Tomball ISD cut its rate seven-tenths of a cent and signed $59 million of bond work the same night

Tomball ISD trustees cut the district tax rate by seven-tenths of a cent Tuesday and, at the same meeting, signed a $49.27 million construction contract inside a $59 million project budget. The rate cut is real. The number that says whether the district collects more money than last year was not published.

Why it matters

Tomball ISD is a Harris County taxing unit, and its rate lands on the same bill as the county’s. A lower rate does not by itself mean a lower tax bill, because rising appraised values can more than cover the difference. The district also promised voters in May 2025 that a $429 million bond would not raise the total district tax rate. Sixteen months later the total rate is lower than the year before, so on that promise the record holds.

By the numbers

$1.0558 per $100 of valuation, the adopted rate. That is $0.6598 for maintenance and operations plus $0.3960 for debt service. The two add to $1.0558 exactly.
$0.0071 lower than last year’s $1.0629.
$429,095,000, Bond 2025, approved by voters May 3, 2025. Four propositions: $331,595,000 for facilities, $76,700,000 for multi-program activity centers, $18,000,000 for technology and $2,800,000 for the original high school stadium. They sum to the total exactly.
$49.27 million to ICI Construction for a new Tomball Intermediate School, inside a stated project budget of $59 million.
$9.73 million is the difference between those two, or 16.5 percent of the project budget, for everything that is not the construction contract.
$8.63 million to $8.73 million, an increase of $100,000 or 1.16 percent, on the Millennium Project Solutions contract for the Tomball High School career and technology facility, funded from the 2021 bond.

What the coverage buried

Community Impact reported the rate cut and the contracts accurately. It left out the no-new-revenue rate, which is the rate that would raise the same money from the same properties as last year. That single figure is the difference between “your taxes went down” and “the rate went down and the district still collects more.”

The story also prints $49.27 million and $59 million in the same item without noting they are different things. The gap is $9.73 million. A reader who assumed the school costs $49.27 million would be short by about a sixth.

The other side

A project budget above a construction contract is normal and not a red flag. It covers design, site work, furniture, technology, testing and contingency, and publishing only the construction number would be the more misleading choice. Seven-tenths of a cent is also a small cut, and a district that holds a rate flat or trims it while opening schools is doing something other districts in Harris County are not.

Both points stand. The objection is not that the numbers are wrong, it is that the two figures a homeowner needs, the no-new-revenue rate and the total levy, were not next to the rate that was printed.

What to watch

Tomball ISD’s certified no-new-revenue rate and total 2026 levy, which will show whether collections rose or fell.
The debt service rate as Bond 2025 money is issued. The $0.3960 figure is the one to track against the district’s promise not to raise the total rate.
The construction schedule for the new Tomball Intermediate School at the Tomball Innovation Center.
Any further change orders on the Millennium contract, which has already moved once.

Bottom line

Tomball ISD lowered its rate and kept a promise it made to voters in 2025, and that deserves saying plainly. It also committed $59 million on the same night, and the coverage gave residents neither the no-new-revenue rate nor the gap between the construction contract and the project budget. Both are public. Both belong in the story.

Sources

Editorial