County passes budget, higher tax rate for coming year

County Commissioners on Monday approved the FY2017 budget and an increase in the property tax rate for Young County residents. The effective tax rate was set at $0.622249 per $100 in property value and the rollback rate was set at $0.747577 per $100 property value. The county accepted a proposed tax rate of $0.741629 per $100 of property value, an increase of $0.173 from the current rate of $0.5687 per $100 in valuation. The effective rate is the rate needed to come up with the same amount of money as was brought in the previous year. The rollback rate is the sum of the maintenance and operations and debt service rate, a figure usually higher than the effective rate, unless the amount of debt has decreased. “This tax is above the lower effective tax rate or the rollback rate and will impose more total taxes than the preceding year. This tax rate will raise more for maintenance and operations than last year’s rate and the tax rate will effectively be raised by 19 percent,” said Young County Judge John Bullock. Total property tax revenues will be raised by $750,410 from last year’s budget or a 12.9 percent increase. Of that amount, $180,000 is tax revenue that will be raised from new properties added to the tax roll this year which translates to a 19 percent tax rate increase. According a report from Bullock, Young County’s government is currently sound, but the value loss and other factors have affected the Reserve Fund balance – the county’s savings account. The county currently has about 20 percent of an annual operating budget held in reserve, as compared to the 35 percent recommended by the Texas Association of Counties and their financial experts. Bullock said in the same release that Young County should end FY2016 with an approximate $2.6 million fund balance. For the rest of this story, pick up a copy of Wednesday’s Graham Leader, or subscribe to our online edition.