A recent editorial in the Sun Sentinel has the title “Property taxes keep growing. Why?”
For the Broward County budget, I have the answer. Total property tax revenues keep going up for three reasons: Inflation, population growth and issues that counties need to deal with, such as increased flooding caused by sea-level rise and additional unfunded mandates from the state requiring us to do more things without state funding.
If you have a homestead property, the most that your home’s assessed value has gone up each year is 3% or the CPI, whichever is lower.
Steve Geller is a Broward County commissioner. (courtesy, Steve Geller)
Chief Financial Officer Blaise Ingoglia has said that if a county’s spending increase over five years is lower than a combination of inflation, population growth and 15% miscellaneous (for other responsibilities) than the county’s spending is reasonable.
Ingoglia called a press conference to say Broward had overspent. He used sources that were not the sources most Florida governments use. He declined to say where he got his numbers.
Broward has a “budget book” number that calculates one set of numbers and an “annual comprehensive financial report,” or ACFR, that calculates a different set of numbers and is usually about 5% higher than the budget book.
Ingoglia compared the budget book as a start to the ACFR five years later. If you use the sources that most Florida governments use and compare either the budget books or the ACFRs, Broward met Ingoglia’s standard.
The truth is, we cannot pass Amendment 3 without raising other taxes or making devastating cuts to services such as police and fire. That’s why fire chiefs, sheriffs and police and firefighters unions all oppose the amendment.
The total county general revenue budget after setting aside required reserves is about $1.7 billion. Public safety takes more than half of that. After making other state-required payments, we are left with about $600 million in “discretionary” spending.
Building maintenance and security, cybersecurity and the county attorney’s office to review contracts and defend lawsuits are not really discretionary, and money that is discretionary goes to things like park, libraries, children and healthcare services, animal care and the environment.
If Amendment 3 passes, by Year 2, it would cut that $600 million by $334 million. Either the county will raise other taxes or our quality of life and public safety will go down dramatically.
We will also be underwater. Flood control and water management districts are funded almost entirely by property taxes. Broward’s two hospital districts are partially funded by property taxes.
Even Republican U.S. Sen. Rick Scott has doubts. On Fox Business, he said: “I’d love to get rid of the property taxes. Unfortunately, you’ve got to think about what you’re going to replace it with. We already have a very efficient state. So how are you going to fund education and transportation, the environment, things like that?”
Supporters are lying to you about Amendment 3. They tell you we are overtaxed, but Florida is one of the lowest-taxed states in the nation.
The Tax Foundation, a conservative organization, ranks Florida as the 5th lowest-taxed state in total combined state and local tax burden, and the lowest-taxed large state.
States with lower taxes benefit from oil revenue or lack Florida’s population and services required. Remember, too: Florida has no personal income tax and no estate tax.
Florida is expensive, but taxes are not the reason — it’s skyrocketing property insurance, which affects housing costs.
There are multiple rankings with different numbers, but Florida consistently runs about one-third higher than the next most expensive state, and two to three times the national average. The Legislature could address insurance costs by taking on the insurance and reinsurance industries — among their biggest campaign contributors — but instead they falsely blame local government spending.
Finally, your tax dollars will subsidize rural, upstate counties, while Broward will lose services. Broward already runs a lean operation. We levy just 5.6658 mills, well under the 10-mill cap the state allows.
Smaller, rural counties are at the 10-mill tax cap and cannot survive without help. To buy their votes for the constitutional amendment (which needs 60% approval statewide), Tallahassee will use state tax dollars to subsidize those rural counties.
Large counties like Broward will pay state taxes that will go to smaller counties while we will get dramatically reduced services in return. Beyond the money, this will further consolidate power in Tallahassee, and local governments that lose revenue will become more dependent on the state, surrendering the local control that elected officials have long championed.
The Legislature has already been preempting local decisions. This would accelerates that trend dramatically.
The constitutional amendment sounds great: Lower taxes without lowering needed services. It’s just not true. Remember this on Nov. 3.
Steve Geller is a Broward County commissioner.