Keeping Hope & Recap on the Waxahachie Tax Increase Public Hearing

 

Hello Friends,

    First, let me thank all the folks who spoke at last night’s Council meeting.  Speaking in public can be intimidating and daunting at best and then throw in a controversial topic like politics and it can make even the strongest person a bit weak in the knees.  I still don’t like speaking in public, so I understand.  Nevertheless, those who showed up to the meeting and those who spoke are to be commended for doing what they felt was right. 

    Next, I have been told that several emails were sent to Council members.  I don’t know if they were for the tax rate or against, but I appreciate all who got involved and took the time to at least send an email!  Participation at the local level of government is so very important because that is the governmental level that really impacts our daily lives and yet many don’t know the importance and some who do know, just don’t care.  I want to be sure that those who contacted Council via email  are recognized for their efforts. 

    I also want to extend a huge THANK YOU to Council Member Billie Wallace who made it very clear that she does NOT support the Council taxing citizens at practically the highest amount they can without an election.  It is unfortunate that she was in the minority, but she stood strong and held to her convictions, so thank you for that!!! I’ve been in her shoes before and it’s hard - really hard.  

    I want to make one clarification for those who were wondering about the vote last night. That vote was not actually approving the tax rate, but was to set the date for the tax rate adoption. I do not believe the item will be listed as a public hearing at the adoption meeting; however, you are welcome to address it in the public comments portion in the beginning of the meeting on Tuesday, September 6th, if you wish. 

    For those who were unable to catch the live-stream or attend the meeting last night, you can watch a recording of the meeting here: https://waxahachietx.new.swagit.com/videos/179611

    Now, here’s the part I really wanted to get to…. I was upset, disgusted and flabbergasted at the behavior from some on our Council last night.  Some called Representative Brian Harrison “irresponsible” for sending a letter to taxing entities asking them to adopt the NNR (no-new-revenue rate).  A state-level elected official reached out to local entities and that’s irresponsible?! I was grateful that Representative Harrison had done such a thing!  All too often, we have elected officials, especially at the state and federal level, who don’t really give much time or effort into the local governmental entities, but he did.   Thank you, Representative Harrison!

    Some Council Members were downright disrespectful to those who showed up, in my opinion. We have a hard time getting residents involved and instead of thanking them, the residents were chastised for not coming to ENOUGH meetings!  That is very belittling to residents. 
I will address some comments made by Mayor Pro Tem Wright.  Last night, Mr. Wright  said pretty much everything he had already said to me in an email on Saturday. I also responded to his email, but none of THAT was mentioned at all, nor did he ever respond to that email or address any of the questions in it.  I will just share my email back to him, which I think covers the question of whether the cities I mentioned are comparable:

“Good Morning Mr. Wright,

My examples were simply to show that cities CAN thrive and adopt the NNR (or below) at the same time.  My basis for comparison was simply North Texas because I knew if I used cities from elsewhere in the state, then THOSE would be called incomparable. 

Waxahachie needs only to compare to Waxahachie. 

1) Is the city giving the taxpayers a break yet or is the city taxing at the max it can without an election?  

2) Why would you or anyone else up at that dais be okay with passing a tax rate that is so far above the NNR that ALSO includes using increments to make the voter approval rate higher so the city can tax even more?

3) Everyone in Waxahachie has had to tighten their belts due to the rising costs of goods and services.  How can you support a total tax levy INCREASE of 23.68% from last year if the 63 cent rate is adopted?  (Numbers from public notice.)

4) “This year’s budget will raise more total property taxes than last year’s budget by $5,647,240 or 19.6%, and of that amount, $2,022,980 is tax revenue to be raised from new property added to the tax roll this year.”  

4A. Did your home budget increase by 19.6%? Ours didn’t and I bet the majority of Waxahachie is like us. 

4B. Why does the city have the right to increase their budget by 19.6%? 

4C. Why can’t the city grow the budget by the $2 Million from new properties? I think that would be a VERY reasonable request. 

5) Why does Waxahachie REFUSE to even explore the possibility of lowering taxes?  THAT is what makes the Council look so bad in the eyes of residents because it looks like y’all don’t care or aren’t even trying to help. 

