Keller City Council approves ‘single largest tax relief effort’ in city’s history

In adopting this year’s budget, the Keller City Council approved keeping the fiscal year 2021-22 tax rate at $0.395 per $100 assessed value—the same as it was for FY 2020-21.

In fact, according to city documents, thanks in part to new home construction and and increased property values, the city will bring in $123,754 more in property tax revenue in FY 2021-22 than it did the previous year—a 0.52% increase.

Nonetheless, the final outcome of City Council's Sept. 21 meeting was tax relief for homeowners.

According to Aaron Rector, director of administrative services for the city, because Keller previously raised its homestead exemption to the state maximum of 20%, a homeowner with the average residential taxable home value of $347,898 can expect to pay $1,374 in taxes to the city.

That is a decrease of $15.48 from fiscal year 2020-21, even with the tax rate remaining level. Rector said the average residential taxpayer can expect to pay $114.52 per month for city services.

The total tax rate of $0.395 consists of a maintenance and operations rate, or M&O, of $0.336030 and an interest and sinking rate, or I&S, of $0.058970.

The city's homestead exemption was previously 14%, but was raised in June.

Keller Mayor Armin Mizani said that the city is providing the “single largest tax relief effort in the history of Keller.” That sentiment was echoed by Rector.

The city’s now-adopted FY 2021-22 budget totals $100,247,944—an increase of $13,882,022 from last year’s budget, according to meeting documents.