ECTOR COUNTY, TX (KWES) - Board members of the Ector County Hospital District are now second guessing their tax hike. They are still looking for an increase, but not nearly as much.
David Nelson, a member of the board of directors for the Ector County Hospital District said after hearing the concerns of Ector County community members at last week's meeting, the majority of the board members decided to back off such a high tax rate hike.
The current tax rate for the hospital district is .073 cents per hundred valuation. The original proposed increase was .00995 cents per hundred valuation. Now, the hospital is looking at a rate closer to .0833 cents.
This means an average Ector County home valued at $142,1110 would pay about $117.95 per year. That's about $9.83 per month, an increase of about $1.18 per month.
Nelson said making the decision was easy, "The impact of some of the ladies that were there, they're basically single moms that were struggling and it was hard not to have any compassion on them because they really were sincere on what they were saying."
Nelson said the board is hopeful that the economy will improve. They expect a tougher year but will find a way to make it work.
Nelson said the executive team agreed to pass on a raise this year. However, staff on the floor, like nurses, will not be affected by that decision.
"This is not going to affect the quality of the hospital at all," said Nelson. "That is the biggest concern. That's the thing we look at, that we can continue to do things that we need to do. We have the capital budget that will take care of the equipment that we need."
Nelson said the board expects to adopt both the tax rate and budget at Tuesday's meeting at 1:30 p.m.
