The Dallas County Commissioners voted this morning to rescind the rescinding of the $69,000 senior citizen property tax exemption they voted to adopt at their previous meeting, effectively reinstating it. They learned, apparently for the first time, that they cannot rescind the senior citizen property tax freeze they adopted at their previous meeting without an amendment to the Texas Constitution, which seems unlikely.
Commissioner John Wiley Price learned that the commission had not voted to rescind the county’s $20,000 homestead exemption for seniors, as he thought they had. But they all learned that the $20,000 homestead exemption is not for seniors, as they thought it was. It’s for everybody.
They also learned after voting to rescind the rescinding of the special $69,000 senior citizen exemption that it’s not a senior citizen exemption and applies to everybody. They have no idea how any of this effects their budget, and while I was there, they did not ask. They haven’t adopted the budget yet, anyway. Which is a good thing?
The more I see, the more I question my own fairness in singling out County Judge Jim Foster for being non compos mentis. I think he and Maurine Dickey may be co-incompetent. More in my column in the paper version of Unfair Park tomorrow. --Jim Schutze
