HUTTO – In a budget that allocated $3 million for improvements to Fritz Park, only $750,000 was set aside for maintaining city streets. The $351 million fiscal year 2024 budget presented by city staff found room for items including a new street sweeper and a shower being installed in City Hall, but fell short of the approximately $1.2 million staff said was needed for road maintenance.
Divisive discussions in council centered around how to raise the additional funds, with the council split between whether to charge all Hutto utility residents a $60 per year road fee or raise the tax rate to cover the shortfall. After a special City Council meeting Aug. 31, both options are now on the table.
Council member Dana Wilcott, who called the special meeting, is in favor of raising the tax rate to fund the road maintenance.
“I know that we had proposed the no new revenue rate and I was on board for that. Then the fee came into play after we passed the no new revenue and I was concerned with the fee because it doesn’t protect those individuals who are protected by the tax base like our disabled vets and our (age) 65 and up,” she said.
Council member Randal Clark, who supported Wilcott’s request for the special meeting, agreed.
“I said I was willing to be at no new revenue if we were doing a road maintenance fee. When that failed I now could no longer stay at no new revenue and keep us at the road fees that we promised would get our roads done. I ran on that and I’m going to do it,” he said.
The road fee is not yet dead. It was approved on a first reading, but a subsequent council meeting saw members deciding not to take further action on it. It could still potentially come up for a second reading and approval in a September meeting.
Council member Dan Thornton believes that the budget can accomplish what the city needs using the no new revenue rate without the road fee.
“It’s a matter of prioritizing. We need to get the needs done and then we need to look at the wants and see which wants we can still afford with the money we have left. We need to take a harder look at the wants in the budget and decide which ones get pushed a year,” he said. “I don’t see a need to call for a higher tax rate now when we didn’t do a very good job of trimming some things from the budget.”
“With $750,000 in the budget initially, and another $100,000 (collected) from the trash fee, we were only about $350,000 short. We could take the $350,000 from general fund and leave the general fund at $7.85 million, which should hit the 30% level desired,” Thornton explained.
One of the things council members have discussed trimming is the growth of city staff, and all that entails (salaries, benefits, supplies, training, etc.). The proposed budget provides $2.45 million in funding for the addition of 39 new full time positions, according to City Manager James Earp.
The 2023 no new revenue rate is lower than the 2022 rate of $0.42198. However, home values in the area increased by an average of 11.56%. At the no new revenue rate of $0.402114, the amount of taxes the average Hutto homeowner will pay increases 6.31% This would add an additional $2,021,320 in revenue to the city.
Regardless of which rate council decides on, most homeowners will see an additional tax burden according to the city’s figures. How much will be determined by what happens in the September meetings.
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I said I was willing to be at no new revenue if we were doing a road maintenance fee. When that failed I now could no longer stay at no new revenue and keep us at the road fees that we promised would get our roads done.”
-Hutto Council member Randal Clark
