Hays County Commissioners Court Proposes FY 2017 Tax Rate and County Budget, Sets Public Hearing Dates

Hays County Courthouse, San Marcos, TX – The Hays County Commissioners Court Tuesday proposed a tax rate of 0.4600 per $100 of assessed valuation for Fiscal Year 2017, down from 0.4670 in FY16. The County’s 2017 fiscal year begins October 1, 2016.

The Commissioners Court also proposed a County government budget for FY17 of $179,156,141.00.           The FY16 budget is $178,442,071.00.

Public hearings on the proposed tax rate are set for September 8 at 10 a.m. and September 13 at 1:30 p.m., and a public hearing to adopt the proposed County budget is set for September 20 at 1:30 p.m. All hearings will be held at the Hays County Commissioners Courtroom, 111 E. San Antonio St., San Marcos. The hearings will be livestreamed and archived at www.co.hays.tx.us.

Because the proposed tax rate exceeds the effective tax rate, state law requires two public hearings be held by the Commissioners Court before the proposed rate is adopted, which would also be required if the proposed rate exceeds the rollback rate. The FY17 proposed tax rate is 0.4600 per $100. The effective tax rate is 0.4465 per $100 and the rollback tax rate is 0.4916 per $100.

The effective tax rate is the total tax rate needed to raise the same amount of property tax revenue for Hays County from the same properties in both the 2015 and 2016 tax years. The rollback tax rate is the highest tax rate that Hays County may adopt before voters are entitled to petition for an election to limit the rate that may be approved to the rollback rate.

Your specific taxes owed under any of the above rates can be calculated using this formula:

Property tax amount = (rate) x (taxable value of your property) divided by 100.

For assistance or detailed information about tax calculations, contact Luanne Caraway, Hays County Tax Assessor-Collector Luanne Caraway at luanne@co.hays.tx.us, 512-393-5545 or from 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Monday through Friday at 712 S. Stagecoach Trail, San Marcos, TX  78666.

County documents pertaining to the current and proposed budgets and tax rates are available at www.co.hays.tx.us by choosing the Financial Transparency icon.

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