The city of El Paso charged us $273,328,226 in property taxes last year.
They also charge franchise taxes to various utilities. Last year those came to $63,334,112.
The citizens of El Paso pay for franchise taxes through increased bills from the companies. The companies just add the tax to your bill.
The $63 million is actually an addition of 23% to what we pay for city operations.
They even charge franchise taxes to the city owned water utility and the city owned garbage collection department.
We deserve better
Brutus
elpasospeak 
Wait until you find out what your house is worth in the coming years
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I haven’t seen a house on my cu-de-sac sell for more than appraised value in over a decade. Usually it is substantially under. It is just sad how the progressives in this town are robbing property owners to fund their friends and family deals.
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Tell me the name of your street and I will research sales versus tax appraised values. Your statement is not consistent with my experience. Because Texas is a non-reporting state, CAD does not have access to sales price in most sales, and neither does the public. Therefore, tax assessed values tend to be lower than actual sales price. Your street may be the exception.
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Neighbors talk. And you can visit the county website and see what people are financing their houses for to verify. I agree in the average house price range houses have appreciated. In the $250k+ plus range there is a different story because the number of buyers who can afford that is much lower. I actually did the research because I appeal my property value when the skew gets too high. I’ve made two house appeals to CAD and one business property rendition appeal (that went all the way to the review board). I won all three. The house valuation issue was reversed because CAD had estimated my house square footage at 800 sf more that it was based on exterior measurements that didn’t consider a high ceiling great room. Then when CAD changed computer systems they reloaded the pre-appeal records and I had to do it all over again. On the business property rendition CAD was refusing to recognize depreciation. Using their depreciation method I presented to the appeal board and got it lowered. The review board seemed unhappy about the fact that a legitimate valuation had been rejected by CAD. I haven’t had a problem with CAD on that since then.
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When neighbors talk, you get three prices – what the seller said he got, what the buyer said he paid, and then there’s the real price. The county website does not accurately, or completely, report financing information.
Congratulations on successfully challenging 3 properties. But with well over 300,000 parcels of property in the area, that doesn’t suggest a trend. I’ll make the offer again, tell me the name of the street you first mentioned in your post, and I’ll research it and report back here with true numbers.
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What really skews our street is lack of actual comps and low turnover. CAD doesn’t differentiate between new construction and older houses. Buyers do.
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Good idea. I’m going to make my car pay for space in my garage.
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For decades we had mayors and councils who were not “progressive.” They did not invest in the city. Look what happened…we went from being one of more prosperous cities in Texas to one of the poorest. Downtown went to hell. People with success on their agenda began moving away. You can call those now who are trying to make up for decades of neglect “progresive” if you so choose but they are trying to make up for decades of neglect. If you do not agree with improvements downtown, with the increasing number of entertainment venues available…then you must be in favor of continuing the decline of a once vibrant city. Turn the lights off when you leave.
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Most cities that are truly successful have businesses investing and driving change. Tax and spend revitalization doesn’t work. It will take us another decade to figure that out, but the only thing the progressives have done is mortgage El Paso’s future. Ten years from now, we’ll be near bankruptcy and a lot of what is being built now will be deteriorating just like Cohen stadium (I still remember when the Cohen canopies were going to change the dynamics in that area).
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