The most often complaint I heard about the tax increase involved dissatisfaction of how some monies were spent in the past. The feeling of many taxpayers is the district has not been good stewards of taxpayer dollars. The football field fiasco was often cited as an example.

While many school districts in Texas were seeking a tax increase, only Cedar Hill and Duncanville held elections in October. Some voters felt like the district was holding the election on this date in hopes of a depressed voter turnout.

Too, a tax increase at the middle of economic uncertainties is difficult for taxpayers to handle. Rising unemployment rates and falling stock prices leave many homeowners wary of additional taxes.  I’m sure the financial events of last week contributed to voter uncertainty.

This confluence of situations spelled defeat for the tax measure. Duncanville’s I.S.D. was also unsuccessful.

Voting statistics for the measure are available on the Dallas County Elections website.

Some of the proceeds from the event will be donated to the Cedar Hill/Grand Prairie joint Fire Department.

Featured events for the day will include: Putting Contest, Longest Drive Contest, Hole in One Contests, Mulligans, Player Gifts, Prizes and Awards, Sponsor Gifts, Raffle, Volunteer Gifts and much more. Register now and remember to invite your friends to play. Just click on “Tell a Friend” and you can send them a link to this site automatically. Thank you for your support of the Property Owners Association of LakeRidge.

Date: October 18, 2008
Times: 8:00 am
Facility: Tangle Ridge Golf Course

Fees:
Individual Golfer: $85.00
Foursomes: $340.00

The school board will seek a 13 cent tax increase in October. This increase would bring them up to an M&O tax rate of $1.17 per $100 valuation. That’s the maximum that districts can charge.

I think most people who oppose tax rate increases do so for two reasons.

First, the perception is that government budgets are bloated and the way to solve funding problems is cut the fat.

Second, people feel like the need for more revenue was caused by poor decisions in the past and that a tax increase would encourage more poor decisions.

I won’t rehash the issues that gave rise to the tax rate increase. You can read my previous articles here and here.

In short, the Legislature lowered the maximum M&O tax rate from $1.50 to $1.00. School Districts could apply for the “golden pennies” and get a rate of $1.04. This is the first year the new law allows schools to raise taxes, but the increase cannot go above $1.17. Even so, that’s roughly a 20% cut in revenue from the pre-reform rules.

And the state has not replaced that funding as promised.

The bottom line is that the immediacy for additional revenue was caused by the Texas Legislature taking a large portion of the district’s revenue and not returning the money to the district through state funding.

The harder issue is the second reason people are skeptical of new taxes. Some may feel that past decisions have caused the need for an increase. They point to the recent $1.2 million dollars expense to fix the football field.

Here’s the background on that decision. The district used a contractor in 2006 that wasn’t bonded. That contractor committed some of the most egregious fraud I have ever seen. When it was discovered that the district had been duped, the contractor was out of business and the district was left holding the bag.

I suppose in retrospect its easy to say the district should have chosen a different contractor in 2006. But you have to understand the mindset of school districts in Texas. They fight for pennies so they can educate students. And when faced with the need for fixing the field in 2006, they chose the contractor with the lowest bid.

All that said, the football field is not the reason our district is faced with a bleak financial outlook without the tax increase.

So, the need for additional revenue is not the result of a bloated budget; nor is it the result of bad decisions. Rather, the need was caused by something totally outside their control.

What Texas needs is real education reform. It used to be that the legislature funded 70% or more of public education. Today, in Cedar Hill at least, the state funds 32%. The Legislature keeps putting more and more tax burden on the backs of property owners.

The recent efforts to reform property taxes address the symptom but not the problem.

At the end of this debate, it is the children who are most affected. Libraries without enough books, classrooms with out-dated technology, teachers who leave Cedar Hill for higher salaries, all effect the quality of education in Cedar Hill.

I’ve said often that our city with flourish or fail based on our schools. Schools transcend businesses, economic development, workforce, labor market, and quality of life. If parents can’t be confident in Cedar Hill schools, they will go elsewhere. We can’t afford that.

This tax increase is not the answer to all the problems, but it is a response to a reality.

That’s why I support the tax increase.

But there was also another group that was delightful and informative. The North Texas Bully Breed Club, led by president Rachael King, showed the level of courtesy and maturity that can actually get people’s attention.

To summarize, the Cedar Hill City Council passed a resolution requesting the legislature allow cities to make their own decision about BSL. The day after the meeting, Rachael asked me to come to one of their meetings. I think I surprised her by agreeing to go. So, on that Saturday night my wife and I went to White Rock Lake and met with the North Texas Bully Breed Club.

Given Rachael’s emails, I knew the group would be courteous. When I arrived, I was given a tour and introduced to many of the pets. The pets were predominately American Pit Bull Terriers but there were a few other “bully” breeds there.

I was surprised to find that some of the pets didn’t look like my vision of pit bulls. Some had faces quite similar to a labrador. Without exception the pets were well-behaved.

These pet owners represented the “responsible” owner. Someone who cares for the animal and spends the necessary time to train the dog. They also took precautions, such has keeping the dogs in individual cages when they were not being played with.

A couple of times some of the dogs started barking and growling at each other. But I suppose that is not a breed specific act. The owners were very careful not to allow their dog to approach another dog from behind. I was told that because of their breeding, pit bulls can be aggressive toward other dogs and so reasonable measures were taken.

All in all, I had a very enjoyable time. The people were nice and the animals were well-behaved. I don’t know that I have changed my position just yet, but groups like these go a long way in changing the perspective and opening a productive dialog.

