CITY STAFF RECOMMENDS LEAVING TAX RATE THE SAME

  

The City of Brenham held their 4th and final Budget Workshop Tuesday afternoon.  The city received the estimated property tax revenues for 2022 today (Tuesday) from Dyann White, Chief Tax Appraiser.  City staff is recommending that the city keep the same tax rate as last year to fund the growth of the city.  Last year the tax rate was $.35 for M&O and $.144 for I&S for a total of $.494 per $100 valuation.  The estimated property value inside the city limits is nearly $1.8 billion, an increase of $150 million from last year.

City staff is recommending an additional 3 new firefighters be added in 2024, 2025 and 2026 for an additional 9 firefighters to man a second fire station.  That is in addition to the three that were added this year.  City Manager Carolyn Miller said that the 2nd fire station will be funded through Certificates of Obligation.  Councilman Atwood Kenjura asked Fire Chief Roger Williams about the large number of calls over the past 3 years.  Williams said the growth of the city has a lot to do with it, but the number of false alarms has to be attributed to the Brenham State School.  He said he has worked with the state over the past 2 years, to replace the pull stations with lock boxes, to keep the residents from pulling an alarm, but now the residents are simply pulling the boxes off the wall.

City staff did not have time to calculate the voter approval tax rate before the meeting, but will have it for next week’s City Council meeting.  At that meeting, City Council will set the new proposed tax rate and set 2 public hearings for the new rate.