How to avert a walkout over taxes
Despite our hyperpartisan climate, Harris County commissioners reach a compromise.
Paying taxes is so unpopular in Texas that local leaders spend their energy bickering not about whether to raise them but how low to cut them.
That was the source of the most recent brouhaha at Harris County Commissioners Court, where newly empowered Democrats proposed a cut in the property tax rate, the third cut in as many years, that wasn’t quite as deep as Republicans wanted. So the two Republican commissioners, knowing they didn’t have the votes to override the three Democrats, threatened to walk out as they did over another tax feud in 2019. Back then, the Democrats really did want a tax increase and the Republicans stopped them from getting it.
On the newly divided court, tax debates stem from an everpresent philosophical debate on the role of county government. Republicans want to keep it limited, focused on basic infrastructure improvements. Republican Precinct 4 Commissioner Jack Cagle told us that, especially during the pandemic, the court should focus on giving taxpayers relief and not increasing spending as appraisal values skyrocket.
Democrats, meanwhile, look around at the glaring inequities across the county and yearn to address them with investments in criminal justice, social services and education. And on the pandemic, Democratic Precinct 2 Commissioner Adrian Garcia says it’s no reason to skimp on services: “you need government — and you need it to be responsive on all fronts.” He’s particularly concerned about the hospital district, which bears a disproportionate burden of caring for the area’s uninsured population since Gov. Greg Abbott and state legislative leaders have refused to expand Medicaid to provide the access to health insurance widely available to low-income Americans in other states.
In this recent tax showdown, the clash could have been just as ugly as 2019 because if the court hadn’t reached a compromise on a new rate by Oct. 15, and Republicans had walked out to deny a voting quorum, state law would have forced them to revert to a “no net revenue rate,” a deeper cut than Republicans had sought.
That rate would have been “catastrophic,” Garcia told the editorial board, describing severe cuts that would have had to be made to the already struggling hospital district.
But as Democrats warned of current and future consequences, a funny thing happened. Compromise. Common ground. A tax rate everyone found acceptable without anybody having to walk out.
Hey, why didn’t the Texas House think of that during this summer’s epic standoff over the new voting bill? Answer: because, in the end, Republican lawmakers in Austin knew they really didn’t have to compromise because they so out-number Democrats that all they had to do was wait them out to ram the bill through.
Fortunately, it’s different in Harris County government these days. The body is smaller, only five members. And today, it’s more evenly divided: 3-2. They have an incentive and a mandate to find common ground. And so they did.
And taxpayers are better for it. The court agreed in principle to reduce the county’s property tax rate by 3 percent — a greater reduction than Democrats proposed and a smaller one than Republicans called for but one that funds flood control and avoids severe consequences for the hospital district. The rate cut amounts to about $54 on a $300,000 home.
Garcia describes his own efforts behind the scenes as pivotal, including “a strong pressure campaign” to persuade Republicans to negotiate, in part by recruiting the help of engineers and other county contractors. He says he reminded them that they may not be getting as much work on county projects if the county was forced to adopt a steep tax cut. Garcia told the editorial board he didn’t even tell his own Democratic colleagues what he was up to. “My colleagues didn’t like my compromise,” he said. “They didn’t know it was coming.”
Garcia sought credit for the accomplishment — granted, more than some of his colleagues may have given him — but we’re happy to commend the deal he sponsored that brought the parties together.
“We can feel confident that infrastructure improvements, public safety, and caring for those in our hospital system will not be hurt,” Garcia said.
Commissioners haven’t scheduled a final vote for the tax rate, although they must vote on it before Oct. 15.
Precinct 4 Commissioner Jack Cagle said he was pleased with the result and hoped it was a sign of a court that’s more willing to work together going forward.
“There is a level of animosity and a lack of trust that’s been built into the system, so being able to come to a compromise was just a little bit short of a miracle in that hostile environment — and I hope that it’s a precursor to where we can maybe move away from calling each other ugly names and focus on serving the people,” Cagle told us Monday.
Disagreement is good. Debate is healthy and important. But so is compromise and so is collaboration, and we see so little of it at the state and national levels of government that we’re willing to spill a little ink to applaud this outcome.
Concerns still remain over public health and hospital funding, though. County hospital leaders had called for a tax rate increase of 3.2 percent for a reason. “There are a number of brilliant caregivers, some of whom feel they have one arm tied behind their back because of certain resource constraints,” said Harris Health board member Dr. Arthur Bracey.
Commissioners face tough decisions. They can increase Harris Health’s tax rate by up to 8 percent without voter approval. Precinct 3 Commissioner Tom Ramsey also pointed out at one meeting that Harris Health could raise additional revenues through bonds.
We urge commissioners to approach that problem with the same open-mindedness as they showed in the past week.
What’s meaningful to us today is that leaders of principle who don’t agree on much stayed at the table to hammer out an agreement that achieves at least some of what everyone wanted.
It’s a good reminder at a time when Republican lawmakers in Austin are busy drawing up redistricting maps that try to further divide Texans, quiet the voices of growing communities of color and gerrymander every last drop of competition they can out of Texas’ congressional districts to preserve Republican dominance and protect incumbents.
What would happen if our congressional delegation and state house truly reflected the diverse voices across this vast state, and our elected representatives in those chambers were forced find compromises that did the most good for the most people? Here in Harris County, we have an idea. And we like what we see.