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Covid, School Districts, Texas Property Taxes, and Class action lawsuits???

3,234 Views | 23 Replies | Last: 3 yr ago by 2wealfth Man
BTHOB-98
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School taxes make up about 70% (approximately) of property taxes. If kids are staying at home or we have to shut down again and parents are having to take care of their kids education I could see this getting ugly. If we do not have kids return to school or if they can't stay in the class I could see class action lawsuit by property owners to have taxes reduced? Thoughts?
drill4oil78
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Good luck .... Much of the public education cost is in administration. Do you really think they are not going to pay teachers or the bureaucracy during this time. I doubt it.

It will be interesting to see what the private schools do this fall.
Yesterday
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BTHOB-98 said:

School taxes make up about 70% (approximately) of property taxes. If kids are staying at home or we have to shut down again and parents are having to take care of their kids education I could see this getting ugly. If we do not have kids return to school or if they can't stay in the class I could see class action lawsuit by property owners to have taxes reduced? Thoughts?


I'm in
BTHOB-98
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I just think stuff like this is going to pop up. If kids don't attend then why should people pay so much?
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FarmerJohn
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Because people voted to pay that much. Besides, a lot of the money is already spent.
BTHOB-98
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JJMt said:

BTHOB-98 said:

School taxes make up about 70% (approximately) of property taxes. If kids are staying at home or we have to shut down again and parents are having to take care of their kids education I could see this getting ugly. If we do not have kids return to school or if they can't stay in the class I could see class action lawsuit by property owners to have taxes reduced? Thoughts?
What would the legal theory be behind such suits? I understand your point, but it has to fit within some recognized cause of action.


No idea. I am not a lawyer. Someone smarter than me will figure it out though. We're talking about huge amounts of money.

Taxes are paid so that service can be provided. If the service is not provided then there should be some kind of legal solution to get taxes reduced. People should have the right to educate their kids with that money. The reality is online home school is not even close to classroom education. Not the same universe.

Some of that money has been spent. Everyone paid in December and January for their property taxes. Money paid teachers and utilities and other expenses for the spring. School as not even started for the fall yet. There is money left. At the very least there could be a problem for 2021 taxes

Stringfellow Hawke
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BTHOB-98 said:

JJMt said:

BTHOB-98 said:

School taxes make up about 70% (approximately) of property taxes. If kids are staying at home or we have to shut down again and parents are having to take care of their kids education I could see this getting ugly. If we do not have kids return to school or if they can't stay in the class I could see class action lawsuit by property owners to have taxes reduced? Thoughts?
What would the legal theory be behind such suits? I understand your point, but it has to fit within some recognized cause of action.


No idea. I am not a lawyer. Someone smarter than me will figure it out though. We're talking about huge amounts of money.

Taxes are paid so that service can be provided. If the service is not provided then there should be some kind of legal solution to get taxes reduced. People should have the right to educate their kids with that money. The reality is online home school is not even close to classroom education. Not the same universe.

Some of that money has been spent. Everyone paid in December and January for their property taxes. Money paid teachers and utilities and other expenses for the spring. School as not even started for the fall yet. There is money left. At the very least there could be a problem for 2021 taxes




It would also be prudent to ask about transportation costs and salary since those services are not being provided. There are also medical and security staff that are not doing anything at this time compared to when students and staff are present.
gig em 02
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brs4688 said:

BTHOB-98 said:

JJMt said:

BTHOB-98 said:

School taxes make up about 70% (approximately) of property taxes. If kids are staying at home or we have to shut down again and parents are having to take care of their kids education I could see this getting ugly. If we do not have kids return to school or if they can't stay in the class I could see class action lawsuit by property owners to have taxes reduced? Thoughts?
What would the legal theory be behind such suits? I understand your point, but it has to fit within some recognized cause of action.


No idea. I am not a lawyer. Someone smarter than me will figure it out though. We're talking about huge amounts of money.

Taxes are paid so that service can be provided. If the service is not provided then there should be some kind of legal solution to get taxes reduced. People should have the right to educate their kids with that money. The reality is online home school is not even close to classroom education. Not the same universe.

Some of that money has been spent. Everyone paid in December and January for their property taxes. Money paid teachers and utilities and other expenses for the spring. School as not even started for the fall yet. There is money left. At the very least there could be a problem for 2021 taxes




It would also be prudent to ask about transportation costs and salary since those services are not being provided. There are also medical and security staff that are not doing anything at this time compared to when students and staff are present.
janitors, maintenance, cafeteria workers, food, coffee... if you look at the districts budget I bet most districts have already saved millions by not having summer programs
topher06
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brs4688 said:

BTHOB-98 said:

JJMt said:

BTHOB-98 said:

School taxes make up about 70% (approximately) of property taxes. If kids are staying at home or we have to shut down again and parents are having to take care of their kids education I could see this getting ugly. If we do not have kids return to school or if they can't stay in the class I could see class action lawsuit by property owners to have taxes reduced? Thoughts?
What would the legal theory be behind such suits? I understand your point, but it has to fit within some recognized cause of action.


