Dallas County commissioners narrowly OK $1.8 billion budget, with small tax rate decrease

Dallas County got a new tax rate and $1.8 billion budget for the upcoming year on Friday, but not without disagreements between commissioners.

Two of the five commissioners voted against the new tax rate and budget, citing different specifics. But both felt that these measures did not keep the taxpayer at the forefront.

Dallas County will collect about 22 cents per $100 of assessed property value — about a cent less than last year.

This tax rate is the lowest rate adopted since 2011, Dallas County Budget Director Ronica Watkins told commissioners on Tuesday. Yet, County Judge Clay Jenkins and Commissioner J.J. Koch voted against the tax rate and budget.

Recognizing that soaring property values this year will be hard on property owners, Jenkins and Koch wanted a lower tax rate that would have been closer to a 1.4 cent reduction from the current tax rate, rather than just a cent.

“When taxpayers are feeling a bite from so much inflation, whether it’s at the grocery store, the gas pump, or their taxes. So, this is a year where I’d like to see us take as little as possible,” Jenkins said.

On Aug. 16, Watkins provided the commissioners four tax rate options, all lower than the current tax rate of 23 cents per $100 of assessed property value. The three other commissioners voted for the highest provided option of about 22 cents.

Last year’s property bill on the average Dallas County home value of $360,000 was $9,361, according to Watkins’ Aug. 16 presentation.

The county’s tax rate accounted for about nine percent of the total taxes collected – or $821. A home at the same value of $360,000 would pay the county $785 in 2023. But the likelihood of a home staying valued the same is slim.

Despite the slight cut to the tax rate, most property owners will see a larger tax bill in October, due to the hot real estate market. The Dallas Central Appraisal District estimates that property market values spiked an average of 24.5% within the last year.

The county is estimated to bring in $1.058 billion in taxes.

Budget disagreements

The general fund is expected to grow by $53.6 million of $780.3 million. The general fund covers ongoing costs, more than 80 percent of which is allocated for salaries and benefits. General fund dollars can also be moved to the county reserves.

Jenkins felt that the budget allocated too much to its funds for emergencies. Credit investors have recommended the county keep about 10.5 percent of its budget in reserves to keep a good bond rating, the county judge told The Dallas Morning News. The budget allocated more than 11 percent of tax-collected dollars for reserves, netting a total of $91 million in the savings account.

“Not one penny of that is going towards fixing your pothole or doing anything for you,” he said in an interview. “I’d rather see that not taken from the taxpayers to sit there as extra emergency reserves when we’ve never spent more than one to two percent of our emergency reserves.”

Commissioner John Wiley Price said the county has been frugal for years, and now it is time to build back up its reserves and have adequate project funding. About 15 percent of the budget is slated for major infrastructure and building projects.

“You talk about fudging, we have been fudging about our reserves. We started dipping into our reserves, and this gets us back,” Price said.

Koch had different reasons for his disapproval.

He disagrees with the use of more than half a billion federal coronavirus relief dollars as well as some of the cost estimates. He feels that the federal dollars should be used more this year than budgeted for next year, wanting to save more taxpayer-collected money for down the road. He said some of the cost estimates for budgeted expenses are too high, like budgeting $60,000 for a $45,000 market-valued car.

“Clearly, I’ve lost the argument. This is a mistake,” Koch said on the dias.

Commissioner Theresa Daniel replied to Koch’s concerns, saying that she trusts the county staff and their financial decisions.

“Sometimes the lowest price item is not the best item for the county to have,” Daniel said.

Both Jenkins and Koch have opponents in the November election. The Democratic county judge faces Lauren Davis, a Republican who outraised him in the latest campaign filing report. Major redistricting in District 2 has the only Republican on the Commissioners Court, Koch, facing off in a contested race against personal injury attorney Andrew Sommerman, a Democrat.