The owners who attack people with name-calling and hateful language do not serve their cause well. To those people, you would be better served not acting like the stereotype of the animals you are defending.

The City Council met with the school board to discuss the issues and asked some direct and tough questions.

In 2006, the Texas Legislature passed comprehensive school finance reform. I wrote about this plan back in 2006 as the negotiations were raging.

In a nutshell, the plan called for reducing a school district’s M&O budget from a cap of $1.50 to $1.00. At the time most districts, including Cedar Hill, chose the “Golden Pennies,” raising the M&O tax rate to $1.04.

In exchange for the reduction in revenue, the Legislature promised new monies to schools in the form of teacher raises, teacher performance incentives, and 1 billion over three years to reform Texas high schools.
You can read Gov. Perry’s press release of May 16 2006 here.

But Cedar Hill has not seen any of that money.

Mike McSwain, the Director of Finance for the district, did a good job explaining the situation.

Schools receive money from the state based on a standard called the “Weighted Average Daily Attendance” or WADA. Essentially, this is how much the state thinks it should cost to educate each student in the district.

When a city’s property values increase so that the district would collect more than their set WADA, the excess is given to the state to support the “Robin Hood” program.

So schools don’t get the benefit of a healthly local economy. The only way to get more than the WADA, is to raise the tax rate.

The additional 13 cent tax increase would amount to about $4.7 million dollars to the schools.

This would help pay for some basics that have been deferred from prior budgets. It is also the first step in bringing the schools inline with the vision the school board and the citizens of Cedar Hill have for our schools.

Lt. Thompson has is a 23-year veteran from Arlington where he commanded the southwest sector of the city.

He has a Bachelor of Science in Criminal Justice from Southwest Texas Statute University now known as Texas State University.

He will officially begin August 4, wisely avoiding the move into the new Government Center.

BSL stands for Breed Specific Legislation. That is, an ordinance that applies to a specific breed of dog.

Think pit bulls are more aggressive than other breeds and want to do something about it? Well, you can’t. At least not under the law as passed by the Texas Legislature.

The Texas Legislature prohibits cities from passing ordinances designed to address specific dangerous dog breeds.

All this came up because the Council had received numerous complaints from citizens about dogs — pit bulls especially — wandering around neighborhoods “terrorizing” the citizens.

Normal ordinances don’t work very well. We can pick up the dog and impound it. We can even impose escalating fines and impoundment fees. But the irresponsible owners, who don’t care for the animal anyway, never claim it. They just go get another dog and start the process over again.

Citizens told us compelling stories about their experiences with pit bulls. One poor lady said she was charged by a pit bull and her small dog jumped in to protect her. She ran to a safe place and watched as the Pit Bull mutilated and fatally wounded her dog.

Another citizen was recently attacked in her own yard when a pit bull got out of a neighbors yard. In that case, the pit bull was euthanized and the citizen agreed to help with the medical bills.

The issue before the Council last night was not a specific BSL. Rather, it was a resolution asking the Texas Legislature to remove the prohibition to BSL so local governments can pass ordinances that are right for that community. In my view, it provides flexibility for municipalities.

The issue got the attention of several animal groups. In the days leading up the meeting, the Council received emails from Wisconsin, Washington, and a host of area cities. A rather large crowd gathered.

In emails, BSL was called “doggie profiling.” Some of its opponents compared it to the KKK or Al-Queda. One person at the Council meeting said that America was fighting the war in Iraq to protect the rights of persons wanting to own pit bulls. I was called some pretty mean-spirited names in emails when I challenged some of their arguments.

Last night’s resolution passed unanimously.

Update: Rachael King’ the president of the North Texas Bully Breed Club, invited me to one of their meetings. I think she was a little surprised I accepted. I went last Saturday night and had a good meeting. The people we very nice and the dogs were well behaved. It was an enjoyable evening.

Also on the Net: Cedar Hill Addresses Pit Bull Problem, from Best Southwest Citizen.

• Board of Adjustment
• Planning and Zoning
• Zula B. Wylie Public Library Board
• Building Appeals and Advisory Board
• Main Street Development and Preservation Board
• Parks and Recreation Board
• Tri-City Animal Shelter Advisory Committee
• Economic Development Corporation
• Community Development Corporation
• Neighborhood Advisory Board

Applications are available during business hours Monday through Friday from the office of the City Secretary at City Hall, located at 502 Cedar Street.

Deadline for acceptance will be 5:00 p.m. June 27. For more information, call 972 291-5100 ext. 1011.

This demographic — often called the ‘working poor’ — has been on the rise lately.  Nearly 300 people have been added to the food pantry rolls since the beginning of the year.

Several weeks ago I was talking to Greg Patton, another one of our City Council Members, who works at the food pantry at least one day a week.  He told me that in all his years, he has never seen such a demand for food.

Because of the increased need, the stock of food is running low.

The food pantry buys the food in bulk from the North Texas Food Pantry, so they can make every dollar go far — each dollar feeds 5 people.

Please help contribute, if you can.

Links: Cedar Hill Food Pantry

The field in Longhorn Stadium apparently has always suffered from poor drainage since 1999. In 2004, the district spent about $480,000 to fix a drainage problem where water would stand on the field. The company, now bankrupt, didn’t perform the work correctly and it must be redone. Except now, it’s the district that is getting drained.

The School Board is understandably upset.

Too bad, really. $1,300,000 is a lot of money to fix a drainage problem that probably should have been corrected by the original contractor when the stadium was built in 1999.

Source: Dallas Morning News