“Only four years ago, the State got one third of what the City got. Only three years ago, the State got one half of what the City got. And next year, for the very first time, the State will be taking more than what the City of Austin gets. So to be clear, property taxes are no longer a local property tax. From this day forward, let’s call it what it really is. Ours is a state property tax. And the recent increases by the state of property taxes has been extreme, geometric, and irresponsible.

“Yet in this ‘Alice in Wonderland’ world, state leaders are blaming local governments for their property tax increases, and  that is simply not true. It’s not appropriate. As chairman [Dennis] Bonnen has said so clearly—chair of Ways and Means in the House—the attempt to cap local property taxes has nothing to do with property tax relief. To suggest otherwise is inaccurate, and it’s harmful.

“If the legislature wants to do something about our increasing property taxes, they need to fix their increases in our property tax. They have to hold down this out of control state property tax that citizens and residents of Austin are paying. If the legislature wants to do something about increasing property taxes, they need to fix our broken school finance system. That’s the only thing, the real thing, that people all over our state want our state legislature to do. And it appears to be the only thing they are not doing this special session.” Continue reading →