Brittany Kelley
KYLE — The Hays CISD Board of Trustees adopted its fiscal year 2026-27 tax rate during its Sept. 28 meeting.
Prior to adoption, Chief Financial Officer Deborah Ottmers presented the board with background information at its Sept. 21 meeting. She noted that the district budgeted for 25,400 students at 28 campuses, with 3,500 employees across the 221 mile area it covers.
In order to calculate the tax rate, the district has to wait until July for certified property tax values to be released from the Hays Central Appraisal District, she said.
“When we get those July certified values, we use those in the months of July through September to come to the point of adopting the tax rate. We do have to publish notices. We start the first one in June, when we’re about to adopt the budget, and if we have to we will have a second notice published in September. At this point, we did not have to do that because our tax rates are equal to or lower than our initial posting,” said Ottmers, adding that the initial proposed rate, prior to certified values, was the same as 2025 at $1.1546 per $100 valuation.
Despite the rate not changing, estimates in April assumed that an average homeowner with a value of $182,110, after the homestead reduction, would expect to pay $86 less than before, for a total of $2,103.
“We end up seeing now a different tax rate, now that we have more detailed information with the July [certified value] amounts,” Ottmers explained.
Because the home values actually increased, the district’s Texas Education Agency’s (TEA) calculated compressed maintenance and operations (M&O) tax rate decreased from $0.6169 to $0.6023.
Based on these numbers, the new tax rate would be $1.1400, a $0.0546 decrease. This includes an M&O rate of $0.6523 — which includes $0.0500 of copper pennies, also known as enrichment funding — and an interest and sinking rate of $0.4877.
Now, an average homeowner with a value of $173,290 after homestead exemptions can expect to pay $1,976, for an estimated $210 savings from 2025 for the year.
“Because we are in that grey area, where we could potentially become a recapture district with excess local revenue and have to send money back to the state, they want to look at all of our information and agree that we’re in good shape and that we know what’s going on … and then, we have to wait for this letter to come back [from TEA] to approve for us to adopt the tax rate,” said Ottmers, adding that the letter was dated past their last meeting in August, so they had to wait, though TEA does not anticipate that the district will have to send money back.
“Thank you for you and your team for definitely doing all the work needed to make these things happen for our community. It’s so important. We’re all — most of us — are hurting financially right now, so every bit counts,” said trustee Esperanza Orosco.
The board of trustees approved the tax rate at $1.1400 unanimously at the Sept. 28 meeting.
