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Since some state leaders appear to be interested in requiring votes of the people prior to tax increases, it is easy to anticipate the filing of a bill to enact TABOR in Texas. Advocates of such an approach are apparently unimpressed with the Truth-in-Taxation safeguards already on the books. These safeguards, combined with old-fashioned anti-tax sentiment by local voters, have been more than sufficient to keep city taxes in check for years. No matter, say those who think that all taxing entities are out of control and must be reigned in. Here's more. The January 28, 2004, edition of the San Antonio Express News reported that the school funding approach favored by the Governor's chief of staff"would also prevent city and county governments from trying to raise their taxes after local school tax rates drop." In addition, the January 29, 2004, edition of the Quorum Report, an Austin-based newsletter, reported the following about the governor's school finance proposal: In order to prevent non-school taxing authorities from simply raising taxes to take advantage of school property tax reductions, there would be severe restrictions on other taxing authorities. Any effort to increase revenues would have to be approved in a public referendum by the voters...In order to 'fix the appraisal problem, ' local property tax appraisal boards would be elected. As if these possibilities weren't scary enough, still lurking in the background is S.J.R. 1, a bill that passed the Senate during the 2003 legislative session. (Please seethe January 9, 2004, edition of the TML Legislative Update.) That bill would have diverted some city sales taxes to the state, without providing a reliable mechanism to calculate the state's share versus the city's share. Also, that bill would have dramatically reduced local school property taxes, resulting in cities and counties paying a much higher share of appraisal district operating costs. There is every reason to think that a proposal similar to S.J.R. 1 may surface again. It is possible, in other words, that cities will face attacks on property and sales taxes during a special session, a session that is ostensibly about schools. The TML Task Force on the Impacts of School Finance Reform As previously reported, TML formed a special task force on school finance in August 2003. The Task Force on the Impacts of School Finance Reform was asked to: 1. identify the potential impacts on cities of legislation designed to reform the manner in which public schools are funded; 2. describe the potential impacts on specific revenue sources (property tax, sales tax, other revenues); 3. recommend ways in which the potentially negative impacts can most effectively be opposed; and 4. report to the TML Board at its November 19, 2003, meeting in San Antonio.