A public hearing for the proposed county tax increase of 8.5 percent was held Thursday evening.
Former Road and Bridge Supervisor Guadalupe Cardona was the only citizen to speak at the hearing, stating that, despite commissioners raising taxes, he had not seen improvements in the community for the last four years.
Cardona said many people would struggle with an increase to both property values, that alone would generate $800,000 for the county, and taxes.
Raising rates because of increased insurance costs was not enough of a reason, said Cardona, who asked commissioners not to go through with the increase.
County Judge David Saucedo said it was difficult to take criticism from Cardona because he was a part of the system.
“I think we as an entity we could accept having someone come up and being critical of the county if they were never part of the county, yet here we are having to clean up the mess this man made years ago,” said Saucedo. “How much did we pay on those tires that were never taken care of? We continue to pay on issues like that. It becomes very difficult to stand here and let somebody try to berate you when he was part of the problem. We’re up here trying to say we’ve got to fix the mess the previous road and bridge supervisor made. It costs money to do that.”
Saucedo said rate increases were not paying for “luxuries,” but going toward county clean up, and health care costs.
“It’s a million times better than what it was when Mr. Cardona was road and bridge director. Remember part of what the tax payers are paying is his inability to do his job,” said Saucedo. “We do what we have to do because we do care about the community, we do take care of business. If health insurance rates go up, there’s nothing we can do about that. We did raise the salary of employees that were making less than $8.50 an hour to $8.50. Those are the only people that got that raise. Believe me, $8.50 is hard to live on and I can appreciate the fact that if $8.50 is hard to live on $8 is worse, and $7.50 is even worse.”
Saucedo said he recognized many of the departments had gone with staff shortages, and continued to struggle but were doing their best.
“Just the fact that only one individual is here tonight shows that the community understands what we’re trying to do,” said Saucedo. “All I know is we can try to do our best, try to fix whatever wrongs were done, and move forward.”
Commissioner Gerardo “Jerry” Morales found Cardona’s words offensive because of several projects he has seen to completion.
“Take a drive out to Cedar Ridge and ask any of our residents if we have been doing our job out there. You could take a look at our drainage arroyos that hadn’t been touched in 17 years and ask yourself if we’ve been doing a good job or not,” said Morales. “We had 6.5 inches of rain this past time and we didn’t have a single home flooded. That to me is a huge accomplishment.”
Morales added that two parks had been created, more than 12,000 linear feet in the area had been cleaned, as well as 7,600 linear feet of curb and gutter in Precinct 1, and planned to start on pavement next. An engineer was also brought on to monitor new developments, said Morales.
“With the tax budget we have we’ve been able to come a long way. You hear someone say ‘you’ve been doing nothing.’ We’ve been doing our part with what we have, and I think we’ll be doing a lot more as we see the light at the end of the tunnel,” said Morales.
Commissioner Rosy Cantu stated that work had been done in her precinct as well.
“They hadn’t paved many of our streets in quite some years, and we’ve already paved one and we’re looking at others. It’s a small budget that we have, that’s all we can work with,” said Cantu. “I do think the county is improving. Slowly, but it is improving.”
Cantu also added that she understands the struggle tax payers will have.
“I’m also a tax payer, I pay taxes for my properties and if we increase our taxes I’m also one of the affected residents, but I have my properties and I have to pay them,” said Cantu.
Disgusto al incremento en condado
La corte de comisionados está trabajando en el presupuesto para el nuevo año fiscal que entra en vigor el 1 de octubre. Para tratar de balancear su presupuesto están tratando de aumentar los impuestos en la propiedad.
Es y a sido costumbre siempre de aumentar impuestos en lugar de buscar una manera de ahorrar dinero y no afectar los bolsillos de los pagadores de impuestos. Hace varias semanas algunos comisionados informaron que no habría ningun aumento y que tampoco habria un aumento de sueldo, el año pasado si se aumento un 3% a empleados.
La corte de comisionados para balancear su presupuesto están tratando de aumentar el 8.50% con eso lograrían recaudar $273,546.00, esto sin contar que este año hubo un incremento enorme en todas las propiedades del condado de Maverick, todas las propiedadas aumentaron de precio y por lo mismo vamos a pagar mas impuestos.
Con el aumento que se nos dio en las propiedades el condado va a recibir $800,000 y todavia quieren subirnos el 8.50% en cada $100.00 de valor en la propiedad, ya sería un incremento para el condado de mas de un millon de dólares.
El principal problema por el cual el condado necesita recaudar mas dinero, es porque subió el costo de aseguranzas que por cierto los empleados del condado tienen mejor aseguranza que los empleados de la EPISD y los de la ciudad, la aseguranza del condado tiene un deducible de $20.00. Muchas personas piensan que el condado deberia de buscar una aseguranza que no sea tan cara aunque tengan deducibles mas altos, y que el resto de los residentes del condado no se tengan que sacrificar pagando el aumento de impuestos.
El condado continuara realizando una audiencia pública mas para este tema, desgraciadamente hay mas de 50,000 personas en el condado y solo una persona tiene el valor cívico y el interés de que cada vez que el condado quiere hacer aumentos protesta es el Sr. Guadalupe Cardona, ojala y como esta persona hubieramos muchos que tomaramos nuestro tiempo y tuvieramos el valor para pararnos frente a los comisionados y decirles
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