Hays County Courthouse, San Marcos, TX (Aug. 5, 2019) – At its July 30 meeting Hays County Judge Ruben Becerra presented his Fiscal Year 2020 recommended County budget of $273,097,653 to the rest of the Commissioners Court. The Judge’s budget is a working document that is the first step in the County’s budget process.
Initial budget requests submitted to the Judge were in excess of $22.7 million. After estimating additional revenue and approving a one-time use of reserves for capital projects and equipment purchases, the Judge reduced those requests by $15.3 million to maintain the current tax rate of 43.37 cents per $100 valuation of property*.
“I’d like to see us work to lower the tax rate to the effective rate of 40.51 cents per $100 valuation,” he said, noting that liabilities had to be addressed such as new equipment and staff for the jail expansion and public safety buildings that were voter approved as a part of the 2016 bond.
Some highlights of the Judge’s recommended budget include:
$718,000 for expansion of the flood warning system
$ 872,000 for equipment for the new jail and public safety building
$3,000,000 for salaries for additional jail employees
$260,000 for salary increases for law enforcement personnel per voter-approved Collective Bargaining Agreement
$905,000 for a two-percent cost-of-living raise for employees and a one-percent merit pool for employees making less than $100,000 (this excludes Elected Officials except for the Precinct 2 and 5 Constables to bring their salaries in line with the other Constables).
The Court also set three public budget workshops for August 6, 13, and 20 at 10 a.m., which will be livestreamed and archived at https://hayscountytx.com/commissioners-court/court-video/. The Judge’s recommended budget and related financial information is available online at the Financial Transparency icon on the County’s home page at https://hayscountytx.com (scroll down to the FY 2020 Budget Planning section under Auditor’s Reports).
### *Your specific taxes owed under the above rate can be calculated using this formula:
Property tax amount = (rate) x (taxable value of your property) divided by 100.
The effective tax rate is the tax rate that would generate the same amount of revenue in the current tax year as was generated by a taxing unit’s adopted tax rate in the preceding tax year from property that is taxable in both the current tax year and the preceding tax year. The tax rate applies only to Hays County government; other taxing entities within the county such as cities, school districts, and special districts set their own tax rates.