The honest truth is this:  Waxahachie is literally taxing people (and businesses) at the maximum it can get away with. Yes, you could TRY for higher, but everyone knows that it wouldn’t pass in an election because people are tapped out.  To add insult to injury, those increments were used to bump it up even higher… I just find that reprehensible, to say the least. 

Please consider directing staff to at LEAST split the difference between the NNR and what’s proposed.

Thank you for your consideration.

Melissa”

 

    I, like many last night, felt hopeless after hearing the comments from our elected city leadership. It’s frustrating because it feels that we are not heard.   It’s frustrating that instead of even LOOKING at the numbers involved in a NNR budget or even HALF the difference between the NNR and the proposed (almost max) rate, some on council vent their frustrations on the residents they have been elected to serve!  Not only that, but they throw the burden of the budget onto the citizens!  They are in that position and should be having the city manager direct his team to see what could be removed without significant impact to residents.  They should have given city management the direction to create a NNR budget from the get-go to at least have a starting point.  The burden of proving why they NEED  to take our money is on THE CITY - NOT the citizens.

 
    That all being said… I titled this blog “Keeping Hope…” and I meant it.  Please don’t give up reaching out to city leadership.  So many of us LOVE THIS CITY.  That’s why it’s heartbreaking to be treated this way by those who are called public servants. If we didn’t care, we wouldn’t even bother raising a fuss, but we do.  Please don’t stop caring or fighting for what you believe to be the right thing.  I think it’s fair to say that all of us want Waxahachie to be a better city for our children and grandchildren and generations beyond. The only way that can happen is to be involved. The more ideas that are given and shared amongst those in leadership positions, the better!  We just need to have a Council who is receptive to ideas.  
I don’t say that I have all the answers.  I don’t even pretend to, but I can say that I pray for our city leadership and citizens too.  The only true way to fail our city is to give up.  Please keep hope alive that our city leaders will become more receptive and open to the ideas of others.      

     

    We cannot continue to be a town that does things the same way over and over simply because “that’s the way it’s always been done.”  Sometimes you need to think outside of the box.  
 

    At the end of the day, we are all neighbors. This isn’t Dallas. It’s not Fort Worth. This is Waxahachie and we can all contribute to the current and future success of this city as long as we don’t lose hope. 

The Week of August 29, 2022 in the City of Waxahachie

 

Hello Friends!

 

    This is it.  It's go time!  The only Waxahachie meeting that is on the calendar for this week (as of noon on 8/27) is the City Council Special Meeting on Tuesday, August 30, 2022 at 5:30 PM.  It's possible that some other meetings may be added at a later time, so please check back on the city's website later in the week.  The link to do so is here: https://www.waxahachie.com/calendar.php

 

    So let's get to it!  

 

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Tuesday, August 30, 2022

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5:30 PM - City Council SPECIAL Meeting

Council Chamber, City Hall

401 S. Rogers St.

Agenda Packet: https://storage.googleapis.com/document-uploads-001/uploads/video/agenda_file/179611/8-30-22_Special_City_Council_Meeting_Agenda_Packet.pdf

4 - Public Comments:  While you are able talk about anything you'd like to during public comments, if you are going to speak regarding the budget or the tax rate, I'd highly encourage you to wait until that item since the sole purpose of this special meeting is to hold public hearings on each - the tax rate and budget for FY 23

5 - Public Hearing on the proposed Tax Rate for fiscal year 2022-2023

 

6 - Public Hearing on the Waxahachie proposed budget for FY 23 and there will be a vote on this item, but this vote is ONLY to set the date for the adoption, which they are proposing to be done at the next regular Council meeting, on September 6, 2022 at 7:00 PM.  They do provide a very, very thousand foot view of the budget in the packet, but if you are interested, I encourage you to look through it. 

