School district funding is made up of local property taxes, as well as funding from the State of Texas. Despite increases in the costs for services and goods, the State has not raised the minimum amount it provides per student attending school since 2019. In addition, school districts are experiencing enrollment decline and inconsistent student attendance at school, resulting in Beaumont ISD and other schools to project a funding shortfall for 2024-2025.
Despite making every effort to streamline operations and staffing, including evaluation and restructure of student programming, the District finds that its salaries are not in alignment with the state averages and the District continues to struggle recruiting and retaining quality teachers. The District seeks to generate additional local funding to support security upgrades, increase teacher and staff compensation, and provide more options in student programming.
For these reasons, the BISD Board of Trustees approved calling for a Voter-Approval Tax Rate Election (VATRE - Proposition A).
Click here to view the Voter Approval Tax Rate Election Results.
Approval of the VATRE (Proposition A) will provide:
A voter-approved tax rate election (VATRE) is an election required to be held when the District adopts a Maintenance and Operations (M&O) tax rate that exceeds the amount allowed by the state.
The short answer is to be more competitive with teacher and staff pay. More than 72.6% of Beaumont ISD’s maintenance and operations budget goes to compensation for teachers and staff.
Competitive pay is one way to ensure we retain and recruit high quality staff to maintain and improve the high standards and expectations of our community.
This additional increase will allow Beaumont ISD to give employees an additional three percent increase in pay. These additional pay increases would make BISD teacher salaries more in line with our comparable districts and allow the district to operate within a balanced budget.
Currently, BISD employees have been given a raise of two percent for the 2024-25 school year. If the VATRE (Proposition A) is passed by voters, BISD employees will receive a total raise of five percent.
BISD also plans to utilize the additional funds to maintain and enhance the delivery of essential programs and personnel that our students rely on daily as well as implementing and upgrading safety and security measures, ensuring that our schools remain safe places for all students and staff.
BISD teacher salaries were nine to eleven percent lower than the median teacher salaries of comparable districts for the 2023-24 (last year) school year. Starting teacher pay is $5,500 below market (90 percent). A five percent raise and increasing the starting salary for teachers with zero years of experience to $53,500 will move BISD teacher pay from 90% of what comparable districts are paying to 96%.
2023-2024 BISD Teacher Salaries versus Comparable Districts
Be sure to look for the Beaumont ISD Proposition A on your November 2024 ballot.
The ballot language will be as follows:
"BEAUMONT INDEPENDENT SCHOOL DISTRICT Proposition A – Ratifying the ad valorem tax rate of $ 0.96491 per $100 valuation in Beaumont Independent School District for the current year, a rate that will result in an increase of 14.3% percent in maintenance and operations tax revenue for the district for the current year as compared to the preceding year, which is an additional $13,087,884."
The amount of $13,087,884 in the ballot language represents the total projected increase in local property tax revenue with the VATRE relative to the prior fiscal year (2023-2024).
In this particular situation, your total tax rate will actually be lower than it was in 2023. Because of state-mandated tax-rate compression to compensate for increased property values, the Beaumont ISD tax rate is being lowered by 2.15 cents. The tax rate is made up of two parts, maintenance and operations (M&O) and interest and sinking (I&S).
The M&O tax rate will be $0.8023, which is 6.85 cents higher than the 2023-24 rate of $0.7338.
The I&S tax rate will be $0.16261, which is 9 cents LOWER than the 2023-24 rate.
The total tax rate of $.96491 is LOWER than the previous year of $0.98641.
Citizens 65 and older who have applied for and received the over 65 exemption will see no increase in their taxes as a result of approval of the VATRE.
The homestead tax ceiling is a limit on the amount of school taxes you pay. When you qualify for an Over 65 or Disabled Person homestead exemption, the school taxes on your house will not increase. The ceiling freezes your school taxes at the amount you pay in the year that you qualify for the exemption.
The school taxes on your house may go below the ceiling but not above.
If the VATRE (Proposition A) ballot proposal does not pass, Beaumont ISD will not have access to additional funding. The 3% additional raise will not occur for employees. This will also limit the district’s ability to offer competitive salaries to attract and retain teachers. In addition, staffing levels may have to be reduced, safety and security upgrades will be limited, and some instructional opportunities may have to be curtailed, delayed or not offered. The district will also amend the current budget to reduce expenditures and revenue which will result in a deficit budget of almost $4 million.
Yes, and we do. We carefully prioritize our needs each year and look for opportunities to cut costs. We have taken steps to reduce expenditures each year.
Over the past 4 years BISD has:
Limited employee increases
Decreased department budgets
Reduced teacher positions in relation to student enrollment
Yes, we can go back and ask again, but only during the November elections. However, if we go back next November to ask for it again, we would not be able to reduce the tax rate by reducing the I&S tax rate.
The district has no control over your property values, our local county appraisal district sets those values each year. The district only adopts the tax rate.
