Enough, already: Don’t ask more from local taxpayers
To maintain its 2021 standard of living, the average Texas household now spends $12,348 more per year, according to the Congressional Joint Economic Committee Republicans state inflation tracker. That’s slightly higher than the national average of $11,434 .
Is that eye-popping number a partisan, election-year exaggeration?
I reached out to economics professor Dennis W. Jansen, the director of Texas A&M’s Private Enterprise Research Center, to get his take. Jansen calculated a similar number — a 20.4% rise in the consumer price index — using the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ rate for the West South Central region, which includes Texas. “My quick look at the numbers, and brief perusal of their methodology, makes me think that the State Inflation Tracker numbers are reasonable estimates,” he said.
Even center-left Brookings Institute noted that, since January 2021, the cost of car insurance has increased 44%; eggs, 37.4%; gas, 34.6%; electricity, 28%; restaurants and groceries, 21%; meat, 20%; used vehicles, 20%; and rents, 19.5%.
Jansen told me that the increased costs have in part been offset by wage increases, although when people complain that prices have increased substantially, they are correct. Their frustration is understandable. “They are getting more wages, but they have not been able to get ahead of the rising prices over this period.”
Price increases on necessities such as food and shelter weigh most heavily on lowincome people, who spend a higher percentage of their income on the basics. And as the Dallas Federal Reserve explained, Texas is one of the states feeling most stressed about inflation because “the prices of necessities such as food and shelter rose at a somewhat faster pace in the state, and more people live below the poverty level in Texas.”
Here in the Houston area, that’s a lot of people. More than 14% of Houstonians live in poverty. For kids under the age of 18, it’s more than 20%.
That’s why our local governments should hesitate before pursuing any revenue-raising measures that will worsen the burden on local taxpayers.
But local governments’ expenses have risen too. So already, the conversation has started.
Houston Finance Director Melissa Dubowski recently indicated that the city is considering a ballot referendum in November that would ask voters for a public safety exception to our local property tax cap and for permission to exceed the state-imposed property tax cap. That would be on top of a possible garbage fee and more debt in the form of a $650 million bond that, as of writing this, voters won’t have a say on.
Houston ISD is exploring its own bond, a multibillion-dollar one. The board recently approved the administration’s request to spend resources to develop a plan for a 2024 bond. Now the county.
Harris County Budget Director Daniel Ramos said in January that the only reason the county isn’t running deficits is because it’s enjoyed one-time revenue sources — things like the State Criminal Alien Assistance Grant or settlement funds awarded because of lawsuits lodged by the county attorney.
The problem is, one-time revenue sources go away.
Given that the court’s majority has tried to raise taxes in times of better fiscal health, it seems likely that they’d consider it to address a deficit. As I’ve pointed out before, some of Harris County’s budget growth, which has outpaced population and inflation, is because of mission creep, an expansion of the scope that the court’s majority has pursued. New departments and legal funds, and even a new state-ofthe art Commissioners Courtroom, to name a few.
It would be premature to oppose any governmental fundraising measure before kicking its tires. (In the case of HISD, the school district hasn’t pursued a bond in over a decade.) But it would also be premature for our local governments to turn to taxpayers before identifying cost-saving measures first.
There are certainly lots of good ideas about ways to save money. Just to start: department audits, privatization of functions, city-county shared services, tapping into Houston Metro’s sales tax revenue or some of the more well-funded Tax Increment Reinvestment Zones.
Houstonians know shared sacrifice, and we’re more than willing to do our part. But given our current economic climate, this may not be the time to ask us to shoulder a heavier burden.