Fort Worth District 5 Budget Town Hall – September 2, 2026
Fort Worth District 5 Budget Town Hall – September 2, 2026
On September 2, 2026, Councilmember (not named in transcript) hosted a District 5 budget town hall at which City Manager Jay Choppa and Fort Worth Lab Director Christian Simmons presented the proposed Fiscal Year 2027 budget. The meeting, the eighth of ten, was attended by approximately 20-50 people in person and streamed to about 200 viewers. The presentation focused on a $3.3 billion total operating budget, a general fund shortfall driven by Tarrant Appraisal District (TAD) practices, and the recommended property tax rate increase from 67 cents to 70.2 cents per $100 valuation (later adjusted to 70.565 cents after council-directed restorations). Residents asked questions and offered comments on spending priorities, service cuts, and the impact of TAD’s reappraisal plan.
Public Comments & Testimony
- Bob (resident): Expressed strong opposition to what he termed wasteful spending, specifically calling for the elimination of the community engagement office and the police oversight monitor. He stated these positions cost more than the Texas Attorney General and are unnecessary.
- Evelyn Bagley (transplant resident): Raised concerns about rapid development, loss of mature trees, and lack of shade in parks. She criticized the city for not preserving large trees and replacing them with smaller ones, and for playgrounds without shade.
- Colita (resident): Asked about neighborhood services programs and whether they factor in preserving nature; expressed hope that green space is being protected.
- Unidentified male resident: Asked whether TAD’s practices caused the tax rate increase and questioned what the tax rate would be if Fort Worth values grew like Collin and Dallas counties. He also asked about the police budget increase and the inevitability of those costs.
- Unidentified female resident: Questioned the reduction in the neighborhood improvement program, asking if it was a real cut or just a funding shift. She also asked about CCPD funding and its original intent for community programs.
- Multiple speakers: Expressed concerns about specific program cuts (e.g., Alliance PetSmart Adoption Center, mobile tool shed) and advocated for restoring services.
Discussion Items
- Budget Overview: City Manager Jay Choppa explained that Texas law requires a balanced budget. The total operating budget is $3.3 billion, with the general fund at $1.15 billion. About 60% of general fund revenue comes from property taxes. Christian Simmons noted that because of TAD’s every-other-year reappraisal plan and a high number of protests, property tax growth was only 0.89% (well below the projected 2%), creating a $49 million gap that later narrowed to $37 million after cuts.
- TAD Impact: Simmons presented a graph comparing average taxable home values in Collin, Dallas, and Tarrant counties, showing Tarrant values flat then falling, while other counties grew. The city manager noted TAD is the only appraisal district in Texas using its current methodology.
- Budget Reductions: Departments were asked for 1% and 3% reduction ideas, yielding $7.8 million in savings. Deeper cuts included: eliminating vacant positions, reducing employee pay-for-performance from 4% to 1.5% (later partially restored), and reducing the transfer to the Economic Development Initiatives Fund from $5 million to $500,000. The proposed budget originally cut the Alliance PetSmart Adoption Center and removed six code compliance positions, but council and public pushback led to restorations.
- Police and Fire Funding: The police budget increases by about $23 million, mostly due to contractual pay raises (averaging 6%). The budget also adds 76 patrol officers (funded by CCPD initially) and creates 30 corporal positions to allow promotions within patrol. Fire’s budget grows $52.6 million, largely due to a $30 million subsidy for EMS, a placeholder for a new labor contract, and fleet/overtime cost adjustments.
- Fee Increases: Various fee increases were proposed, most notably a four-year phased solid waste fee increase after 22 years without an increase. The city manager cited the need to replenish reserves and plan for future landfill replacement. Average resident bill impact: about $7.09 more per month from stormwater, water, solid waste, and environmental fees combined.
- Property Tax Bill Effect: Despite a recommended tax rate increase (70.2 to 70.565 cents), the average homestead taxable value is falling, so the city portion of the tax bill is slightly lower than the current year. The councilmember emphasized that the city lowered the tax rate 8 of the last 10 years, and this increase is needed to maintain services.
- Neighborhood Improvement Program (NIP): The budget reduces NIP funding from $4 million to $1 million in year one, but officials explained this is a funding delivery shift (matching actual spending) and not a service cut; the program will still select a neighborhood each year but fund projects over three years.
