This November, Texans across the State will go to the polls to vote on fourteen (14) amendment propositions to the Texas Constitution. These proposed amendments were passed by two-thirds of both the Texas House and the Texas Senate and require a majority of voting Texans to vote in favor of them to be officially added to the Texas State Constitution. 

Here we will give a brief breakdown of the proposed amendments, and our recommendation on how to vote on each:

Proposition 1 (HJR 126) 

Ballot Language (the language that will appear on your ballot): 

“The constitutional amendment protecting the right to engage in farming, ranching, timber production, horticulture, and wildlife management.” 

Explanation:

This amendment will explicitly protect the right to engage in “generally accepted” farm, ranch, timber, horticulture, and wildlife. It does not, however, prohibit the Legislature or authorized state agencies from regulating such activities for specific purposes. 

Vote Recommendation: 

“FOR” – We recommend voting in favor of this amendment, to further protect and enshrine private property rights into the Texas Constitution.

Proposition 2 (SJR 64)

Ballot Language:

“The constitutional amendment authorizing a local option exemption from ad valorem taxation by a county or municipality of all or part of the appraised value of real property used to operate a child-care facility.” 

Explanation:

This amendment would allow cities and counties to exempt all or part of the appraised value of a childcare facility’s property from taxation. 

Vote Recommendation:

“AGAINST” – We strongly recommend voting against this amendment. Carving out property tax exemptions for businesses always result in higher tax burdens for other businesses, especially homeowners, who must pay more in taxes to make up the difference in lost tax revenue.

Proposition 3 (HJR 132)

Ballot Language:

“The constitutional amendment prohibiting the imposition of an individual wealth or net worth tax, including a tax on the difference between the assets and liabilities of an individual or family.” 

Explanation:

This amendment will prohibit the Texas Legislature from imposing any type of wealth tax on an individual or family (a tax based on net wealth). 

Vote Recommendation:

“FOR” – We recommended voting in favor of this amendment. Texans are already taxed too much, and taxing individuals or families based on their total wealth is immoral and would be an abuse of the State’s taxing authority.

Proposition 4 (HJR 2 – Second Special Session)

Ballot Language:

“The constitutional amendment to authorize the legislature to establish a temporary limit on the maximum appraised value of real property other than a residence homestead for ad valorem tax purposes; to increase the amount of the exemption from ad valorem taxation by a school district applicable to residence homesteads from $40,000 to $100,000; to adjust the amount of the limitation on school district ad valorem taxes imposed on the residence homesteads of the elderly or disabled to reflect increases in certain exemption amounts; to except certain appropriations to pay for ad valorem tax relief from the constitutional limitation on the rate of growth of appropriations; and to authorize the legislature to provide for a four-year term of office for a member of the board of directors of certain appraisal districts.”

Explanation:

This amendment would officially authorize the property tax relief package that was passed by the Legislature during the second special session. While many Texas politicians have claimed that this relief is the largest in Texas history at $18 billion, that is unfortunately not true. It is the second largest in history, amounting to $12.7 Billion in new relief (the largest was in 2007). Additionally, while this will provide some temporary relief, because of inflation, rising appraisals, and increasing local government budgets, most of the relief will be very short-lived.

Vote Recommendation:

“FOR” – While recognizing that most of this relief will not be permanent and most Texans will continue to struggle under the crushing weight of property taxes, some relief is better than none. We recommended voting in favor of this amendment.

Proposition 5 (HJR 3)

Ballot Language:

“The constitutional amendment relating to the Texas University Fund, which provides funding to certain institutions of higher education to achieve national prominence as major research universities and drive the state economy.” 

Explanation:

This Amendment would rename the national research university fund as the Texas University Fund (TUF) and would establish an ongoing revenue source from the accrued interest of the economic stabilization fund. 

Vote Recommendation:

“AGAINST” – Taxpayers already fund higher education by billions of dollars every year. Higher education already receives enough public support, not to mention that most of them are essentially publicly funded, leftist indoctrination centers.

Proposition 6 (SJR 75)

Ballot Language:

“The constitutional amendment creating the Texas water fund to assist in financing water projects in this state.” 

Explanation:

This amendment would create the Texas Water Fund to help finance water projects in Texas. 

Vote Recommendation:

“NEUTRAL” – While clean water is a very important resource, this amendment nonetheless will expand government and the spending of taxpayer dollars. We remain neutral.

Proposition 7 (SJR 93)

Ballot Language:

“The constitutional amendment providing for the creation of the Texas energy fund to support the construction, maintenance, modernization, and operation of electric generating facilities.” 

