San Marcos City Council To Spend Two Day’s At A New Braunfel’s Retreat, Debt & Spending Not On Agenda
The San Marcos City Council will be spending Tuesday and Wednesday in a “visioning workshop” at T Bar M, a corporate retreat and camp in New Braunfels.
According to this week’s agenda, the council will “Discuss and participate in Fiscal Year 2018-2019 Visioning Workshop, topics discussed may or may not include or be limited to growth, quality of life, economic development policies, transportation, community partners, outreach, future infrastructure, and facility needs, beautification and community enhancement, enhancement of core services including future staffing and personnel needs, flood mitigation strategies, and provide direction to Staff.”
As of August 31, 2016, the City of San Marcos had a TAX SUPPORTED DEBT of $351,197,318 and REVENUE SUPPORTED DEBT of $37,831,732, for an overall total debt of $389,029,050. Read more…
The $389,029,050 debt includes the city’s total debt incurred BEFORE August 31, 2016.
Here is a partial list1 of what the above amount of $389,029,050 does not cover;
- March 20, 2017: The purchase of 50 additional acres of green space of Purgatory Creek for $632,000;
- May 1, 2017: San Marcos City Council To Sell City Bonds totaling $7,407,660 million;
- May 10, 2017: Voter approved bonds, May 2017 totaling $31.5 million;
- August 1, 2017: Issues $34.7 million in Certificates of Obligation Bonds for Capital Improvement Projects;
- November 11, 2017: The purchase of Country Estates from Texas State University for $1,270,000 million;
- October 9, 2017: A new maintenance, service facility for the city at $112,000 per acre totaling $2.5 million;
- December 5, 2017: Council approved to receive a loan from Texas Water Development Board (TWDB) to purchase property from the San Marcos River Foundation (SMRF) for $4.4 million.
When the above items are added to the debt as of August 31, 2016, residents are looking at $464,031,050 million in debt.
Perhaps this is one of the reasons why San Marcos residents are facing such high property taxes and new fees and surcharges from the recently passed FY 2018 budget.
The current property tax rate in San Marcos is .6139 cents per $100 of property valuation, while the City of Austin is .4448 cents per $100 of property valuation, a difference of .1691 cents per $100 of property valuation.
Yes, San Marcos property owners pay a higher property tax rate than Austin residents.
No costs were given for councils two days “visioning retreat.”
The City of San Marcos is ranked 22nd out of 1,218 incorporated cities across Texas, with the highest tax-supported debt.
Considering the city council is spending some of their citizen’s money on a two-day team building visioning retreat, it might do them well to spend a couple of hours while at this retreat on how to cut spending and admit to themselves and each other they have a spending problem.
Admitting you have a problem is the first step with any addiction.
1partial list this only a partial list of spending and debt the council has added to their bottom line from August 31, 2016.
I applaud your article.
When one takes the time to write a letter to the editor, they do not envision crafting a follow up within less than a month’s time. Please consider when reading this letter the irony of a Mayor who as a sophomore City Council elected official campaigned as champion for organization on the transparency beat. First, formerly known “packet meetings” now “work sessions” no longer have “Question and Answer Session with Press and Public.” Now as “Its raining men” as now the yearly, “Council Visioning Workshop for January 9th and 10th, 2018 unlike the Friday February 10, 2017 DOES NOT HAVE ITEM for “Question and Answer Session with Press and Public.” The agenda caption kindly enumerates many key issues of which press and public would be privy to on tape dialog inquiry “Hold discussion and participate in Fiscal Year 2018-2019Visioning Workshop, topics discussed may or may not include or be limited to: growth, quality of life, economic development policies, transportation, community partners, outreach, future infrastructure and facility needs, beautification and community enhancement, enhancement of core services including future staffing and personnel needs, flood mitigation strategies, and provide direction to Staff.” City staff have confirmed this is a change of work flow from previous years. Things that make one go hmmm.