Anderson County Commissioners OK 1-cent tax rate increase; set hearing

Aug. 02--PALESTINE -- Anderson County Commissioners approved a proposed tax rate to fund its 2015 budget on Friday, proposing a 1-cent increase of the general fund tax rate over last year's rate of .5032 cents per $100 of property valuation.

During a presentation by Anderson County Tax Assessor Teri Garvey, commissioners heard a report on 2014 effective and rollback tax rates for the county's General Fund and Flood Market/Flood Control as well as 2014 property values for each.

(The effective tax rate is the tax rate that would raise the same amount of revenue as the previous year's tax rate. The rollback rate is the maximum rate at which taxes could be raised without an election to approve it.)

Total appraised values for 2014 are $4,137,983,972, with total assessed values at $2,913,489,034. New construction values for Anderson County are $24,552,788, increasing $2,328,846 from last year's values of $22,168,942.

According to County Judge Robert Johnston, more than $1.2 billion -- or 36 percent -- of those certified values for 2014 are exempted (or "frozen" ) properties. Agriculture exemptions total $966,139,000 of that $1.2 billion.

"That means that 64 percent of county taxpayers are providing the revenue for county," the judge stated.

The proposed tax rate for the 2015 budget totals .53608 cents per $100 of property valuation, just one cent above the effective tax rate of .52608 per $100 of property valuation.

"The average home is valued at $89,250, which would mean a tax increase of about $9.45," Johnston explained. "For a $100,000 home, the tax increase would be $10.58 -- less than it would cost two people to eat at Whataburger."

That tax increase, Johnston explained, was attributed to large construction projects, increasing supply costs and unfunded mandates required by the state.

"We have some large projects coming up in the next budget year including maintenance work on the courthouse, and the rest of the Sanderson Farms project," the judge said. "A state mandate requiring all civil documents to be filed electronically begins in July of 2015, and necessary software updates are going to be expensive.

"We are purchasing land in the Dogwood Trails that we did not previously own," he continued. "There are increases in unemployment, retirement, insurance, appraisal district costs, computer software maintenance costs and road materials as well.

"Everything is going up. We have to live within our budget, which is something we have been since I have been here."

The county set hearings for the proposed tax rate at 9:30 a.m. Monday, Aug. 11 and Monday Aug. 18, with a hearing for the budget also set for Aug. 8. Johnston expects that commissioners will be able to adopt budget on Aug. 25.

A copy of the proposed budget for 2015, as well as the proposed tax rate are posted on the Anderson County website, www.co.anderson.tx.us/.

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