BELTON — The Bell County Commissioners Court approved a proposed $0.3635 property tax rate Monday and set public hearings for the fiscal year 2027 budget and tax rate adoption.
The proposed rate, if approved, would come in $0.0308 higher than the current $0.3327 rate per $100 valuation.
For the average Bell County home, valued at $219,708, the proposed rate would increase the annual county tax bill from $730.97 to $798.64, an increase of $67.67, or about $5.64 per month.
“This has been one of the most difficult budgets,” County Judge David Blackburn, R-Bell County, said. He described it as “particularly challenging this year.”
The proposed rate consists of a $0.3167 general county rate and a $0.0468 road and bridge rate.
The general county rate would increase from $0.3128 by $0.0039 while the road and bridge rate would increase from $0.0199 by $0.0269, accounting for the bulk of the overall tax increase.
The proposed county rate is 2.82% below the no-new-revenue rate of $0.3259. The proposed road and bridge rate represents a 129% increase from the no-new-revenue rate, according to a presentation by County Auditor Tina Entrop.
The overall increase still sits below the voter-approval tax rate of $0.4108.
The increase would generate roughly $3.2 million in additional revenue, according to Entrop. Blackburn said the county is trying to “right-size” the road and bridge fund, which state law requires counties to maintain.
Precinct 2 Commissioner Bobby Whitson, R-Harker Heights, said the fund has been severely underfunded in recent years. The county wants to use the additional revenue to address a roughly $5 million deficit and stop relying on general fund reserves as it has for the past few years.
“You can’t get rid of your savings account and then think nothing will ever happen,” Whitson said.
The proposed budget moves the county engineer and road and bridge departments, which account for about $6.1 million in spending, into a special revenue fund supported by the road and bridge tax.
County property tax rolls total $41.723 billion, an increase of 3.18%, which Blackburn said was the smallest increase in more than a decade. Sales tax receipts also declined 1.2% from 2025, falling from $34.9 million to $34.5 million, which affected the budget.
The general fund budget totals $161.9 million in revenue and expenditures, down from $165.4 million last year. About 60% of spending will go toward personnel, with the remaining 40% covering other expenses.
Public safety remained the top spending priority.
Blackburn said state-mandated services account for about one-third of county costs and equate to 10.3 cents of the property tax rate. The top state-mandated costs included tax exemptions for disabled veterans and people over 65, indigent health care, indigent defense and Child Protective Services.
The disabled veteran exemption alone reduced county revenue by $21.5 million. Blackburn said Bell County faces a disproportionate impact because of Fort Hood, noting the number of properties receiving the exemption grew from about 700 in 2009 to more than 21,000 now.
Whitson said these exemptions do not eliminate the cost of those services but shift the tax burden to other property owners.
“I’m not arguing (against) the exemptions, but I think all of us need to understand that when exemptions are given, the folks that don’t get the exemptions still pay that tax,” Whitson said.
“At the end of the day, those that don’t have exemptions make up for those that do,” Entrop said.
Precinct 4 Commissioner Louie Minor, D-Killeen, cast the only opposing vote to the tax rate.
He objected to setting the general county rate below the no-new-revenue rate, saying the decision would shift priorities and underfund the sheriff’s office, including overtime and employee compensation.
After approving the proposed budget and tax rate, the court unanimously approved five animal control officer positions that take effect Monday, Aug. 17. The county will fund these positions by eliminating four corrections officer positions and jail overtime, along with funding from vacancies in the animal control budget.
The first tax rate public hearing will begin at 6 p.m. Wednesday, Aug. 19.
The county will hold the budget public hearing and second tax rate public hearing at 9 a.m. Monday, Aug. 24, before adopting the fiscal year 2027 budget and tax rate.
