SCHOOL BOARD LOOKS AT BUDGET / SETS TAX RATE

  

The Brenham School Board voted at their noon meeting today (Monday) to maintain the same tax rate at 1.135 per $100 valuation.  That has been the tax rate set by the district since the 2012-2013 school year.  The board also voted to conduct a public meeting on Monday August 17th at Brenham High School to hear comments on both the school budget and the proposed tax rate.  Both of these actions are contingent upon the district receiving a letter from the TEA approving the district option of purchasing attendance credits from the state.  BISD Financial Director Kim Horne said that this was just a formality as the district has opted to purchase these credits since 2012 when Brenham was first designated a Chapter 41 wealthy district.

Update:

The effective tax rate for the district is 1.0476 per $100 valuation.  That is the rate that would bring to the district the same amount of tax dollars as last year given the rise in property values.  By keeping the rate at 1.135, the district will bring in an additional $1,182,384 in property tax dollars.  Horne says that the district's income will not increase by that amount because the state reduces it's funding as the tax base increases.

Before setting the tax rate, the board reviewed the budget for the upcoming school year.  At their last meeting, the board approved a 4.69 percent midpoint pay increase for all district employees.  The maintenance and operations budget for this coming school year will increase just over 2 percent while debt service will decrease by 11 percent.  That equates to a 1.27 percent increase over last year bringing the total budget to 42 million dollars.  Kim Horne explains that the budget process looks a more than one year at a time:

Across the district, taxable property values saw a 5.8 percent increase this year.  The average residence in the district increased in value to $162,608.  That would equate to $1561 for the BISD portion of their property taxes or an increase of $39 over last year.

In other discussion during the meeting, Brenham Superintendent Dr. Walter Jackson mentioned that he is working with Michael Watts, the new Principal at the DAEP/ PRIDE Academy, to get dropouts back into school.  Jackson said that in the past, when a student would have truancy problems, they would often drop out and claim that they are being home schooled.  In some instances, this was not the case.  Jackson stated that this was not good for the student or the community.  Jackson and Watts plan to develop a program to invite these dropouts back to school so they can earn their diploma.