James Quintero is the policy director for the Texas Public Policy Foundation’s Government for the People campaign. Since joining the Foundation in 2008, Quintero has focused extensively on: state & local government spending, taxes, debt, public pension reform, annexation, and local regulations.
Every even-numbered year, the state’s Legislative Budget Board (LBB) publishes a helpful, user-friendly summation of the General Appropriations Act (GAA), otherwise known as the state’s two-year budget. On Wednesday, the LBB published the next iteration—its 2024-25 Fiscal Size-Up. From a 30,000 ft. level, this new report provides “a comprehensive review of how tax dollars were...
The proposed Southern Spirit transmission line connecting Texas to Louisiana and Mississippi has generated a lot of headlines over the past week, with my favorite coming from the publication Electrek: “Hell froze over in Texas—the state will connect to the U.S. grid for the first time via a fed grant.” I laughed. The article fails...
Many city, county, and school district officials are right now deciding where to set tax rates for the next fiscal year. In some cases, these local decisions will push property taxes higher, creating new challenges for families struggling with affordability. Given the very real prospect of tax hikes on the horizon, now is the time...