The Blanco County Emergency Services District 2 board voted to refinance the loan for its station at the Aug. 11 meeting.

The board voted unanimously to refinance with Government Capital at an interest rate of 2.749 percent. The savings over the previous loan is expected to be about $455,000, said board member Lynne McKirdy. The loan will be repaid in 211 payments.

Monthly payments will be set at $14,328.05, which is just over $3 million. The payments will be approximately $2,000 less per month than the current loan. The expected closing date is Aug. 28, and payments are set to begin Oct. 1.

Associated attorneys’ fees, marketing costs and brokerage fees are included in the loan, McKirdy said.

The board voted unanimously to set a proposed tax rate of 10 cents per $100 valuation. The public hearing on the proposed tax rate was held Tuesday afternoon (Aug. 18) after press time.

If the rate was approved Tuesday, the cost to the average homestead in Blanco County would be $259, said board president Ann Hall. That’s an increase of $18 from last year, she said.

“That’s just not a whole lot of money, $18 dollars, to make sure you have ambulance service and fire service seven days a week,” Hall said.

The increase would be 7.47 percent.

Because the proposed tax rate is larger than the voter-approved rate, voters may petition for an election to reduce the rate. The election would be to reduce the rate to the voter-approved rate, which is 9.29 cents per $100 valuation.

“The taxpayers can call for...a rollback election. I think this year, with our expenses, we need to be at 10 cents,” Hall said.

Voters would need to gather signatures from 3 percent of the registered voters in the district for a rollback election to appear on the ballot.