Explanation:

We believe this is a necessary interim step to attempt to avoid blackouts that might have been made inevitable by previous poor policy decisions. There was a major effort this past legislative session to make our grid reliable. Legislation was passed that authorized the PUC to fix many problems with the grid, specifically the addition of a new reliability standard. Those laws in conjunction with this amendment provide a possible solution to rescue our destabilized Texas electric grid.

Vote Recommendation:

“FOR” – We recommend voting FOR this amendment as a crucial step to securing the Texas Grid and protecting against rolling blackouts.

Proposition 8 (HJR 125)

Ballot Language:

“The constitutional amendment creating the broadband infrastructure fund to expand high-speed broadband access and assist in the financing of connectivity projects.” 

Explanation:

This amendment would create the broadband infrastructure fund, to help expand broadband access in Texas, by spending billions in taxpayer dollars.  

Vote Recommendation:

“AGAINST” – Since this fund would essentially act as corporate welfare for broadband companies, and the money used in the fund should be returned to the taxpayers in the form of property tax relief, we recommended voting against this amendment.

Proposition 9 (HJR 2)

Ballot Language:

“The constitutional amendment authorizing the 88th Legislature to provide a cost-of-living adjustment to certain annuitants of the Teacher Retirement System of Texas.” 

Explanation:

This amendment would provide a cost-of-living adjustment to the retirement payments of retired Texas Teachers. 

Vote Recommendation:

“NEUTRAL” – While this amendment would spend billions in taxpayer dollars, we also recognize that retired teachers have not had a cost-of-living adjustment, to keep up with inflation, in many years.

Proposition 10 (SJR 87)

Ballot Language:

“The constitutional amendment to authorize the legislature to exempt from ad valorem taxation equipment or inventory held by a manufacturer of medical or biomedical products to protect the Texas healthcare network and strengthen our medical supply chain.” 

Explanation:

This amendment will provide medical and biomedical manufacturing companies (private businesses) with potentially billions of dollars in tax breaks. This is a tax break carve-out that will increase the tax burden on small businesses and homeowners. 

Vote Recommendation:

“AGAINST” – Since this will inevitably increase the tax burden on homeowners and small businesses to make up the difference in lost tax revenue, we strongly recommend voting against this amendment.

Proposition 11 (SJR 32)

Ballot Language:

“The constitutional amendment authorizing the legislature to permit conservation and reclamation districts in El Paso County to issue bonds supported by ad valorem taxes to fund the development and maintenance of parks and recreational facilities.” 

Explanation:

Currently, El Paso does not have the authority to issue bonds to fund the development or maintenance of parks and recreational facilities. This amendment would remedy this restriction for El Paso County. 

Vote Recommendation:

“NEUTRAL” – While bonds inevitably mean increases in taxes on taxpayers, this amendment is local in nature and only affects El Paso County. We remain neutral.

Proposition 12 (HJR 134)

Ballot Language:

“The constitutional amendment providing for the abolition of the Office of County Treasurer in Galveston County.” 

Explanation:

This amendment would simply abolish the position of county treasurers in Galveston County. 

Vote Recommendation:

“FOR” – The current Galveston County Treasurer ran on a platform of abolishing the position (getting rid of his own job). This is a local issue, and one less government official means a smaller government overall. We support this amendment. 

Proposition 13 (HJR 107)

Ballot Language:

“The constitutional amendment to increase the mandatory age of retirement for state justices and judges.” 

Explanation:

The current mandatory retirement age for State Justices and Judges is 75 years old. This amendment would raise the mandatory retirement age to 79 years. 

Vote Recommendation:

“AGAINST“– While the average life expectancy has increased, and the State could experience benefits from more experienced Judges serving longer, there is always the risk of more elderly Judges overseeing important parts of our Judicial system. As we have seen on the federal level cognitive decline is a real problem and could jeopardize justice.

Proposition 14 (SJR 74)

Ballot Language:

“The constitutional amendment providing for the creation of the Centennial Parks Conservation Fund to be used for the creation and improvement of state parks.” 

Explanation:

Would create a fund to use taxpayer dollars to maintain, improve or create new State parks through the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department (TPWD). 

Vote Recommendation:

“AGAINST” – While conservation of natural resources and areas is important, there are other ways than spending billions of taxpayer dollars to maintain or create new State parks. We oppose this amendment.

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It is important for Texans to show up to the polls in November and make their voices heard. For more information about the November ballot, the proposition, or voting, visit the Texas Secretary of State’s website HERE.