After two long days of deliberation, City Council gave final approval late in the evening Thursday, Aug. 18, to a $5 billion "all funds" fiscal year 2023 budget. The General Fund, which is where your sales and property taxes go, accounts for about $1.3 billion of that budget, with more than 60% of that amount earmarked for public safety.
Council approved a property tax rate of 46.27 cents per $100 of taxable value, which is right at the 3.5% maximum increase in total property tax revenue (the "revenue cap") allowed under state law and about 8 cents lower than the current year's tax rate. The new tax rate on its own will not increase tax bills for homeowners, but combined with rate and fee increases for city services, the owner of a median-price home in Austin ($453,727) will pay an additional $169.68 in taxes and fees per year.
The biggest change Council made to the budget proposed by City Manager Spencer Cronk a month ago was to further increase the base wage offered to city workers. Cronk's budget would have boosted the city minimum wage from $15 per hour (though no current city workers still earn that base wage) to $18 per hour, along with offering a 4% cost-of-living adjustment to everyone higher up the pay scales.
But a broad coalition of progressive advocates, ranging from labor groups to criminal justice reformers, were campaigning for an increase to $22 per hour. Council met them in the middle; Council Member Vanessa Fuentes carried a budget amendment that...
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