By LYNETTE SOWELL
Cove Leader-Press
The Copperas Cove city council took a record vote to propose a new tax rate during its meeting on Tuesday evening.
The proposed tax rate is $0.686419 per $100 valuation, which is higher than the current tax rate of $0.661043.
As presented during the meeting, the average home value in Copperas Cove is $208,210. With this proposed rate, the taxes would increase by $93 for the year.
Other rates were presented at a July 31 special meeting during which the “no-new-revenue” tax rate and “voter approval” rate were presented. The no-new-revenue rate is the rate that will generate the same amount of property tax revenue as the current year. According to the calculations as done per state law, the rate is no-new-revenue rate is 64.1782 cents ($0.64.1782) per $100 valuation. The voter approval rate is the highest tax rate that the city council can approve without triggering a special election. This calculated rate is 73.2345 cents ($0.732345) per $100 valuation.
The goal of proposing a tax rate was also to offset the little more than $800,000 general fund deficit in the proposed budget.
The proposed rate also includes using $1 million of the city’s debt service fund balance on the city’s annual debt for next year.
One of the budget items also on the table was what to do about a proposed market rate adjustment for city staff that was part of the proposed budget.
One option presented to the council had been to not include that market rate adjustment.
At the council special meeting las week, councilmember Rita Hogan asked if the city could bring back numbers that would reduce that market rate adjustment by two-thirds. This proposed market rate adjustment would be for city staff with the exception of public safety staff members, who had a market rate adjustment with this current fiscal year.
The city’s budget department did indeed bring that back, along with several other options that the council discussed on Tuesday.
The city council chambers were nearly full on Tuesday evening, with many of the seats filled by city staff members. One of them spoke during citizens forum and addressed the council.
Ashley Wilson is the office manager for the city’s Parks & Recreation Department and shared her viewpoint on the possibility of the council reducing or even eliminating the market rate adjustment for city staff.
“I understand that citizens voted you to do a job, and one of those responsibilities is to balance a budget. However, I want to say that I completely disagree with this decision, not only from a personal standpoint of view, but from a city point of view,” Wilson told the council. “Not giving the employees or deserve market adjustments can ultimately impact the quality of life and services for citizens. The city is already significantly lower than all other surrounding cities when it comes to market adjustments for all of our employees. As of right now, we will never be competitive to other cities, including Lampasas who has a lower population with higher pay. If City Council does not approve market adjustments or even does only a third of what the original adjustment is set for, it will impact the city negatively. Employee turnover rates will increase and recruitment rates will decrease. You will lose experience and knowledgeable staff to surrounding towns that pay higher for the same job they’re doing now.”
Also discussed by the council during last week’s special meeting and Tuesday’s meeting were the non-city organization requests for general funds.
The Boys & Girls club had requested $15,000, but was earmarked for $7,500; Cove House Emergency Homeless Shelter had requested $50,000 but was designated $25,000; Hill Country Communication Action Association (Meals on Wheels) requested and was designated $10,000; the Hill Country Transit District had requested $94,463 but lowered their request to $85,000; and the Noon Exchange Club had requested $4,250 for its annual Feast of Sharing but was designated $2,000.
Councilmember Shawn Alzona commented in that looking at those numbers, it was “like change” compared to the overall city budget.
“I think this is just such a small portion, that we’re nickel and diming them away, and we’re not helping the big picture,” he said.
Conversely, councilmember Dale Treadway said he understood what Alzona was saying and agreed – but only to a point.
“But a lot of these are nonprofit organizations. They’re responsible for raising their own funds. We are a city. We provide services to the entire community. That’s water, sewer, streets, police, fire protection and, of course, pay increase for the employees. We have to take care of our own home first before we can start helping other outside agencies,” Treadway said. “I don’t mind helping them to a point, but we can’t just keep giving and giving every year when we got to start taking care of our community business.”
The council will vote to adopt a tax rate its Aug. 19 meeting, during which the council will also hold a public hearing on the budget and also vote on the budget.
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