MANATEE COUNTY Fla. (WWSB) – Florida Chief Financial Officer Blaise Ingoglia continued his statewide tour highlighting “excessive and wasteful government spending.”
He presented his findings on Manatee County Thursday afternoon at Pier 22.
Ingoglia explained that after crunching the numbers, the county’s general budget had risen $269 million, a nearly 70% increase after 5 years.
He presented the results of his Florida Agency for Fiscal Oversight audit of the county budget.
Ingoglia explained that the findings weren’t “meant to be an attack” but rather a criticism, and a wakeup call for local governments.
“It is incumbent on us to do everything that we can do to keep the government in check and hold them accountable and make sure they are using our tax dollars wisely,” Ingoglia said.
In six audits of local governments, Ingoglia reported nearly $1 billion in what he called excessive, wasteful spending in the 2024-2025 fiscal year budgets.
“It’s $1 billion that belongs in the hands of you, the taxpayers, and not in the hands of the government. That is $1 billion of property tax cuts they could have given you this year,” he said.
Ingoglia said that compared to other counties, Manatee County does not have a large budget. and determined over $112 million dollars as excessive and wasteful spending.
He adds that the budget increase over the last 5 years of nearly 70% is the largest his team has seen in its audit.
“We came up with the number of where the number should’ve been if you account for population and inflation. We have accounted for the normal growth of the government in our numbers,” Ingoglia explained.
He went on to include that Manatee County is probably the worst they have come to so far. “I’m sorry to say that Manatee County blew right past that number. blew right past it,” he said.
Manatee County issued a statement to ABC7 following the audit presentation. It reads:
“Manatee County has been fully cooperative with the CFO’s office and the Governor’s DOGE team throughout the last several months. Our team has supplied all requested information promptly and in good faith and has maintained regular communication with state officials, including meeting with the DOGE team this week in Tallahassee.
“We were not previously aware of the details released by the Chief Financial Officer today, but we welcome the opportunity to review the findings and better understand the analysis. In fact, Manatee County recently established a citizen-led Government Efficiency Liaison Committee, which is dedicated to reviewing spending, streamlining operations, and reducing waste. We hope they choose to investigate these findings and information the CFO shared. Manatee County remains committed to transparency, accountability, and responsible stewardship of taxpayer resources. We value our partnership with the State of Florida and share the same goal – to serve residents efficiently and effectively across all our shared communities.”
Ingoglia noted that this audit is separate from the DOGE audit; today’s figures focused on the amount of overspending. The DOGE audit will provide more specifics in terms of where funds were excessively or wastefully spent.
Copyright 2025 WWSB. All rights reserved.