Representative, good to see you again.
Great to be here. Thanks, Jason.
Is this Select Committee a
peace offering to the Senate,
do you think, to to try to get
property tax relief finally pas?
Well, I think there's a couple
different things happening here, Jason.
I think we still have this ongog
debate in this special session
about how to pass an immediate
property tax relief for Texans.
I think what the Speaker's tryig
to do with the Select Committee
that he announced last week is.
Study the issue in depth going into the
next legislative session back in in 2025.
So this is not immediate.
I I don't I I think there may be
some immediate work but I think
it's going to be a longer term
project as well to see what the,
what the viability is of providg
A lasting property tax reductios
for property owners in Texas.
And looking at all the different
ways that that people have propd
to do that whether that's appral
caps or rate compression or homestead
exemptions or a combination the.
And I would just say that becaue
property taxes are are fundamental to
how we fund public schools in T,
public education has to be at te
very forefront of this discussi.
Do you think it will be?
I think it has to be and I I certainly
intended to to bring up public
schools a lot in this discussion
because that's primarily how puc
schools are are funded in in Te.
And so any discussion about how
to reduce property taxes also hs
to include how we're going to fd
public schools to provide the bt
education possible for more than
5,000,000 Texas school children.
And then a lot of people are wondering,
can the state sustain this if they were to,
you know, find a different fundg
mechanism for schools besides
the property taxes you and I pa?
Yeah, well, well, that.
And that's, that's the challeng,
right, Because because property taxes
make up such a significant portn
of public school funding in Texs
does not have a state income ta.
Our sales tax is already pretty high.
It's a 6 1/4% the state level.
You factor in local taxes,
it's eight and 1/4.
That's a fairly significant sales tax.
So there's really very limited options as
to where the where the funding comes from.
So for those who say we're going
to abolish property taxes forev,
they got to answer the questionf
how you going to fund public schools.
That's the most important thing
the state does. One
of the things on here is the committee
will be looking at is whether the state
can eliminate the school property taxes,
the the M&amp;O, the maintee
and operations portion of that.
Do you think that's possible? Y,
right. Well, it and so there's.
There are two primary property
taxes that school districts ass.
There's the maintenance operatis
that you just mentioned and
there's interest in sinking,
which is generally how new construction
is funded for to build new buils
or to renovate older buildings.
That type of thing when districs
go out for bond elections.
But to to to do away with M&amp;O property taxes,
essentially the state would have
to backfill the equivalent amout
of money into school districts.
It is a lot of money turning
10s of billions of dollars.
And it's important to note that
that it's not as though Texas is
funding public schools adequate.
Right now we're somewhere between 42nd,
44th in the country in per
pupil funding in the classroom.
We got to get that number up and
then let's talk about how the
state can pay a higher share of
it at which would reduce pressue
on local property taxpayers,
but to completely eliminate the property tax.
It's hard to see how you do that
without jeopardizing public education,
but I'm interested to hear everyone's
ideas and we're going to get
into this in the next 18 months.
And the idea, I think, is to look for
ways to do this to eliminate the
maintenance and operations cost.
By 2035, in the next 12 years,
that's some time to get
the state's rankings up.
But does Texas have the money
to physically pay for that?
You think it will have
the money in the future?
Yeah, right now I can't.
I can't say that we would
have the money to do that.
You know, we're this year in a
unique budget situation that
we've had a very big surplus.
That's for a lot of reasons.
Sales tax revenues been high,
oil and gas tax revenues been h.
The COVID funding from the fedel
government has has certainly hed
Texas and a lot of other states.
But that's not going to
be a permanent situation.
And so we have to plan for years
in which our coffers are not as
full as they as they are in 202.
And how you do that in a way tht
provides adequate funding for public schools.
I think it's a real question
that hasn't been answered.
But I think it's one of the this
this committee is going to look.
When will the committee meet
and and then any idea when it
will report back to the speaker,
well, take it in reverse or the speaker's
asked that the committee report to the
legislature ahead of the 2025 session.
So that's a good 18 months
to to do this work.
I don't know when the committees
going to begin its meetings that
that'll be up to the Chairman,
Chairman Meyer to and and this was just
announced you know a couple days ago so.
So I imagine we'll be hearing ie
in the days ahead what our schedule is.
Chris,
do you have any indication the House is
going to reconvene before the special
sessions over on Tuesday night o
consider what the the Senate has proposed.
I don't have any indication that
that's going to happen though
how likely is that?
You know the politics of Austin
I I I don't think it's likely.
I think the the House,
the leadership decided to pass
legislation that that was very
specific to what the governor
asked for in his in his call.
Whether you support that policy or not,
that's what the House did and
I think the House has put it,
put it over to the Senate and
the Senate has to decide if
they're going to take action on.
So far they haven't but hopefuly
something does happen before the
deadline Tuesday night.
But right now I can't say that it looks
likely the House would come bac.
You've
been in Austin for a minute.
How do you think this still made ends?
Well, I look I think I think ultimately
that the governor has to has tou
know get everyone together and d
and and show some leadership on this.
You know frankly the House and e
Senate had different property tx
plans throughout the entire sesn
and the Governor didn't get invd
literally till the 2nd last day.
And I think that's why we're
in the situation we're in.
So I think the Governor has
to get engaged more.
And and help the help the
legislature get out of this mes.
Representative thank you. Thank.