AUSTIN (Nexstar) – After a months-long stalemate that led to two special sessions, Texas lawmakers reached a compromise deal on property tax relief. The legislation passed both the House and Senate Thursday evening with near-unanimous support.
It includes a measure to raise the homestead exemption to $100,000, up from the current $40,000 exemption.
The plan includes $12 billion to lower school property tax rates, by having the state pay part of what school districts normally collect from homeowners and businesses.
The compromise plan would cut franchise taxes for small businesses, and non-homestead properties worth $5 million or less would get a break on appraised values under a three-year pilot program.
Texas voters will make the final decision over whether to put the tax relief plan into place. The legislation requires voter approval in a constitutional amendment election to be held in November.
Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick told Nexstar he expects the measures will receive strong public approval and homeowners will see tax savings as soon as this year.
“It’s a long road. We went into the second overtime period. But the truth is no one really has ever done an $18 billion package in the history of the world that I know of for property taxes,” Patrick said. “We got to where we needed to get and when the voters vote this November, the constitutional amendment will take effect this year. They will get the savings this year of $1,250 to $1,450.”
You can watch the full interview with Patrick in the clip below.
Those numbers are based on an average home value of about $300,000. Under the plan, homeowners will be able to exempt $100,000 of their primary home’s value from property taxes, compared to the current homestead exemption of $40,000. Each school district’s tax rate will also drop due to the state backfilling $12 billion of its maintenance and operations expenses.
While the plan passed the House with near unanimous support, some Democrats pushed back, saying the plan leaves out key groups of Texans.
“The reported property tax deal between the Speaker of the House and the Lieutenant Governor dumps public education, homeowners, and rental households in favor of tax cuts for refineries, skyscrapers, and big business,” said State Rep. John Bryant, D-Dallas, before the vote. “Their proposal abandons entirely the 38% of Texas households who rent.”
Bryant tried to add amendments to include benefits for renters into the bill before the final vote. Those amendments were blocked by House Republicans.
State Rep. Morgan Meyer, chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, echoed Patrick’s sentiments that lower tax rates will force landlords to pass savings on to renters through market forces.
“As taxes have gone up, they’ve had to increase rent to be able to pay those taxes. Now, we’re providing that type of relief, which will then get passed on to renters,” Meyer said.
Patrick said the House chose to take his chamber’s teacher bonuses out of the final deal, but promised teachers would get a pay raise this year.
He said the legislature has $5 billion set aside, in part for teacher pay raises. The Senate will pass those raises when the legislature reconvenes for another special session focusing on education issues. Patrick said that will be in October.
“I believe we will get to them,” he said.
Before the final vote on the legislation, Patrick sustained a point of order to block an amendment from State Sen. Roland Gutierrez that would have added funding for supplemental teacher pay raises.
“The teachers expect a permanent raise and we will have time in the fall, I believe, to give them a permanent raise and not just a one-time raise,” Patrick said.
Long-serving Democrat plans to retire, opening Texas House opportunity for Republicans
After nearly 30 years of service. Rep. Tracy King, D-Uvalde, announced that he will not run for reelection.
King announced his retirement in a news release, thanking his constituents and praising his staff.
“We served 14 regular sessions and 14 special sessions (so far) and no doubt could cruise to another win in 2024, but I’m tired and I want to slow down,” King wrote in the release.
King represents House District 80 in South Texas. His retirement presents an opportunity for Republicans to take control of the district in next year’s elections.
In the 2020 presidential election, voters in District 80 went for Joe Biden by a margin of 7.5 percentage points over Donald Trump. But those district lines changed in the redistricting process in 2021. The new lines contain voters who chose Trump in the 2020 election by a more than four-point margin.
A few days after King announced he would not seek reelection, Clint Powell, the Mayor of Pleasanton, announced plans to run for the District 80 seat. Powell, an Air Force veteran, plans to run as a Republican.
“This campaign for State Representative is the next logical step in my public service to Texas,” said Powell in a news release announcing his House campaign.
King chaired the House Natural Resources Committee in this past session. He also served as the first chairman of the newly-created Texas House Water Caucus.
King made news with his bill to raise the age to buy certain semi-automatic rifles from 18 to 21. That legislation was filed in the wake of the mass shooting at Robb Elementary in Uvalde. That legislation failed to pass.
King’s announcement came a few days after another long-serving Democrat announced plans to leave the House. Corpus Christi Representative Abel Herrero said he would not run for reelection in District 34. Herrero was first elected in 2004.
