Harris County Commissioners Court, which approved a property tax hike of nearly 10% last month, is set to approve a $250,000 expenditure to have a graffiti artist paint murals at the County’s juvenile detention center.
The agenda for the October 8 meeting of the Harris County Commissioners Court includes an item that states, “Request for approval of a personal services exemption from the competitive
bid requirements and that the County Judge execute an agreement with GONZO247 Art Studios in the amount of $250,000 for murals at the Juvenile Detention Center for the Office of the County Engineer for the period of October 8, 2024 – October 7, 2025.”
The backup materials for the meeting agenda include further background for the proposed project, saying, “GONZO247 will paint murals for Harris County Engineering inside of Harris County Juvenile probation Department’s building.”
According to his website, “Mario Enrique Figueroa, Jr., artistically known as GONZO247, is a Houston native and a self-taught multidisciplinary artist with over 30 years of experience. GONZO’s recognizable style of art, some in the form of large murals, adorn various neighborhoods around the city and state and in places around the world.”
Figueroa’s biography also states, “GONZO247 participated as a leading figure and pioneered graffiti and street art culture as an energetic underground art movement in Houston.”
Expensive street art projects have been popular among the Democrats on Harris County Commissioners Court.
In July, when hundreds of thousands of Harris County residents were still without power after Hurricane Beryl, the Harris County Commissioners Court approved a $210,000 expenditure for street art murals.
Harris County’s latest art project comes as local taxpayers will face a massive increase in their property tax bills.
As Holly Hansen of The Texan reported, Harris County Commissioners voted to increase the County’s property tax rate by 9.53% at their meeting on September 19. Hansen also reported that the budget adopted by the Commissioners Court cut funding for the Harris County District Attorney’s office by $6 million while increasing the salaries of elected officials by 9.2%.
Democrat Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo has defended the tax hike as “investing in the future” and blamed Republicans for “putting essential services at risk of being defunded” under the prior tax rate.
