County Judge lays out proposed 2022 budget

Hays County Judge Ruben Becerra recently laid out his proposed budget for fiscal year 2022, including the lowest tax rate in 30 years.

Becerra introduced his proposed budget during a special-called Hays County Commissioners Court meeting on Tuesday. The proposed tax rate for fiscal year 2022 is $0.3867 — a no new revenue tax rate.

“COVID continues to impact our citizenry not only physically but economically, so in an attempt to help our citizens and as a challenge to our municipalities and independent school districts, I am reducing the tax rate again this year to a no new revenue rate,” Becerra said.

A no new revenue tax rate formula assumes that if property values increase, the tax rate should decrease to create the same amount of revenue as it did before, according to the Texas Comptroller’s office.

Hays County Commissioner Lon Shell said he appreciated Becerra working toward a no new revenue rate when coming up with his proposed budget.

“I know that’s one of our goals is to try and get there with what used to be called the effective tax rate,” Shell said. “I think it’s a trend, you mentioned, that the tax rate has been lowered. I think last year it was barely lowered but for the most part it’s been lowered for the past 10 years fairly consistently … that rate has continued to go down as our appraisal values have continued to go up.”

The county judge’s budget includes funding for 25 replacement patrol vehicles and five new patrol vehicles. One new truck for animal control, one new transport vehicle for both juvenile probation and juvenile detention.

The budget accounts for $250,000 for the mental health/veterans services facility planning, which is pending approval of American Rescue Plan funds; $100,000 for evacuation/civic center facility planning, from reserves or American Rescue Plan funds; and $500,00 for architectural planning for a new district courtroom — 50% from reserve funding and 50% from civil courts building fund.

The proposed budget also includes $918,000 for 20 new positions for expansion of jail operations. The specialty court program for County Courts-at-Law would receive $72,000 of the proposed budget. Additionally, $600,000 would be allocated to establish a public defender office and $90,000 would be spent to establish a budget office. Funding has also been set aside to consider deputy constable positions after redistricting and for a new district judge and district court reporter.

Becerra said he weighed all requests from county department heads for new positions but said he wouldn’t add positions when those departments can’t fill positions they already have.

“I have budgeted just what we need and nothing more,” Becerra said. “If you don’t have justification and there is no history to support it, I cut it.”

The commissioners court will hold three public budget workshops to receive feedback on the drafted budget: Aug. 10 at 11 a.m., Aug. 17 at 11 a.m. and Aug. 24 at 1 p.m.

“The commissioners court wants to hear from our residents about budgetary process,” Becerra said. “Our goal is to develop a balanced budget that meets the needs of our county and provides adequate levels of service. It’s important to receive public feedback during this process so we can achieve our common goals.”

Each budget workshop will be livestreamed and archived at https://hayscountytx.com/commissioners-court/court-video/.

The judge’s recommended budget and financial information is available on the county’s website after clicking the Financial Transparency icon on the website at https://hayscountytx.com — once you click that icon, scroll down to the FY 2022 Budget Planning section under Auditor’s Reports.