County proposes 3.88 cent decrease in tax rate

Gonzales County commissioners voted unanimously during a special called meeting Monday, Aug. 5, to propose a 2024 no-new-revenue tax rate of 20.32 cents per $100 valuation — a decrease of 3.88 cents from last year’s tax rate of 24.2 cents.

Commissioners also voted to give county employees a 50-cent per hour raise across the board and to allow County Tax Assessor-Collector Crystal Cedillo to hire for a new position.

The county has an adjusted taxable value of $7,004,555,765 — an increase of $888,979,260 above the 2023 adjusted value of $6,119,576,505. That comes after identifying $346,793,100 in taxable value as subject to a tax ceiling (over 65 or disabled) from the certified net taxable value of $7,351,348,865. New properties on the tax rolls account for $63,806,280 in taxable value.

The proposed rate is expected to generate $14,233,257 in tax revenue. Raising the tax rate to the voter-approval rate of 21.32 cents, the most the county would be able to raise without a voter approval election, would generate an additional $700,456 in tax revenues, but the commissioners opted not to take the route.

“You've got a solid budget to handle with a solid tax rate and revenues to handle the budget that you're looking at,” County Auditor Becky Weston told commissioners. “Everything that I gave you was proposed around a no-new-revenue rate of 20.32.”

A sharp rise in taxable value for the county during the past two years has seen the county’s tax rate drop from 43.91 cents in 2021-22 to a proposed 20.32 cents in 2024-25, a decrease of 23.61 cents per $100 valuation in three years.

Weston said the proposed fiscal year 2025 budget currently calls for $15.596 million in estimated revenues against anticipated expenditures of $19.218 million, which will require the expenditure of about $3.62 million of the county’s more than $10 million fund balance.

During discussions, Weston said a 50-cent per hour raise across the board, or $1,040 per year per person for 161 employees, would result in an additional $207,000 in expenditures for the general fund and an additional $45,000 out of the road and bridge fund. Last year, the county gave employees a $1.50 per hour raise, which equaled $3,120 per year per person.

Commissioners also discussed a need to add a position at the Tax Assessor-Collector’s office to handle web-based title transactions from automobile dealers, which Cedillo said is more labor intensive and will require a dedicated person to handle.

“I'm just requesting an additional position so that we can try to serve the public in an efficient manner and get our work done,” Cedillo said. “I mean, everybody can see how busy we are. The legislature just keeps adding and adding and we just need an additional digital employee to try to help us.”

Some departments are also asking for adjustments to some of their employees due to additional supervisory roles that are being performed or to create a difference in salary between patrol deputies and investigators in the sheriff’s department.