Seminole County is firing back at Florida\u2019s Chief Financial Officer over his accusations the county is overspending by $120 million annually, alleging that the county\u2019s budget has risen primarily because of mandates from state government.<\/p>\n
Seminole found itself in CFO Blaise Ingoglia\u2019s crosshairs earlier this month after its board of county commissioners voted to raise its property tax rate, at a time when the CFO and Gov. Ron DeSantis are campaigning to abolish the tax, a major funding source for cities and counties.<\/p>\n
Commissioners have also hiked the county gas tax by five cents per gallon sold and increased its \u00a0public service tax on water and electric bills in the unincorporated areas from the current 4% to 10% starting Jan. 1.<\/p>\n
Ingoglia, a Republican, bashed the county for excessive spending, which he said was proof his crusade wasn\u2019t partisan. All five Seminole County Commissioners are Republicans.<\/p>\n
Board of County Commissioners Chair Jay Zembower sent a letter to Ingoglia last week contending that the CFO\u2019s \u201canalysis of our County budget presents an incomplete picture of our local government operations.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYour analysis assumes that local government expenditures should rise only by the combined rate of population growth and the Consumer Price Index (CPI),\u201d he wrote. \u201cWhile that assumption may work in theory, it overlooks state-imposed mandates; essential service demands; and community-supported programs that drive legitimate cost growth well beyond population and inflation.\u201d<\/p>\n
As examples, Zembower said that $121.5 million of the county\u2019s general fund can be attributed to things the state requires Seminole to\u00a0fund. That includes $73 million on jail operations, $19.3 million in court support, $10.8 million on Medicaid, the Medical Examiner, Health Department and Veteran Services , $7.8 million on SunRail, $6.7 million on state retirement contributions and $3.9 million on other mandated services.<\/p>\n
Such expenses have gone up by 74% since 2020, Zembower wrote.<\/p>\n
Further, he wrote, commissioners are required to fund the county\u2019s constitutional officers, including the sheriff, tax collector, property appraiser and clerk of the court.<\/p>\n
Those offices have seen a 50% increase in budget since 2020, with most of that coming from the Seminole County Sheriff\u2019s Office. That agency, like others across the region and state, is in what Zembower described as an \u201carm\u2019s race\u201d to pay competitive wages for law enforcement.<\/p>\n
\u201cSheriff\u2019s Office deputy pay has increased 60% since 2020 to remain competitive in a constrained labor market. Police cruisers now cost 56% more than five years ago,\u201d he wrote. \u201cThese are not luxuries; they are essential tools of governance and public protection.\u201d<\/p>\n
At Ingoglia\u2019s Oct. 7 news conference in Sanford, the CFO said he ran Seminole\u2019s top-line spending into a formula he\u2019s used to gauge overspending in cities and counties across the state. The equation includes the growth of a government\u2019s general fund since 2019 as well as data from the Consumer Price Index and population growth.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe question you have to ask is: Is an extra 25,000 people in the county worth an increase of $137 million?\u201d he said. \u201cJust because you have more people moving into a city or a county, does not mean that you have a blank check to grow the government exponentially.\u201d<\/p>\n
But Zembower argued that\u2019s a flawed formula, He said county staff used the same method dating back to 2011 \u2013 the last time prior to this year when the property tax rate was raised \u2013 and found using that formula Seminole\u2019s tax rate should be $6.90 per $1,000 in taxable value, as opposed to $5.30.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe reason it isn\u2019t \u2026 is because this county commission has been fiscally responsible,\u201d he said. \u201cWhat\u2019s more fiscally conservative: raising the tax rate only when you need it? Or before you need it?\u201d<\/p>\n
Sydney Booker, a spokesperson for Ingoglia, said Monday evening that Seminole was being disingenuous in stating the CFO hadn\u2019t responded in five days.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe fact of the matter is we have been in receipt of their letter for a little over 2 business days. While we are in the process of reviewing the items, it is disingenuous on Seminole County\u2019s part to say that they would not fund core public safety functions such as the sheriff\u2019s office, jail or court support, without a state mandate,\u201d she said in an email. \u201cWhen we are finished with the review, we will advise Seminole County leaders.\u201d<\/p>\n
Originally Published: October 20, 2025 at 4:08 PM EDT<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Seminole County is firing back at Florida\u2019s Chief Financial Officer over his accusations the county is overspending by…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":13885,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[28,30,29,114,266,115,1335,99,109],"class_list":{"0":"post-13884","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-florida","8":"tag-florida","9":"tag-florida-headlines","10":"tag-florida-news","11":"tag-latest-headlines","12":"tag-local-news","13":"tag-news","14":"tag-orange-county","15":"tag-politics","16":"tag-social"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13884","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13884"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13884\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13885"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13884"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13884"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13884"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}