Coryell County residents learn new tax rate increase following major pushback
CORYELL COUNTY, Texas (KWTX) - Coryell County residents came together and pushed back against the Commissioner Court’s original 2026 budget proposal, which would have raised residents’ taxes by 21%
After the court voted Tuesday night, residents have a lower tax rate that sits at 8.6%.
Two weeks ago, Coryell County residents like Justin Smith learned about the proposed 21% increase, so they packed the Commissioners Court’s meeting and weren’t afraid to speak their minds
“You don’t go and ask for more money because you can’t make ends meet. Any individual here in Coryell County can’t just get money from somewhere else,” said Smith.
Smith said the county’s mismanagement from previous years doesn’t warrant residents to be the emergency clean up.
“They cut the taxes a couple of years ago with the ARPA money. But that was mismanagement of funds at that point, they should have never cut it like they did. Now they’re trying to fix the mistakes of the past by having us bail them out,” said Smith.
After residents voiced their concerns, County Commissioners went back to the drawing board.
County commissioners said they cut nearly $1.5 million from the budget.
County commissioner precinct one, Kyle Matthews said cuts were made to the sheriff’s department, jail operations and the road and bridge department.
“Those were the two largest budgets, but everyone wants the road and bridge departments to stay intact and have good roads. They also want security and safety from the sheriff’s office. Those are the two budgets you can touch, but they’ll affect everyone,” said Matthews.
Smith says the 8.6 tax increase isn’t a bad deal.
“I understand that taxes have to go up. The only issue that I have with it is it seemed to be majority of people thought that we needed to revisit the budget entirely,” said Smith.
Smith said to speak out and speak up if you want to start or even stop a major change.
“I encourage everyone who has the ability to speak out to do so. I was certainly speaking for myself, but I had a whole lot of people who said, ‘You’re speaking for me as well,’” said Smith.
You can view examples of tax rates based on your homestead taxable value here.
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