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County sets hearings on property tax rate increase

Wed, 08/10/2016 - 6:00 am
newsdesk@grahamleader.com
Young County set the dates for two public hearings on its proposed tax rate increase for the new budget year. The public hearing dates – Aug. 22 and Aug. 18, both at 9:30 a.m. – were set at the Commissioners Court meeting Monday, Aug 8. Both meetings will be at the Young County Courthouse in Judge Bullock’s courtroom. The county’s meeting to establish the effective and rollback rates for the 2017 budget was held Thursday, Aug. 4. Young County Judge John C. Bullock and Young County Auditor Cheryl Roberts met with Luke Robbins, the county’s chief tax appraiser, and with a tax specialist attorney from Perdue, Brandon, Fielder, Collins & Mott, LLP. 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. The effective 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 $0.747570 per $100 of property value, an increase of $0.179 from the current rate of $0.5687 per $100 in valuation. The county has until Sept. 30 to adopt its final tax rate. The final budget adoption hearing was also set at the Monday meeting, for 9:30 a.m. Aug. 29 in Judge Bullock’s courtroom. “We have to adopt the budget before we can set the tax rate,” said Bullock. “The tax rate can be lower than what we propose, but it can’t go higher.” “That’s one of the things we have had difficulty with our constituents understanding, is that when we set this rate that’s not saying that that is the rate we are going to use. We can’t go up, but we can always go down,” said Precinct 4 Commissioner Jimmy Wiley. By law, the County Judge is the person required to submit a budget and the tax rate required to fund it. On July 22 Bullock submitted a proposed budget that was $1,169,674 less than the current budget with no proposed pay increases and a two fewer employees. For the rest of this story, pick up a copy of Wednesday’s Graham Leader, or subscribe to our online edition.