Pearland - Friendswood Edition | February 2023

BRINGING DOWN PROPERTY TAX

Sen. Nathan Johnson, D-Dallas, led Senate Bill 88 to increase the state’s per-pupil funding in Texas public schools, which trails the national average by over $4,000. ADDRESSING SCHOOL FUNDING

House bills proposed by three representatives would use some of the state’s surplus dollars to relieve school districts, which historically have the highest property tax rates among government entities. If this passes, it would provide enough funding for school districts to lower their property taxes when planning their scal year budgets.

$8K

$7,075

$6,106

Up by $969 (16%)

CITYISD TAX RATES

City of Pearland

City of Friendswood

Pearland ISD Friendswood ISD

$6K

$4K

$0.20 $0 $0.40 $0.60 $0.80 $1.00 $1.20 $1.40

$2K

SOURCES: EDUCATION WEEK, STATE OF TEXAS COMMUNITY IMPACT

led Senate Bill 88 this legislative session, which would increase this allotment to $7,075. “There’s a lot of issues [with school funding] that we can do to help,” Thompson said. “We’ve had some great meetings with both Alvin ISD and Pearland ISD, some great ideas that we’re going to take up and work on.” Pearland ISD Superintendent Larry Berger said one of the topics he dis- cussed with Thompson was the unfunded state mandate of full-day pre-K from the 2019 Texas Legislature, which requires full-day prekinder- garten to be provided for all eligible 4-year-old students. Exemptions to the mandate could be provided to districts that would have to construct facilities to host pre-K classes or if implementing the mandate would result in fewer eligible children being enrolled in pre-K. “We’re only funded at half-time pre-K. … We are providing 100% of the education that the state asks us to do, but they’re only giving us 50% of the funding,” Berger said.

FY 2018-19

FY 2019-20

FY 2020-21

FY 2021-22

FY 2022-23

SOURCES: BRAZORIA COUNTY, PEARLAND ISD, CITY OF PEARLANDCOMMUNITY IMPACT

Brazoria and Galveston counties and part of Harris County. He said the surplus could be used to relieve local taxpayers by “buying down” the rate, or paying a lump sum of money to districts to allow them to reduce their property tax rates. Three state House representatives so far have led bills this session that relate to allocating the surplus state revenue to the property tax relief fund to reduce district maintenance and operations property taxes. “We’ve wanted that for a long time … because it provides real relief to local property taxpayers; their bill goes down a lot,” Middleton said. Education reform Legislators are expressing an interest in major education reform this session, with many bills being led relating to a

slew of topics from public school fund- ing to electronic cigarettes. Thompson said the state needs to continue to work with public schools on funding, which has shifted from being predominantly state-funded to mostly locally funded over the span of several years. House Bill 3 from the 86th Texas Legislature in 2019 was the last time the basic per-student allotment of funds was increased from $5,140 to $6,160, and some local school dis- tricts said ination and the COVID-19 pandemic brought an urgent need for change. The state gives schools $6,160 per student who meets the average daily attendance threshold, or the sum of attendance counts in a school year divided by the number of days schools are open. Sen. Nathan Johnson, DDallas,

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property taxes and an ongoing teacher shortage. These needs were also expressed by city and school district ocials in Pearland and Friendswood. While local lawmakers have not led bills directly pertaining to these topics, other lawmakers in the state House and Senate have, and the dead- line for ling bills will occur 60 calen- dar days after the start of the session, or March 10. At Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s Jan. 17 inauguration speech, he indicated the 88th Texas legislative session will come with a $32.7 billion state surplus. “[We] will use that budget surplus to provide the largest property tax cut in the history of the state,” he said. Middleton is the senator of District 11, which encompasses

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