Somebody in Forsyth County really got this tax bill. Let's follow where the money actually goes, and figure out why the whole thing keeps climbing.
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Pay to the order of — Forsyth County
$1,000
Your housewhere it goes ↓
follow it in ↓
01 · where it goes
Sourced · Forsyth FY2026-27 budget
None of this is waste. It's the stuff you actually use: your kid's school, the ambulance, the deputy down the road. The county spending the money was never the problem. The trouble starts with where that money has to come from.
02 · the catch
It can't really say no.
Almost everything the county spends on, the state makes it do. Tap any of these to see who gives the order, and who's stuck paying for it.
Public schoolsState-requiredtap +
Who orders itThe state constitution. Every county has to fund schools.
Who paysThe state covers a base, then the county piles local property-tax money on top.
The catchSchools can't tax anyone themselves. They get whatever the county hands them.
ElectionsState-requiredtap +
Who orders itState law, run exactly the way the legislature says to run it.
Who paysThe county. New machines or new ID rules just become a local bill.
The catchNobody ever votes to "fund elections." It just shows up in the budget.
Sheriff & jailState-requiredtap +
Who orders itThe state. A sheriff and a county jail aren't optional.
Who paysThe county, just about all of it.
The catchThe building, the staffing, the state standards: those costs are mostly fixed. Split among 20,000 people instead of 200,000, the same jail costs far more per person.
Social servicesState-requiredtap +
Who orders itThe state and the feds. Medicaid, food aid, child welfare.
Who paysMostly state and federal money, but the county hires the people and rents the building.
The catchThe program money comes from above. The staff and space are local.
CourtsState-requiredtap +
Who orders itThe state runs the courts. The county provides the courthouse.
Who paysThe county builds it, heats it, secures it, and keeps it standing.
The catchIt's a split bill that nobody really sees.
EMS & 911State-requiredtap +
Who orders itThe state sets the standards for emergency response.
Who paysThe county.
The catchA rural county covers way more road per taxpayer. It costs more and brings in less.
So the state decides what has to get done, and your property tax is what pays for it.
03 · zoom out
That was your $1,000.
Now back up and look at the whole county. It's your thousand plus everybody else's, plus a slice that comes down from the state and the feds.
Sourced · Forsyth FY2026-27 budget
Who funds the county≈ $601M / yr
Property tax · 61%The county's main source, and the only one it really sets itself. This is the number that goes up or down.You set this
Sales tax · 18%The county keeps a small slice of what people spend. It can't make anyone spend more, and the state caps how much it's allowed to charge. Any increase needs a public vote.Limited
State & federal · 8%Money sent down from Raleigh and Washington, mostly locked to specific programs like Medicaid and social services. The county can't move it around.Locked
Other · 13%Fees and permits, what the county earns on money it holds, and savings it draws down. Real money, but small pieces, and a lot of it one-time.Limited
Property tax is the only one the county really controls. Keep going, because that's the piece that ends up doing all the work.
04 · the squeeze
Your county is a household.
Think of the county like a household and the state like its main employer. A big share of the county's money is basically a paycheck from Raleigh.
Every year the bills go up, the way yours do. But that paycheck hasn't kept up. And the bills still have to get paid.
Schematic · illustrative shape, not a data series
↗ the bills keep climbing
you
THEN
you
+5 YRS
you
+10 YRS
you
NOW
The paycheck from the state, staying about flatWhat the county raises itself, which is your property tax
The bill on top keeps climbing while the state's paycheck stays put. So the red part, the money the county has to raise itself from you, stretches further every year to cover the difference.
05 · and then
Then it gets harder.
Stick with the job analogy, because this is where it lands. Picture an employer who pulls three moves at once.
It decided to make less
The state keeps cutting its own taxes, with the corporate tax headed all the way to zero. Less coming in up top means a smaller paycheck going down to the county.
So it gives you more to do
It keeps piling on required costs the county can't refuse, like mandated retirement and health contributions. Forsyth's own budget names those as a big reason its costs went up.
And now it wants to cap what you can earn
When the county tries to make up the gap the only way it can, through property tax, the legislature moves to cap that too. It passed a bill putting a constitutional amendment on your November ballot.
Put simply: the state is sending the county less, piling on more it has to pay for, and now moving to block the one way it could catch up.
06 · the choice
The money is there.