Herrero’s district leans toward Democrats. On Thursday, Roland Barrera, a Corpus Christi city councilman announced he would run in the Democratic primary for the District 34 seat.
In his campaign announcement, Barrera thanked Herrero for his service, saying “his work has enhanced our community and the lives of people in Texas House District 34.”
‘We need to have serious people in Washington’ – Gutierrez targets Cruz in campaign for U.S. Senate
One of the most vocal advocates at the State Capitol for gun legislation is now aiming for higher office — Gutierrez has launched his campaign for U.S. Senate. He’ll face Dallas Congressman Colin Allred in the March Democratic primary.
The San Antonio Democrat sat down with Nexstar in a one-on-one interview on Monday after launching his campaign to talk about his motivations for running and intentions if elected. You can watch the full interview below:
Both on and off camera, Gutierrez has talked frequently about how Uvalde has “changed his life.” While he did not say it was the sole reason he decided to run for higher office, Gutierrez signaled what happened in Uvalde revealed cracks in the system — whether it be law enforcement training or that he hopes can be better addressed as a member of Congress.
“Rural America is hurting tremendously,” he said. “The truth is, a lot of our systems are broken and they need fixing. Texans need to have the benefit of the bargain. Give us the stuff that government is supposed to give.”
First, Gutierrez will have to face off against Allred in the Democratic primary race. According to the Texas Ethics Commission, Gutierrez has a little over $300,000 cash on hand as of January. Texas law prevents legislators from fundraising during the legislative session.
Allred told the Texas Tribune that his campaign raised nearly $6.2 million since he announced his Senate run in May. While Allred is starting the race with millions more, Gutierrez is confident he can rise to the occasion.
“I’m no stranger to hard races,” he said. “I think that as we focus on the things that are we value most which is working hard talking to people about getting the big things done that we’ve done throughout these last 20 years in public office.”
“We have the resources to do great big things. We need to have serious people in Washington that are willing to talk about those things,” Gutierrez added.
The Allred campaign in response welcomed Gutierrez to the race, with campaign manager Paige Hutchinson saying in a statement “our campaign is laser-focused on beating Ted Cruz, and we are happy to welcome anyone who shares that mission into this race.”
No Democrat has won statewide office in Texas in nearly 30 years. Former congressman Beto O’Rourke mounted a serious challenge to Cruz in 2018. Cruz spent well over $45 million on his campaign. O’Rourke spent more than $79 million. Cruz won the race with 51% of the vote.
Both Gutierrez and Allred are likely to draw attention to Cruz voting to reject the certification of President Joe Biden’s victory over former President Donald Trump in 2020. Allred has also accused Cruz of abandoning Texas by going on vacation with his family during a deadly winter storm a few weeks later.
Cruz spokesperson Nick Maddux released the following statement Monday after Gutierrez’s announcement: “We welcome Senator Gutierrez to the race. Texans will now get to watch Colin Allred and Roland Gutierrez slug it out for who can be the most radical leftist in the state. Meanwhile, Sen. Cruz will continue passionately defending Texas and delivering real results for 30 million Texans.”
Campaign Context: DeSantis says record numbers of Chinese nationals crossing border
As campaign season nears, politicians are turning up the volume on campaign rhetoric. To cut through the noise we’re launching Campaign Context, a weekly series providing clarity on the messages you’re hearing from candidates on the campaign trail. We’re digging past the politics and into the facts to provide you with the transparent, spin-free information you need to make informed decisions this election season.
In this Campaign Context video, we’re examining comments made by Florida Governor and GOP presidential candidate Ron Desantis while he was campaigning at the Texas border in June.
Desantis was discussing migrants crossing our southern border from countries you might not expect when he said, “I think they’ve identified 10,000 Chinese nationals coming across the southern border.”
We traced that figure back to Rep. Mark Green, R-Tennessee, chair of the House Homeland Security Committee. We reached out to Green’s office and learned that he gathered those numbers from this data dashboard on the U.S. Customs and Border Protection website.
When we pulled up the data for Chinese citizens entering the southwest border, it did show more than 10,000 single adults from China have entered the border so far this fiscal year, and that is a sizeable increase compared to 2022.
At the same time, the same data shows the total number of Chinese migrants detected at the border is less than 1% of all migrant encounters this fiscal year.
#State #Texas #Compromise #Capitol #sends #property #tax #relief #Texas #voters