The city of Fair Oaks Ranch officially bumped up its tax exemption for senior residents and introduced a tax exemption for disabled residents. Additionally, a tax freeze will be placed on the value of disabled residents.
After weeks of discussion and consideration, the FOR City Council increased the property tax exemption for residents over age 65 from $20,000 to $50,000 and introduced a tax exemption for disabled residents – who qualify – at either 10 percent or $50,000, depending on which is greater. The $5,000 homestead exemption already in place will remain.
During its most recent meeting this month, the second reading of the ordinance amendment took place. It nearly passed during the council’s previous meeting until it was decided to remove the 10 percent exemption for older residents after several councilmembers noted their goal was to match the FOR “founding fathers’” intended on this, too – on the fire station, we’re really not ready to make a decision on that right now, correct?
“There’s still quite a bit of discussion going on with city staff about where that’s going to be. Recall from our discussion, we have two potential co-development opportunities, both in the Esperanza community and in Regent Park, and that may be one that’s good to pause on if we want to take something off the table.”
Stark said the reduced $36 million bond, if passed by voters in November, could result in a tax rate increase up to 6 cents per $100 valuation. She said such a tax rate increase would cause the average homeowner, with a property valued at $380,000, to see a $19 monthly increase to their property tax bill.
Handren and District 2 Councilmember Nina Woolard pointed out the last city’s last bond issuance in 2007 didn’t warrant a tax rate increase as property valuations climbed after the bond passed. However, Stark noted the city’s interest rates are expected to continue climbing, tax rates will need to be adjusted to meet state limitations with the new property valuation hikes seen across the state, inflation will continue to impact city expenses as it does personal pocketbooks and city staff is expecting to see an increase in contested valuations and increased tax exemptions.
The new bond proposal will be broken into two buckets, including $23 million for Adler Road and other road and intersection improvements and $13 million for development of Northside Community Park and other general park improvements. The Adler Road project is intended to widen the arterial road in town, adding a center turn lane.
Stark said the new bond proposal with more general projects could provide the city with a bit more cushion considering the rapid inflation and cost increases seen across several fields.
“The one thing to think about, too, is – you all get to decide what you want to move forward with – but as you’re looking at these numbers, we know that unless things change everything is very inflated right now,” Stark said. …
“TxDOT sent out a little memo saying, ‘Hey, look at about a 35 percent increase on everything that you’re doing as far as projects go.’ So, if you do a dollar amount that includes some extra stuff instead of doing just Adler Road or just doing Northside Park, that’s a little cushion as we go out and bid these projects. So, if some of them came in quite a bit higher than we expected, you’d still have the funds to be able to fund your larger ones. Then, we could look at coming back and funding the additional ones that are left over maybe in a different fashion.”
Many of the councilmembers expressed satisfaction with prioritizing road and park improvements, noting these are issues that are consistently mentioned by their constituents.
Woolard said any time there are public forums on what citizens wanted to see in the community, which she said city officials and staff saw during open houses and public forums, streets, sidewalks and parks were “always the top comments that they wanted to see in our community.”
“I get an email daily almost about the condition of our roads,” Woolard said. “And you know the bottom line is we don’t have $10 million plus laying around to address a lot of these road issues that we’re looking at. I agree with the $36 million because it does address the two things the public had said over and over and over again are important to our community. …
“We’ll let the public decide. They can either vote yes or no, and if they’ve got two propositions here, they can decide which is more important or they may decide neither one of them. So, we can at least give it to the voters and the citizens and the taxpayers in the city of Boerne to decide what’s important to them.”
While Stark mentioned a few options the city could consider if any bond propositions were to fail, District 5 Councilmember Joe Macaluso said he didn’t want to see a certificate of obligation bond used to circumvent a public vote. A COB is another debt issuance measure cities can use that does not require a public vote.
“What I do not want to do is put something out for a vote, that is declined – even though I know there’s a law that says you can’t come back for three years – I don’t want to come back period unless we put it back to the voters,” Macaluso said. “Because once the voters have declined, I do not want to go to a COB as an alternative to their wishes at that point in time. I would rather re-educate and then come back at the next election if we think it’s important.”
The city council is looking to have a bond proposal on the November ballot, calling the election in August.
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