Here is the information provided in the agenda packet (linked above) regarding the tax rate:

 

 

There is a worksheet for calculating all the different things like the No-New-Revenue Rate, the Voter-Approval Rate and Total Tax Rate.  It should be posted on this website at some point.  Ellis County already has theirs on there.  https://ellis.trueprodigy-taxtransparency.com/taxTransparency/propertySearch  At any rate, on that worksheet, you will notice lots of numbers, but two I want to highlight are the original Voter Approval Rate and the Final Voter Approval Rate.  To me, this goes to show the level of greed involved in this particular year's proposed tax rate and budget (since the budget is funded by the tax rate).  In their graph above, you will see a Voter Approval Rate of 0.63035. This is very important because if the City of Waxahachie proposed to adopt a tax rate ABOVE 0.63035, there would be a mandatory (by law) election held to get the voter's approval. This is where the next picture comes into play.

*** Hopefully you can read line 58 which shows the Voter Approval Rate of 0.626959.  The City COULD keep this amount, but they (and they have the right to do this, although I don't think they should have) added unused increments to * RAISE * the Voter Approval Rate higher!!  *** If the city had proposed a 63 cent rate at the original Voter Approval Rate, then the voters would have had a chance to approve or deny that tax hike... but now, we don't.

From the Texas Comptroller's website: 

Unused Increment Rate

The unused increment rate is the three-year rolling sum of the difference between the adopted tax rate and the voter-approval tax rate and is only available to a taxing unit other than a special taxing unit. The unused increment rate can be used to increase the voter-approval tax rate, depending upon the tax rates adopted by the taxing unit in the previous three years. For example, a city has the ability to “bank” any unused amounts below the voter-approval tax rate to use for up to three years.

The link to the Comptroller's website where this and more information can be found is here: https://comptroller.texas.gov/taxes/property-tax/truth-in-taxation/calculations.php 

 

So while it is perfectly legal for the city to do this, I cannot believe our elected officials are okay with this.  It's not like the City was proposing anything even CLOSE to the NNR Rate of 0.540834, even though Ellis County is proposing to do that and they have tremendous growth as well.  Other cities are going BELOW the NNR Rate and our city won't even go halfway to it to help the taxpayers.

 

I have posted plenty of reasons why I don't think that the City Council should adopt the proposed 63 cent tax rate, but I think it can all boil down to this example I've shown above.  Yes, the city is growing, but use that growth and the massive amount of sales tax (which some is already going to fund the budget and lower the tax rate... let that sink in for a minute...) and give residents a break.  Yes, the Council might consider homestead exemptions NEXT YEAR, and that would be great for homeowners then and IF they do it, but they can also lower the tax rate RIGHT NOW.  In addition, the homestead exemptions won't help renters who keep seeing the taxes impact their rent and according to the city's website, that is almost 40% of residents.  The cost of rent in this town is RIDICULOUS. Here's the link to the demographics breakdown where you can see the renter numbers, along with other information: https://www.waxahachie.com/departments/economic_development_new/site_location_center/demographics.php?fbclid=IwAR2EI6y9z17hWC99GGW2WUpwB1so7j_Lk92GGDlsxrPiCKB7dNF5zDHZFt8

 

This meeting IS absolutely open to the public and really is your last chance to speak to Council regarding the tax rate before it is adopted in a week or two. The meeting will also be live-streamed at the following link: https://www.waxahachie.com/government/city_council/city_council_meeting_live_stream.php

 

I am not going to be at the hearing on Tuesday, but I'm still going to contact the Council and let them know I am very against this tax rate and highly encourage all who cannot be there, to reach out and give the Council your input on the matter.  Their emails can be found here: https://www.waxahachie.com/government/city_council/index.php

 

Thank you all for caring so much about the current and future fate of our beautiful City that we love.  Whether you support the proposed tax rate or oppose it, Waxahachie is nothing without the amazing citizens who live here.

 

For those who would like more information about the tax rate and the public hearing, you can go to this event (even though it is on Facebook, it says that all can see it) and click on the discussion tab under the event details.  https://fb.me/e/1oxqVE9h3

 

I hope everyone has a FANTASTIC week ahead and for those who are speaking on Tuesday - THANK YOU!!!!  I LOVE that people care enough to take ACTION and make a difference!

 

Your Friendly Neighbor,

 

Melissa Olson

(text) 817-507-5162

olsonfortexas@gmail.com