No idea. I am not a lawyer. Someone smarter than me will figure it out though. We're talking about huge amounts of money.

Taxes are paid so that service can be provided. If the service is not provided then there should be some kind of legal solution to get taxes reduced. People should have the right to educate their kids with that money. The reality is online home school is not even close to classroom education. Not the same universe.

Some of that money has been spent. Everyone paid in December and January for their property taxes. Money paid teachers and utilities and other expenses for the spring. School as not even started for the fall yet. There is money left. At the very least there could be a problem for 2021 taxes




It would also be prudent to ask about transportation costs and salary since those services are not being provided. There are also medical and security staff that are not doing anything at this time compared to when students and staff are present.
Not certain whether it is true or not, but I know a couple of school nurses in Houston who claim that they are expected to take temps every day for the kids returning to school. Of course, priority is being given to returning kids to school who are economically disadvantaged or have some other limitation, so there are going to be some dual career parents who are pretty angry.

I have no kids, so school taxes are really just a cost of doing business that I receive no direct benefit from. With that perspective, I really don't care whether they give some rebate to recognize the increased work parents have to put in because I'm used to just paying to educate other people's children. Definitely recognize that some attorneys will try to realize a payday from this, and plenty of parents will be willing to oblige.
deadbq03
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I honestly don't know the answer to this, but I wonder if private schools are gonna lower their tuitions any if they move to online only. If the answer is no, I'm not sure you can expect public to do differently.

Also... I taught an online course in college while I was getting my masters, and even at the college level it was very hard for my students to learn online compared to my live courses. Made it very hard for me because I'd spend so much of my office hours reteaching folks who can't/won't read on their own. To be fair, my course was also 4 times as large.

Coupling that experience with what kind of poo my kids got from their elementary school this spring, and I can say with great certainty that they'd need to double teaching faculty if they were going to even try to give these kids the same quality of education. Your honors HS students can probably get away with online because they're driven, but everyone else will need more handholding in an online environment.
Stringfellow Hawke
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topher06 said:

brs4688 said:

BTHOB-98 said:

JJMt said:

BTHOB-98 said:

School taxes make up about 70% (approximately) of property taxes. If kids are staying at home or we have to shut down again and parents are having to take care of their kids education I could see this getting ugly. If we do not have kids return to school or if they can't stay in the class I could see class action lawsuit by property owners to have taxes reduced? Thoughts?
What would the legal theory be behind such suits? I understand your point, but it has to fit within some recognized cause of action.


No idea. I am not a lawyer. Someone smarter than me will figure it out though. We're talking about huge amounts of money.

Taxes are paid so that service can be provided. If the service is not provided then there should be some kind of legal solution to get taxes reduced. People should have the right to educate their kids with that money. The reality is online home school is not even close to classroom education. Not the same universe.

Some of that money has been spent. Everyone paid in December and January for their property taxes. Money paid teachers and utilities and other expenses for the spring. School as not even started for the fall yet. There is money left. At the very least there could be a problem for 2021 taxes




It would also be prudent to ask about transportation costs and salary since those services are not being provided. There are also medical and security staff that are not doing anything at this time compared to when students and staff are present.
Not certain whether it is true or not, but I know a couple of school nurses in Houston who claim that they are expected to take temps every day for the kids returning to school. Of course, priority is being given to returning kids to school who are economically disadvantaged or have some other limitation, so there are going to be some dual career parents who are pretty angry.

I have no kids, so school taxes are really just a cost of doing business that I receive no direct benefit from. With that perspective, I really don't care whether they give some rebate to recognize the increased work parents have to put in because I'm used to just paying to educate other people's children. Definitely recognize that some attorneys will try to realize a payday from this, and plenty of parents will be willing to oblige.


That would be a huge time waster to have one or two( nurse and an aide) taking temps for every student entering the building. Imagine a HS with 4,000 students. It would take hours if included a screening of any Covid screening questions included in process.
BTHOB-98
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deadbq03 said:

I honestly don't know the answer to this, but I wonder if private schools are gonna lower their tuitions any if they move to online only. If the answer is no, I'm not sure you can expect public to do differently.

Also... I taught an online course in college while I was getting my masters, and even at the college level it was very hard for my students to learn online compared to my live courses. Made it very hard for me because I'd spend so much of my office hours reteaching folks who can't/won't read on their own. To be fair, my course was also 4 times as large.

Coupling that experience with what kind of poo my kids got from their elementary school this spring, and I can say with great certainty that they'd need to double teaching faculty if they were going to even try to give these kids the same quality of education. Your honors HS students can probably get away with online because they're driven, but everyone else will need more handholding in an online environment.


This is spot on. The honors kids will hardly be bothered with this as they will be driven. The kids who have a hard time with math and reading will be in big trouble. Forget it if you have a kid that is esl or special education. It could be very a bad deal.

