As property taxes continue to soar for Austin homeowners, City Council members are looking to intervene with a countermeasure they've long resisted: raising the city's homestead exemption to the maximum allowed by state law.
This week, the council is poised to authorize doubling the current 10% exemption on city property taxes and taking it to the maximum of 20% allowed by Texas law. That would result in the owner of a median home paying $141 less per year in city property taxes than the person would have without the exemption, according to city estimates.
The tax relief comes via a proposal from Mayor Steve Adler, who will be able to check off a signature campaign pledge he made back in 2014 to approve the maximum exemption. At the time, his stated plan was to phase in the exemption over four years, something a council majority adopted as a shared goal a year later when it voted to start with a 6% increase before going to 8% in 2016. Due to tight budget cycles in the following years, the exemption stalled out at 10% in 2018.