County raises exemption for seniors, disabled residents

Travis County Commissioners Court on Tuesday voted to extend more relief to seniors and disabled residents. The Court voted 3-1 to raise to $80,000 the property tax exemption offered to those groups. The move comes just one year after the Court raised the exemption to $75,000. County staff estimated that the tax relief will dent the next budget by $800,000, an amount that cost the support of Commissioner Gerald Daugherty who argued that raising the exemption only shuffles the region’s affordability issues to other shoulders. Commissioner Brigid Shea responded by arguing that an imbalance in property appraisals that favors commercial property owners is a major cause of the pinch being felt by homeowners. However, Daugherty said that commercial property appraisals have significantly increased in the past year. He concluded, “The unfortunate thing is residential properties are going to continue to go up because the demand is so much greater than the supply.”