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Brooks County approves proposed 2025–26 budget and sets proposed tax rate of 0.900847
Summary
After a budget workshop, the Brooks County Commissioners on Aug. 14 approved the proposed 2025–26 budget and voted to publish a proposed tax rate of 0.900847, scheduling public hearings beginning Sept. 3. Commissioners discussed staffing and election precinct consolidation during the workshop.
County Judge Eric Ramos and the Brooks County Commissioners approved the proposed 2025–26 budget during their Aug. 14 meeting in Falfurrias and voted to publish a proposed tax rate of 0.900847, the court said.
The meeting opened with a budget workshop in which Judge Ramos presented a revised package showing corrections to taxable values and projected revenues. The court recorded corrected current-tax numbers of $4,229,735.00, a working ‘90‑cent’ reference to the tax-rate calculation and an expected revenue surplus of $510,398. The court added $6,000 to the budget for Blumer Building expenses during the discussion. The budget motion to submit the proposed 2025–26 budget to the county/district clerk’s office was moved by Commissioner Aaron Trevino and seconded by Commissioner Nora Salinas; it passed unanimously.
Elections Administrator Anna Garcia told the court that recent staffing reductions had made office operations difficult for one employee and asked the court to reconsider staffing levels; she said she also was examining consolidation of voting precincts, leaving Encino as a separate precinct if consolidation proceeds. The court discussed these concerns during the workshop portion but took no immediate staffing action at the meeting.
After reviewing certified appraised and taxable values from the Brooks County Appraisal District, the court approved the certification of 2024 excess debt collections and the anticipated 2025 collection rate presented by Terri A. Silvas, chief deputy tax assessor-collector. The court then voted to publish a proposed tax rate of 0.900847 and scheduled public hearings starting Sept. 3, noting statutory requirements to compare the proposed rate with the voter-approval and no-new-revenue rates before final adoption.
The court also approved a series of small intra-fund transfers including $1,500 for A/C maintenance and transfers to building repairs and corrected a previously cited line-item amount for fire extinguishers from $1,000 to $2,000.
What happens next: the county will hold the scheduled public hearings on the proposed tax rate in September before any final tax-rate adoption; the approved proposed budget will be filed with the county/district clerk as required.
