Galveston County Municipal Utility District No: Fill & Download for Free

Tax rates in Houston and all of Texas, for Commercial Properties, varies by location of the property. Different locations have different taxing entities. It could be a combination of a local school district, municipal utility district or other local taxing jurisdiction. Each decides their tax rates after the annual property valuations come in and are based on revenue needs. *Keep in mind that in Texas we don’t have state income taxes, so property taxes can be higher than in other states.*As of April 2018, the AVERAGE commercial property tax rates were:Harris County: 2.26%Galveston County: 1.925%Dallas County: 2.173%Travis County: 1.973%Tarrant County: 2.321%Kendall County: 1.426%2019 tax rates have not yet been finalized as of the time I am writing this.If your property valuation comes back too high, you can protest it. But you have to file for a commercial property tax appeal by May 15th.

No surprise really, this sort of catastrophic flooding was predicted for Houston 20 years ago. Happens like clockwork on the Gulf/ Atlantic coasts. Global warming + increasing coastal urbanization = more such surprises. Guaranteed.Sandy “surprised” NYC and NJ. Irene also “surprised” New York State. Harvey “surprised” Houston. Sister Katrina “surprised” The Big Easy. If you discern a pattern of “surprises” here, you’re not dreamin’. A hundred billion here, a hundred billion there, pretty soon the insurance companies are no longer “surprised” that If you live within 50 miles of the Atlantic or Gulf coast on ground anywhere less than 50 feet above sea level, you will pay dearly to be similarly “surprised.” Call it the 50/50 No Surprises Rule.Surprise me once, shame on you, surprise me twice, shame on me. Harvey’s flooding was not only predictable, it was predicted 20 years ago in a detail report that called Houston’s 70 year old flood control system a disaster waiting to happen, which it did, 20 years later.A branch of my family has lived in the area since 1873. My grandfather was on a work crew that went to Galveston to help bury the 8,000 dead in the 1900 hurricane. Harvey was surprisingly large since it was a Category 4 that got stalled on the coast by a high pressure system over north Texas.The real “surprise” here is that the devastation gets worse economically and environmentally every time there’s a hurricane because most of what you’ve seen flooded in the region should never have been built in the first place- and so it is uninsured - for just this sort of risk. Makes sense, right ? I didn’t think so either.Houston has been compared to New Orleans (which is tiny by comparison), when its topography/ hydrology is actually more akin to the coastal lowlands of Bangladesh, whereby monsoon flooding inundates the entire region from the rivers as well as the sea. (New Orleans flooded from Lake Pontchartrain)As much of the world has recently learned, “bayou” is cajun for “swamp.” Our (original) family ranch was in Sugar Land, named after the sugar cane fields in the swamps. Now a suburb. Harris county was the largest producer of rice for decades - in naturally flooded fields - now all subdivisions. Simply put, much of what you see in those aerials should be farmland, because hydrologically, that is it's appropriate use. But for the grace of FEMA's increasingly comical "100 Year" flood insurance program and Ted Cruz's Excellent Bailout Bill, that's what the area would naturally revert to over time - rice paddies, sugar cane fields and cattle ranches. Anything else is a catastrophe waiting to happen.Ironically, the suburbanization of farm and ranch land has worsened flooding in the adjacent farm and ranch land. It's easier to get FEMA insurance on a house than on a tractor or a steer.Houston's ETJ extends over all of Harris County - meaning Houston can expand in any direction that is not incorporated, meaning it can grow like a prairie fire - and it has. Since Houston has no zoning laws, anything can be built anywhere you can get utilities to. Where there are no municipal utilities, you incorporate a private utility district. Repeat, repeat, repeat and the result is an urban grid similar to Lagos. This sort of urban sprawl is ill-suited to cope with natural disasters. since it’s a slo-mo environmental disaster itself.To actually prevent such regional flooding, the entire area would to have to be protected by dikes and massive pumps to get the water out - like Holland. Not just a few random river levees and the odd seawall, but a wall around the entire metro area. Won’t happen. Kind of like Trump's Imaginary Wall. Coveffe ?