Lubbock council adopts FY2025–26 budget on first reading, sets tax rate that raises average homeowner bill $15.33 annually

The Lubbock City Council on first reading approved a $953,898,000 fiscal year 2025–26 budget and set a property tax rate of 0.472191 (0.107586 for interest and sinking and 0.364605 for maintenance and operations), a 2.2% increase from the current rate that city staff said will raise the average single-family homeowner's city tax bill by $15.33 annually.

City Manager Jared Atkinson told the council the final rate followed the council's budget vote and several amendments, and described the adopted numbers as a reduction from the tentative proposal the council had reviewed earlier. "The I and S rate . . . is 0.107586. That is no change from your proposed. For the General Fund's maintenance and operations, it is 0.364605," Atkinson said. "Collectively, the total tax rate would be 0.472191. That is a 2.2% increase in the total tax rate." He also told council the average single-family taxable value used for the calculation was $224,602 and that the household impact under the adopted figures is $1,060.55 per year.

Why it matters: The budget and tax-rate decisions affect city services, debt service and how much residents pay in property taxes. Council members spent much of the meeting debating whether to use one-time funds, contingency dollars and program transfers to reduce the tax impact and how much to increase non-public-safety employee pay.

Council debate and amendments

Public comment was brief: resident Michael Ward urged deeper cuts and recommended the council aim for the no-new-revenue rate, saying, "I'm just suggesting that we find enough cuts in order to go to the no new revenue rate." Ward also urged continued hiring freezes and scrutiny of travel and training expenses.

During deliberations councilmembers argued over tradeoffs between reducing the tax impact this year and preserving contingency funds for road-bond projects and other commitments. Several councilmembers emphasized protecting public-safety pay and retaining staff amid tight labor markets; others pressed for steeper reductions in economic-development transfers and discretionary spending.

Council agreed to a package of amendments before voting. The amendments redirected $1.7 million that the city manager had identified in a contingency account into general-fund revenue to reduce the tax increase; reduced the council's discretionary budget by $15,000; and maintained a reduction in the transfer to Market Lubbock that city staff quantified as about $399,752 compared with last year's allocation. The council also discussed, but did not adopt, a larger package of cuts that would have required the manager to find additional reductions across non-public-safety departments.

Votes and outcome

The council voted to approve the budget on first reading, after amendments, by a 5-2 margin. Following the budget vote the council set the tax rate for 2025 at 0.472191 by a separate recorded vote that also passed 5-2. City staff reminded the council that state law treats some reassignments of I&S and M&O as a tax-rate increase even when the city uses existing dollars rather than raising additional revenue.

Debt, revenue and next steps

Atkinson reviewed the city's debt and revenue picture during the presentation. He reported total outstanding city-related debt (tax- and fee-supported) at about $1.849 billion at the snapshot used to prepare the budget, and noted year-over-year movements in tax-supported and fee-supported debt. He also told the council the proposed budget assumes $103 million in sales-tax revenue for FY2025'026, down from a prior-year budget of $105.6 million but close to projected collections.

Atkinson warned the council that the tax-rate action taken this day is not final: the budget and tax rate will return for a second reading and final vote next Tuesday at 2 p.m.

A note about attribution and process

All direct quotes in this story were taken from the public hearing and budget presentation during the Lubbock City Council special meeting on the budget. The council debated multiple amendments on the floor before the adopted first-reading budget and the tax-rate motion; both votes were recorded and passed 5-2. Any changes to the figures between first and second reading will be reported at the council's next meeting.