- Will Rogers Complex: The city is transitioning management of Will Rogers Memorial Complex to a third-party operator to increase efficiency and reduce subsidy from hotel occupancy tax. The city retains ownership. Public events budget declines due to convention center expansion taking key spaces offline.
- Employee Pay for Performance: Originally cut to 1.5% (mid-year), council sought to restore to 4% (2% budget impact), costing $4 million and raising the tax rate to 70.565 cents.
Key Outcomes
- No formal votes were taken; this was a public engagement session. The councilmember stated she would carry feedback to upcoming council budget meetings.
- The recommended tax rate as of the meeting was 70.565 cents per $100 valuation (up from 70.2 cents) to restore the Alliance PetSmart Adoption Center, six code positions, seven development services positions, and restore employee pay-for-performance.
- Departments with the largest budget increases: Fire (+$52.6M), Police (+$23M), Emergency Management & Communications (+$1.2M). Decreases: Property Management (shift of vehicle replacement to debt), Economic Development (reduced transfer), Neighborhood Services (funding smoothing).
- The city will continue to work with TAD to understand future valuation impacts and adjust budgeting accordingly.
- Public comment will be accepted at the formal public hearing on September 3, 2026 at 2:00 PM at City Hall. Two more district meetings will be held.
Meeting Transcript
This district five cares. So Ashley, thank you for coming tonight. Thank you all for being here. Tonight we wanted to talk about the budget. And I want you all to be informed about the budget and what the city is facing and what we're trying to do. And for those of you like me who've lived here for a long time and I know your fifth generation, uh Fort Worthian, we want you to know what is happening and how we spend the money and try to spend it well and try to be very prudent in the decisions that we make. So tonight, the person who's responsible for putting all those numbers together, because y'all know it takes me a little while to understand them, but is our amazing city manager, Jay Choppa, who is here tonight to not only help answer the questions, but walk us through some of this. And so let me introduce you to Jay. And Jay, take it away. Thank you so much, Councilmember. Well, good evening. Thanks for coming out tonight. I'm just gonna provide a little bit of an overview and then I'm gonna turn it over to Christian Simmons. She's a director of the Fort Worth Lab that's responsible for budget and performance at the city. And she'll go through a presentation. But just a little background if you've never paid attention to the city budget or how that works. Under state law, we're required to put together a balanced budget. So we can't, we're not like the feds where they can run a deficit and have to pay interest and all that has to be a balanced budget on an annual basis. And the budget for the city is total operating budget's about $3.3 billion. All right. So that includes all aspects of the city. So the city is kind of like a conglomerate where it has different lines of businesses. And so you have, you know, you have the general fund, which is the what everybody kind of pays attention to. The general fund is basically our property taxes, sales taxes, and other general fees that fund like police, fire, the things you think about the city when you think about what the city does. Police, fire, transportation, public works, parks, libraries, those kind of activities. And then, but you also have all these other funds, like the water department, it's a utility, stands on its own. The aviation department, which is our three, our three uh airports, that stands on its own. Our solid waste. Yes, is here. I met him earlier. Um environmental services that includes the solid waste fund. Um, so we have all these different funds. The thing, the thing is about it, when people say we have a shortfall in one area, and we're we're talking about how we're gonna address that shortfall. People think, well, that's just this amount, and you gotta get it from 3.3, you have 3.3 billion dollars. You can find that savings. Well, the issue is that you can't take dollars like from the water department to pay for police or fire or transportation public works. It has to stay in the utility. So when Christiane goes through the presentation, she'll kind of define some of the issues that we had this year as it relates to the general fund and why we had a shortfall uh related to the general fund and what we're we're talking about. So at the end of the day, I as part of the budget, I did I am recommending an increase in the tax rate, but a lot a lot of that has to do with how Tad, Terran Appraisal District, changed up how they do appraisals. And so, and and they were the only group in the state, the only appraisal district in the state that's actually doing what they're currently doing with the appraisal uh single family appraisals. But with that, I want to be available for questions as Christian goes along through the presentation. Feel free to raise your hand. This is being live streamed. We actually uh this is the eighth of 10 meetings. We've been averaging about 200 people on the live stream and about somewhere between 20 and 50 people in person. So if you have a question, we'd like to get you on the mic so that make sure that it's recorded so the folks hear it. And they're also all available on our website if you want to go back and look at a at a previous one. So I'm gonna turn it over to Christiane. She's gonna go through the presentation. And thank you for being here.
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