The City of Austin will vote on a plan to funnel more of your property taxes into low-income housing.
City leaders are expected to finalize their plan to increase the tax increment for what’s known as the Homestead Preservation District, which for years, Austin has used to skim 10-percent of all property taxes from a specific zone in East Austin, and used that money for taxpayer-funded housing.
Council member Greg Casar said it’s time to raise that percentage,”Which will help us fund, by leveraging other dollars, well over 1000 units of housing for low income people and low income families.”
Council had once thought it could create more of these Homestead Preservation zones in previous years but Governor Greg Abbott put the kibosh on that when he vetoed legislation that would have made that a possibility. Casar believes a 10{6d294a0824f6f808f1cc9dcde10d35acd237638cfa4e8dd876851c8906eac7a1} skim is far from enough to adequately fund affordable housing, which is why he is supporting the council item to double it to a full 20{6d294a0824f6f808f1cc9dcde10d35acd237638cfa4e8dd876851c8906eac7a1} of property taxes in the zone.
(Photo:Shutterstock/stockcreations)
