Count the pieces. The headline is the last thing to trust.
You searched because the bay cities do not share one local bucket, even when the customer paid 8.25%. Corpus Christi's line names a transit authority and a district the Portland line does not. The path below labels the pieces the rate file already printed.
Nueces County's handbook says the port of Corpus Christi opened in 1926, and it lists oil refineries, gas plants, and chemical plants among the industries that followed the fields. Tourism, agribusiness, petroleum refining, shipbuilding and repair, and meat packing are on the later industry list. The Naval Air Station, Corpus Christi, was established on March 12, 1941. The city entry says the region became a petroleum and petrochemical center, that the port handles agricultural products as well as petroleum, and that Del Mar College and Texas A&M University at Corpus Christi are the higher-education campuses. Annual events on that entry include Buccaneer Days and the Navy Relief Festival.
Nueces County and San Patricio County form the middle. Sinton is San Patricio's seat. Aransas County lies outside, with Rockport as its seat. A Corpus Christi slip in Nueces has to be taken apart: city tax 1.375%, Corpus Christi MTA 0.5%, Corpus Christi Crm Con Dist 0.125%, county column zero. The state's 6.25% completes 8.25%. The bus piece is half a point with a name, and the district is an eighth of a point with a different name. Portland's San Patricio row is a plain 2% city tax, transit column blank, district absent, and still 8.25%. The bus name changes the Corpus Christi slip and never appears on Portland's.
The bay is ports, refining, a naval air station, and visitors. The books are whichever of those actually hit your register.
Counties: Nueces (central); San Patricio (central); Aransas (outlying).
Nueces, San Patricio, and Aransas are three appraisal districts. Renditions are due April 15 where the property sits. A boat in Corpus Christi and equipment in Rockport are not one list because both combined rates say 8.25%.
Four city lines show why the cap is a bad shortcut. Corpus Christi in Nueces County: city 1.375%, Corpus Christi MTA 0.5%, Corpus Christi Crm Con Dist 0.125%, combined 8.25%. Robstown, also Nueces: city 1.5%, Corpus Christi MTA 0.5%, no district on the row, combined 8.25%. Portland in San Patricio County: city 2%, no transit, combined 8.25%. Rockport in Aransas County: city 1%, county 0.5%, Aransas Co Health Serv 0.5%, no transit, combined 8.25%. The county file shows no county sales tax in Nueces or San Patricio, and a 0.5% county sales tax in Aransas, which matches these rows.
State sales tax is 6.25%. The franchise report is due May 15. The dollar threshold for no tax due is not printed here. Texas has no state income tax. Sales tax follows the permit, not the skyline.
Do the arithmetic on one Corpus Christi slip before you trust the cap. City tax 1.375%. Corpus Christi MTA 0.5%. Corpus Christi Crm Con Dist 0.125%. State 6.25%. Added up, that is the 8.25%, and each piece keeps its own name. Pouring them into an account called City Tax saves the customer's money and loses the names. Robstown keeps the transit authority and omits the district. Portland has neither. Rockport's extra half point is named Aransas Co Health Serv, which is not city tax and not a transit authority.
A dock invoice and a gift-shop slip can both be honest in a city whose handbook lists a port opened in 1926, refineries, the Naval Air Station from March 12, 1941, and visitors at Buccaneer Days. They are not one column. Offer Steven one of each, plus the return and the deposits. A refinery does not get audited in this pass. The names already printed on the rate rows get written down, including that 0.125% district. It is too small to wave away as rounding and too specific to bury. Fees explain a short deposit. The slip, not the deposit, is the sale.
Labels come back while the return can still change. You approve a finished return electronically. Nobody ferries a folder across the bay, because no Palmieri counter is waiting on the other shore. The bay is why the customers were there. The buckets are what gets filed. Say which paper is the dock and which is the counter, then stop talking.
A refinery vendor file and a visitor counter are different guides. Use the industry list to pick.
Book a time if the open return is the one with the unlabeled 8.25%.
Book a time for a free look at the file
Sources:
Handbook of Texas: Nueces County
Handbook of Texas: Corpus Christi
County membership is the OMB 2023 delineation supplied for this project. City rates, including Corpus Christi MTA and Corpus Christi Crm Con Dist, are the July 2026 Texas Comptroller city-rate file.