Texans’ Debt Burden Will Soon Get Much Larger Unless We Show Up at the Polls
This article was originally published at “Excellent Though” HERE. It is being republished with permission of the author.
According to the Texas Bond Review Board, Texans already owe $613 billion in combined state and local debt.
Figure 1 shows that $500 billion of that debt has been issued by Texas local governments. Unless Texans step up and reject most of the $90.4 billion of proposed debt on the November 4 ballot, Texas’ debt burden will soon be much larger.
Figure 2 breaks out the amount of debt that Texans will be voting on next Tuesday by issuer. Water districts lead the way with $72.7 billion in debt. School districts are next, wanting to borrow more than $10 billion.
The size of these proposals should surprise no one. Texas local government spending is out of control and has been for many years. This is reflected in the rapid growth over the last six years in local property taxes, the primary source of revenue for most local governments. Figure 3 lays out the growth across all types of local governments. Counties lead the way at 50% since 2019, followed by special districts (59%) and cities (50%). School districts trail far behind, but only because the Texas Legislature has given them $51 billion in state taxpayer money since 2019 in the name of property tax “relief.” As the numbers show, Texans are not experiencing any tax relief—property or otherwise.
Figure 4 list the Texas counties with more than $1 billion of total debt proposed by the various taxing districts in each county.
Finally, Figure 5 shows which taxing entities have proposed more than $1 billion in bonds on the November 4 ballot. All of them but two are a MUD or other special taxing district. The other two are school districts.
In one sense, Texans have control over the amount of debt they might take on next week in their own hands.
However, turnout in off-year elections is very light and usually dominated by special interests who would benefit from the issuance of these bonds. Most voters do not turn out. Unless those who oppose the runaway spending by local governments show up to the polls, Texans are all going to be in much deeper debt.
This article was originally published at “Excellent Though” HERE. It is being republished with permission of the author.
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