Pearland and Friendswood have waded into budget season as council members prepare to enact tax rates and budgets before the statutory deadlines.

Friendswood City Council unveiled its proposed 2017-18 fiscal year budget at an August 7 work session. The city anticipates it will adopt a tax rate and budget on October 2, according to a city presentation.

The proposed budget projects total revenues of $56.12 million and total expenditures of $56.06 million, which is an 8 percent increase over last year, according to Friendswood’s proposed 2017-18 budget.

Along with the budget, Friendswood staff proposed a property tax rate of 52 cents per $100 valuation, which is 2.6 cents lower than the 2016-17 rate and represents a nearly 40 year historical low for the city.

“I’m getting old enough to where some consider me historical … and it’s the lowest tax rate that I think I can remember,” Friendswood City Manager Roger Roecker said.

Although the rate itself was lowered, residents can expect to pay more taxes in 2018 than this year. If the city collected the same amount of revenue as the 2017 fiscal year, the tax rate would be 49 cents per $100 valuation.

Friendswood City Council will weigh pay plan adjustments for city employees, a new police department radio, major investments in street improvements and a debut of the Friendswood Downtown Economic Development Corporation efforts.

Friendswood city departments also included $2 million in requested but unfunded budget items, including Stevenson Park pool restroom replacements, increased staffing, and improvements to the fire department training field, according to the budget.

“We’re not discouraged about that,” Roecker said.

Pearland City Council will begin budget discussions on Aug. 12. The proposed 2017-18 fiscal year budget has $287.4 million in expenditures across 39 individual city funds but only $284.35 million in revenue, according to Pearland’s proposed budget. While projected property tax revenues are lower than expenditures, the city is projected to make up the difference with budget surpluses.

"It doesn’t take into account what the city has for other means of financing," Pearland City Manager Clay Pearson said of the budget. "If we carry money from one year to the next, that isn’t revenue. ... We have to show the aggregate revenue and expenditures to show the scale of the funds, but each fund is standalone."

The general revenue fund, a bulk fund that pays for general government operations and public safety, has proposed 2017-18 expenditures of $78.46 million and revenues of $78.54 million, according to the budget

Additionally, the city proposed property tax rate of 68 cents per $100 valuation, according to the proposed budget. The proposed tax rate is one-hundredth of one percent lower than the 2016-17 tax rate. Of the proposed tax rate, 25 cents will go toward the general fund for city services, and 43 cents will be used for debt service to pay off capital expenditures, according to the budget, including bonds issued as part of the $162 million bond referendum that voters approved in 2007 and the city's five-year capital improvement program.

"The bond financing and the debt financing is completing very real very important capital projects, things that we see and use everyday here from Bailey Road and Shadow Creek Ranch [Sports Complex] or the [Pearland] Recreation Center and Natatorium," Clay said. "We’re right in the growth curve. ... It’s a part of our challenge of where we’re at today as a city. The operations are tight, and we’re managing them.”

While Pearland's property tax rate has dropped, Pearland is expected to generate $3.1 million in revenue over last year’s budget, $2 million of which will come from new property added to the tax roll, according to the city’s tax notice.

Major items that Pearland City Council will weigh this budget season is a citywide pay scale restructuring, debt service, fire department staffing levels, streets and sidewalks, expansion of Reflection Bay wastewater treatment facility, construction of a surface water treatment plant and replacement of city water meters.