The ghost of taxation in Killeen

When Interim City Manager Kent Cagle got up in front of the Killeen City Council last week to give what would probably be his last presentation of a budget for the city, he made a joke that taxes was everybody's favorite topic. Certainly, most people don't like the idea of people advocating for the increase of people's taxes, especially when they are being squeezed as it is. And I think you would be hard-pressed to find anyone who wouldn't admit that things are looking a little dim right now economically. So I doubt most people were too happy when they found out that the Killeen City Council approved a 2.87-cent increase in the property tax rate to 73.01 cents per $100 valuation. Council members David Bass and Mellisa Brown were the two dissenting votes on this. But, from my perspective, the council did not really have much of a choice. The city was looking at a deficit of between $2.5 million and $2.8 million if they did not approve the rate that was recommended by the city manager, which would have meant that the city would have had to take a chainsaw to even more things than it had previously. As far as I'm concerned, the council had only two choices: to cut services or to raise taxes. Even though a lot of residents probably would say they would have preferred the former, I feel this is a disingenuous take. Just look at the uproar and anger that occurred when the council almost did not fund the homeless shelter — and, technically speaking, funding a homeless shelter is not supposed to be the city's responsibility. The council's last-minute decision to fund was, I believe, a harm reduction strategy that recognized what would happen if the Friends in Crisis shelter were to close down. Now, should funding the homeless be something that the city should do?In my opinion, yes. I also think that governments should provide healthcare, child care, and other things that according to some people are not a government's responsibility. Yet, those people, in the same breath, will complain that these things are necessary and important. Just albeit scarce because, for whatever reason, private businesses don't pay teachers, social workers, or child care professionals enough to make a living wage. All of this is a long-winded way of saying that what I think Cagle was alluding to in his remarks — particularly his comments about Dallas Cowboys' owner Jerry Jones getting property taxes for his Highland Park home — is that the way the state structures its taxes based on properties as opposed to incomes means that the city of Killeen is never going to levy the amount of tax revenue it needs. Apart from being a mostly transient community, the city of Killeen is also a retirement community made up of retired veterans. Approximately 8% of Killeen's population is retired. Not to mention the disabled veterans property tax exemption that has cost the city hundreds of millions of dollars since 2007. Resident Sue 'Neesy' Croft spoke during citizen comments that the city was in a 'destructive financial loop.' 'State shortfall does not excuse our lack of internal spending discipline,' she said. Texas has $24.8 billion in its rainy day fund. Yet, the city of Killeen struggles at the beginning of every single fiscal year — and the problem is almost certainly going to get worse because the state doesn't adequately reimburse the city for the exempted tax revenue. None of these things are going to improve unless Texas and the city take a look at how these funds are used and — even more poignantly — what the purpose of government even is. Is the point of the government to sell something to its residents? I don't think so. The idea of municipal governments being run as businesses and citizens being customers is a detestable idea that is entirely created to appeal to a segment of the population who never needed help in the first place. That is why any politician that says they approach the city as a businessman I consider a huge red flag. I definitely don't know the answers. I'm not an economist. Far from it, actually. But I do think that these financial realities need to be looked at with slightly different eyes and with far less dogmatism. Or else we are going to be having this exact same conversation at the exact same time next year.