College Station ISD adopts 2025–26 tax rate as finance staff warns of lost property value from appeals

College Station Independent School District trustees on Tuesday approved a 2025–26 property tax rate of 0.9753 per $100 of assessed value, after district finance staff described major property-value losses tied to multi-year appraisal appeals and recent state homestead-exemption changes.

Heather, a district finance staff member, told trustees that apartment-valuation litigation filed going back to 2018 settled heavily in 2024 and 2025 and has reduced the district’s taxable value by roughly $164 million in 2024 and about $86 million so far in 2025. “When they all go when they're all settled at one time, it just hits us at one time,” she said. The board heard that those retroactive reductions have reduced collections and required refunds to taxpayers whose earlier payments were reversed after settlements.

The finance staff also reviewed recent legislation that will affect local property-tax calculations. She cited Senate Bill 4 and Senate Bill 23 and described changes expanding homestead exemptions and compressing rate calculations; she warned that future bond sales may not receive the same “hold harmless” state payments as earlier debt. “If I pass a tax rate that’s higher than my required tax rate to pay my current debt on the books, they could reduce my hold harmless amount,” she said, describing guidance from the Texas Education Agency that is still being clarified.

Board members asked how much of the district’s debt had already been sold and were told roughly $100 million of debt service had already been issued and therefore is currently held harmless. Heather said the district has hired outside counsel and is conducting property-value studies beginning with 2019 to pursue recovery of maintenance-and-operations revenue lost to settlements, but that any recoupment will be partial and collection costs will reduce recovered amounts.

Trustees voted 7–0 to adopt the tax rate in a motion that set maintenance and operations at 0.6963 and interest and sinking at 0.279, producing the 0.9753 total. District staff said the change effectively raises the rate by 1.9% and estimated it will increase taxes for maintenance and operations on a $100,000 home by about $18.09 under the adopted figures.

The board and staff emphasized uncertainty in how the Texas Education Agency will calculate hold-harmless adjustments and recapture if local rates change; trustees asked staff to monitor TEA guidance and to bring further information as it becomes available. The board also discussed operational impacts, including a shortfall in the debt-service fund that staff expect will require some use of fund balance in the current year.

Trustees did not act tonight on longer-term changes such as raising the debt-service rate beyond the amount needed to pay current obligations; staff said they will return with updated calculations as legal and TEA guidance becomes available.