Back to the economics. I feel like the reason districts are pushing hard to start is so they can say they tried. Even if they shut down quickly. As one of the other posters said above they can claim "that money has been spent." Which protects their nest egg. I know someone has talked about this. On top of that all the pressure from people who have their kids in private school and charter schools going to take their money out of the system to educate their children differently. It could turn into a real hornets nest.
NoahAg
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I just want reparations for the last 8 years of school taxes we've paid while homeschooling our kids.

The whole system is screwed up. How did it ever make since that a family with 6 kids going to public school pays the same as a family with 1 kid?
jtraggie99
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NoahAg said:

I just want reparations for the last 8 years of school taxes we've paid while homeschooling our kids.

The whole system is screwed up. How did it ever make since that a family with 6 kids going to public school pays the same as a family with 1 kid?
It was never about your kids, or my kids. It was about this country deciding as a whole that it was worthwhile to have an educated populace, having that benefited all of us. It wasn't that terribly long ago that public schools were not really a thing and only the wealthy and privileged got an education. We decided to change that and agreed, as a country, that we should all chip in in doing so. It's the reason why being born poor in this country is not necessarily a life sentence.
topher06
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Well with that, I think we should all keep paying taxes. No kids or home schoolers are expected to pay forever regardless of no benefit
12thAngryMan
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Except the kids aren't getting educated so no one is benefiting from that societal decision. Or at least that's the argument these people are trying to make.
YouBet
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Love thought in OP and been saying we should get refund but we never would. Government schools are never going to give up funding.

In reality, you can expect taxes to increase.
LOYAL AG
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brs4688 said:

topher06 said:

brs4688 said:

BTHOB-98 said:

JJMt said:

BTHOB-98 said:

School taxes make up about 70% (approximately) of property taxes. If kids are staying at home or we have to shut down again and parents are having to take care of their kids education I could see this getting ugly. If we do not have kids return to school or if they can't stay in the class I could see class action lawsuit by property owners to have taxes reduced? Thoughts?
What would the legal theory be behind such suits? I understand your point, but it has to fit within some recognized cause of action.


No idea. I am not a lawyer. Someone smarter than me will figure it out though. We're talking about huge amounts of money.

Taxes are paid so that service can be provided. If the service is not provided then there should be some kind of legal solution to get taxes reduced. People should have the right to educate their kids with that money. The reality is online home school is not even close to classroom education. Not the same universe.

Some of that money has been spent. Everyone paid in December and January for their property taxes. Money paid teachers and utilities and other expenses for the spring. School as not even started for the fall yet. There is money left. At the very least there could be a problem for 2021 taxes




It would also be prudent to ask about transportation costs and salary since those services are not being provided. There are also medical and security staff that are not doing anything at this time compared to when students and staff are present.
Not certain whether it is true or not, but I know a couple of school nurses in Houston who claim that they are expected to take temps every day for the kids returning to school. Of course, priority is being given to returning kids to school who are economically disadvantaged or have some other limitation, so there are going to be some dual career parents who are pretty angry.

I have no kids, so school taxes are really just a cost of doing business that I receive no direct benefit from. With that perspective, I really don't care whether they give some rebate to recognize the increased work parents have to put in because I'm used to just paying to educate other people's children. Definitely recognize that some attorneys will try to realize a payday from this, and plenty of parents will be willing to oblige.


That would be a huge time waster to have one or two( nurse and an aide) taking temps for every student entering the building. Imagine a HS with 4,000 students. It would take hours if included a screening of any Covid screening questions included in process.
Schools are going to have to invest in things like THIS to handle the requirements to take temps if their districts or counties require it. You're right in that a one on one check is just not practical at all but this thing handles hundreds an hour.
Bluecat_Aggie94
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They get away with using my property tax dollars to shut down a month early ever year after STARR tests for "field trips" to the movies and amusement parks, and I can't seem to get a refund on those funds, so good luck with this.
topher06
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12thAngryMan said:

Except the kids aren't getting educated so no one is benefiting from that societal decision. Or at least that's the argument these people are trying to make.
I'm good with requiring everyone to continue paying 100% of their pre-COVID tax rate if we can stick that in some sort of holding account that can be used to educate future generations. That way everyone will just be continuing to pay taxes to further the societal decision (future education) like everyone who has no kids, has kids in private school or homeschools their children are forced to do for life.
Yesterday
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Dallas ISD is moving the start date to September 8th and extending the school year into June. I can get on board with this idea. Don't start school with some BS online learning system. Just move it back and extend the employees into summer.
PA24
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School taxes have gotten completely out of hand and unaffordable.


Comeby!
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I think the argument is flawed. What do you mean parents have to educate their children? Almost all districts have some sort of virtual learning academy.
2wealfth Man
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Unfortunately money is free these days; we just print more for whatever is needed for this program or that including schools. This likely won't end well for any of us.
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