Here's the part that gets me. This isn't a law of nature, it's a choice. The state is handing out income tax cuts, and its own budget office laid out who they're really for.
Sourced · NC Office of State Budget & Management
REAL — NC OSBM, on the state's scheduled income tax cuts
Who actually gets the cut? The state's own math: the top 5% of earners take more than 40% of it. The bottom 40% of households split just 3.3%. The richest 1% average over $8,000 back, while nearly four in ten households get under a hundred bucks.
And sure, the biggest earners pay the most income tax, so any rate cut tilts their way. That's kind of the point. Of all the ways the state could hand money back, it keeps choosing the one that works like that.
Add it all up, and here's what the state is choosing to give away.
$9.7B
a year by the mid-2030s, the revenue the state is forgoing to these tax cuts, with the largest share flowing to corporations and the highest earners.
Source: NC Office of State Budget & Management (nonpartisan). The $9.7 billion is OSBM's figure for all the cuts scheduled under current law, individual and corporate combined, by FY 2033-34. The who-gets-what figures are OSBM's estimates for the first scheduled rate cut, 3.99% to 3.49%, among households that file.
The corporate rate is the clearest tell. It was 6.9% in 2013, and it hits zero in 2030. That piece alone is about $1.8 billion a year.
77%of North Carolina voters said they're against zeroing out the corporate tax, so this isn't really a partisan thing.2024 TargetSmart poll, via NC Budget & Tax Center (an advocacy group).
Here's where it lands on you. Every dollar the state stops collecting up top is a dollar it doesn't send back down. But the bills it mandates keep coming, and the county has one real lever left to cover them: the property tax you met at the start. The cut for corporations becomes the climb on your bill.
07 · out in the county
It's harder in rural places.
You're looking at the county with the bigger tax base. Now look next door. Stokes is mostly homes, farms, and small towns, so the same orders from Raleigh land on far less to tax.
Here's what that does. The rural county taxes itself harder and still raises less:
53.52¢
Forsyth rate
62.5¢
Stokes rate, higher
It plays out statewide. Wealthier counties end up with far more to spend, even though rural counties tax themselves harder. You can see it in what schools manage to add to teacher pay:
$9,828
Wake County supplement
$1,000
Greene County, taxing higher
Teacher supplements: Public School Forum of NC, 2023-24. Local supplements only: the state adds up to $4,250 in low-wealth counties through a separate allotment. The gap shown is the local piece. Rates: NCDOR / county budgets, FY2025-26.
08 · who pays for it
This lands on real people.
REAL — Charlotte Observer, June 2026
When the money runs short, the county is the last line of defense. Gaston County Schools warned it would cut up to 400 jobs over a budget shortfall. County commissioners put in $10 million, the district still shed staff, and by June it was warning of layoffs again. That's the backstop you pay for, and in a county the money comes mostly from local property tax.
09 · the other side
Plenty of people feel gouged.
And they're not wrong to. A cap sounds like relief. Here's the case for it, and the catch.
The case for the cap
A March 2026 Carolina Journal poll found 76.8% call property taxes a burden and 73.2% back the amendment. Speaker Destin Hall and the John Locke Foundation argue local governments overtax: they point to the 10 largest counties collecting about $2.6 billion more than a strict limit would have allowed.
Poll + figures: Carolina Journal / John Locke Foundation (pro-cap).
The catch
The cap treats the symptom. Rep. Deb Butler of New Hanover put numbers on it during the House debate: a levy limit might save a typical household around $300, while fixing the property tax relief programs the state already has could save some homeowners up to $6,000. And the driver doesn't move: cap the county's only real lever and you don't lower the bills the state mandates. You just force cuts to libraries, EMS, and schools.
House debate + relief comparison: NC Newsline, May 2026.
10
REAL — Carolina Journal, May 2026 · HB 1089 / Session Law 2026-5
Just do the job.
This November, the amendment on your ballot orders a cap on how much your county's property tax can grow. The catch: it doesn't set the limit. It tells the legislature to write one later. You'd be voting yes on a cap before anyone says how tight it is.
On your Nov 3, 2026 ballot:
"Constitutional amendment requiring limits on property tax increases by local governments."
HB 1089 · Session Law 2026-5
The state has the money. It's choosing tax cuts and leaving your county to cover what's left. The fix isn't capping the county. It's the legislature doing the job it already has.
