What a Voter-Approval Tax Rate Election is, what a golden penny is, and what Leon ISD is actually asking for.
Leon ISD is asking voters to approve 3¢ per $100 of taxable property value on the Maintenance & Operations side of the school tax rate. Those three cents are the district’s last three “golden pennies” — operating money that, under Texas law, stays in Leon ISD instead of going back to the state.
Leon ISD says the revenue goes to teacher and staff compensation and to maintenance and operational needs.
It appears on the ballot as Proposition D.
Leon Strong asks you to vote FOR the VATRE.
A Voter-Approval Tax Rate Election. Texas law sets a rate a district may adopt on its own. To go above that, the district has to ask voters — that election is a VATRE.
It is a separate question from the bond propositions, and it pays for entirely different things:
| The bond | The VATRE | |
|---|---|---|
| Tax rate side | Interest & Sinking (I&S) | Maintenance & Operations (M&O) |
| Pays for | Buildings, buses, facilities | Salaries, utilities, day-to-day operations |
| Can it pay teachers? | No — prohibited by law | Yes |
That last row is the whole reason both are on the ballot. A district cannot use bond money to raise teacher pay, no matter how much of it passes.
Texas school tax rates are measured in pennies, literally.
So a 3¢ request is roughly $60 a year on a $200,000 taxable value — before exemptions. Your actual number depends on your appraised value and your exemptions, which is what the calculator below is for.
Leon ISD is a Chapter 41 district — what people usually call a “recapture” or “Robin Hood” district. A large share of what it collects locally can be sent back to the state and redistributed elsewhere.
Golden pennies are the exception. Texas lets a district keep the revenue from roughly the first eight M&O pennies above its base rate. That money is not subject to recapture. It stays home.
Leon ISD currently levies 5 of its 8. The VATRE asks for the last 3.
This is why the VATRE is a different kind of ask than a normal tax increase: the pennies being requested are specifically the ones the state does not take a cut of. Leon ISD says 100% of that revenue stays in the district.
Texas freezes school taxes on a homestead at a “ceiling” for homeowners who are 65 or older or who qualify as disabled. If that applies to you, this election generally does not raise your school taxes. The main exception is if you add improvements to the home.
Don’t take our word for what this costs — or anyone else’s. Enter your own appraised value and compare the result to the school line on your actual tax statement:
Open the tax impact calculator
The calculator starts from Leon ISD’s current total rate of $0.7467 per $100, so you can confirm it reproduces your current bill before you look at the change. It applies the $140,000 homestead exemption Texas provides for a primary residence in 2026.
The 3¢ figure and what it funds are Leon ISD’s, published at leonisdbond.com. The golden-penny mechanics and the tax calculator are from Know Leon County, an independent civic information site — not from this committee.
For the full breakdown with worked examples:
