TEMPLE, Texas — The Temple Independent School District board of trustees voted to lower the district’s tax rate for the third consecutive year at the board’s meeting Monday night, September 13. The tax rate will drop by 4.8 cents and is now at the lowest level for TISD since the 2010 tax year.
The board set the new tax rate at $1.2353 for the upcoming year with $0.9287 designated for the purpose of maintenance and operations and $0.3066 designated for the purpose of payment of debt service. TISD has now lowered its tax rate by a total of nearly 16.5 cents over the past three years. The district was able to lower the rate primarily due to three factors: tax rate compression, an increase in property values within the district and bond refinancing that help lower debt service costs. Temple ISD is also operating at 6.4 cents under the state allowed cap for maintenance and operations this year.
“We have been able to operate our services at the level of quality our community expects, while still being efficient and respectful of our taxpayer’s dollars,” said Kent Boyd, assistant superintendent of finance and operations for Temple ISD. “We elected to operate at a lower figure for maintenance and operations while many districts in the state asked for the maximum amount.”
During the board meeting, Dr. Bobby Ott, superintendent of Temple ISD, thanked Boyd and the rest of the district’s Office of Finance and Operations staff for their fiscal responsibility. He also pointed out the importance of again lowering the tax rate with the upcoming bond proposal on the November ballot.
“Over the past three years, we have been able to drop our tax rate low enough to afford a successful bond election and still have a total tax rate that is four cents lower than our 2018 tax rate,” Ott said. “This illustrates the perfect balance of moving our schools forward, preparing for growth and upholding our fiscal responsibility to the citizens of Temple.”