Plano ISD’s tax rate will remain unchanged for fiscal year 2019, but district officials point to a projected $57 million increase in recapture payments it will send to the state as the reason for adopting the unchanged rate.

Trustees adopted Tuesday a tax rate of $1.439 per $100 valuation—the same rate PISD has adopted in the last three years. That rate is broken down into two categories: $1.17 per $100 valuation for the district’s day-to-day operations, and $0.269 per $100 valuation for the district’s debt-service payments.

Though district officials project PISD will collect $7.6 million less in revenue in fiscal year 2019 than in 2018 due to recapture, the tax rate will be "effectively raised” by 5.5 percent for the district’s maintenance and operations budget, according to a district-prepared document.

“Talking about effective tax rates with school districts is a red herring,” trustee David Stolle said. "This ridiculous language that we’re going to have to read about the effective tax rate being an increase in taxes is absolutely ridiculous, when in fact the amount of taxes that we are going to keep is a decrease of 1.85 percent over last year.”

The state’s recapture policy requires property-wealthy districts with low enrollment growth, like PISD, to send some of their property tax revenues designated for maintenance and operations to the Texas Education Agency.

Trustee Nancy Humphrey said she hopes the 2019 legislative session will result in a reform of the state’s embattled funding formula.

“What [is] happening is school districts will not be able to pay that liability of recapture for very much longer,” Humphrey said. “They have got to fix the system. That’s what we’re hoping for in this upcoming legislative session.”

Board President Missy Bender has testified to a state-established school finance commission, which was created during the 2017 legislative session to address the state's funding formula.