At its Aug. 24 public tax hearing, the Magnolia ISD board of trustees approved the new property tax rate and budget for fiscal year 2026-27. The newly approved tax rate is lower than the previously approved tax rate due to the recently passed 2026 bond.
By the numbers
Presented by Erich Morris, the MISD assistant superintendent of operations, the tax rate for FY 2026-27 is $0.9325 per $100 of home valuation. The tax rate is broken down into two portions of revenue:
- Maintenance & Operations: $0.6399
- Interest & Sinking (debt service): $0.2926
M&O covers daily district needs and day-to-day purchases, and the I&S correlates to helping pay off the debt for any recently passed bonds.
The official budget for FY 2026-27 is set to be $218.3 million, which can be broken down into three categories:
- General operating fund: $169.2 million
- Debt service fund: $40.5 million
- Child nutrition fund: $8.59 million
Quote of note
As previously reported, Morris and the MISD board of trustees made it clear to locals that they would work to avoid a higher property tax rate due to the recently passed bonds.
“During the process, we told our voters it [2026 bond] would not require us to increase the tax rate, which is on the debt service side and has remained the same,” Morris said.
One more thing
Along with the approval of the new tax rate, MISD also approved a one-time payment of $500 for all district employees and a minimum 3% raise for all employees based on experience. The breakdown of the increases for employee raises is:
- 0-10 years of experience: 3% (average increase of $1,883)
- 11-20 years of experience: 4% (average increase of $2,680)
- 21-25 years of experience: 5% (average increase of $3,649)
- 26+ years of experience: 6% (average increase of $4,665)
