about 10 this first year and its the growth that were limiting.
Its for home owners thats no matter how many homes you have rental homes second homes and its for all business property as well. So were going to be saving businesses significant money too. Where their property taxes have been going up 15 or 20 to 25 now theyll be able to reinvest that money back into their company. They can hire people and create more jobs" Patrick said.
In Senate Bill 2 which caps the Cities & Counties at 3.5 and in House Bill 2 that caps schools and ISDs at 2.5 weve put strong transparency language in these bills thats going to give taxpayers more information about how to protest your taxes.
But again the key is your property taxes have been growing by 8 or 9 a year now were going to cut that down by half or more. So over the lifetime of living in a home its $1000s of dollars of savings and the same holds true for businesses" said Patrick.
We have totally taken apart and put back together again School Finance for 1200 school districts and 9000 campuses. We took apart the system that weve been under where you had no voice in your property taxes going up you now have a voice said Texas Lt. Governor.