{"id":250032,"date":"2026-04-28T19:06:09","date_gmt":"2026-04-28T19:06:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/250032\/"},"modified":"2026-04-28T19:06:09","modified_gmt":"2026-04-28T19:06:09","slug":"miami-mayor-prepping-25-budget-cut-if-state-follows-through-on-eliminating-property-taxes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/250032\/","title":{"rendered":"Miami Mayor Prepping 25% Budget Cut If State Follows Through On Eliminating Property Taxes"},"content":{"rendered":"

If Florida voters approve eliminating local homestead taxes in November, Miami is preparing funding cuts to local hospitals, police, fire, parks, public schools and water management, Mayor\u00a0Eileen Higgins<\/a> said Tuesday at\u00a0a\u00a0Bisnow event.<\/p>\n

\"Placeholder\"\/<\/p>\n

\n Bisnow\/Chloe Gallivan\n <\/p>\n

\n WLRN TV\u2019s Tom Hudson, Related Group\u2019s Jorge P\u00e9rez and Miami Mayor Eileen Higgins\n <\/p>\n

Higgins, who was sworn\u00a0in as mayor in December, said the city is preparing multiple budgets with contingencies \u2014 including cuts of 10% and 25% if\u00a0it loses the ability to collect property taxes from homeowners.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf the voters vote for this in November, we\u2019ve got to be ready to go,\u201d Higgins said\u00a0at\u00a0Bisnow’s Condoverse conference at the Miami Airport Convention Center. \u201cIt’s not going to be a joke, and I’m not going to start planning on\u00a0Nov. 10. I want to plan now so that we know what we’re doing and we’re able to comply with the law.\u201d<\/p>\n

The budget cuts could leave the city vulnerable to losing its parks, after-school activities and camp programs for kids, Higgins said. Projects to approve street drainage\u00a0\u2014 critical amid\u00a0increasing flooding<\/a>, even on sunny days \u2014 would be canceled, and police and fire services would be cut back, the mayor warned.<\/p>\n

For developers like billionaire\u00a0Jorge P\u00e9rez<\/a>, known as the \u201cCondo King of Miami<\/a>,\u201d who are trying to retain and attract city residents, the threat of losing property taxes is compounded by broader cuts in transportation, infrastructure and culture at the federal, state and local levels, he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere is no money for nonprofits that are going to the neighborhood, providing music, art and those things museums are all at the edge of bankruptcy,\u201d\u00a0said P\u00e9rez, the chairman, founder and CEO of\u00a0Related Group<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy concern is that we don’t provide all the cultural background that we’ve had to the future generations if we make stupid cuts just for the short-term thinking that you’re going to save a few dollars,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis<\/a> has promoted slashing property taxes for homeowners, campaigning on it<\/a> as a way to lower housing costs in a state where about 31% of homeowners pay more than 30% of their income on housing, second only to California,\u00a0according to the National Association of Home Builders<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The Florida House of Representatives passed a bill<\/a>\u00a0in February that would repeal property taxes on everything other than the taxes that fund public schools. Taxes on second homes, investment properties and commercial properties would remain.<\/p>\n

The bill did not pass the state Senate, but DeSantis has said<\/a> he wants to call the\u00a0Florida\u00a0Legislature back for a special session over the summer on property taxes to get the amendment on the ballot for voters in November.<\/p>\n

The measure has drawn loud criticism from local politicians<\/a>\u00a0in Miami-Dade County’s\u00a0bedroom communities that have minimal commercial real estate tax bases and rely on residential property taxes to fund\u00a0their services.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think everybody’s initial reaction is, \u2018I hate paying taxes,\u2019\u201d Higgins said. \u201cWell, everybody hates paying taxes, but at the end of the day, your local government is providing services. I can’t tell you a single thing Tallahassee does for me, but I can tell you everything our local government does for me.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"If Florida voters approve eliminating local homestead taxes in November, Miami is preparing funding cuts to local hospitals,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":250033,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[3674,225,227,226,85347,42575],"class_list":["post-250032","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-hialeah","tag-eileen-higgins","tag-hialeah","tag-hialeah-headlines","tag-hialeah-news","tag-jorge-perez","tag-the-related-group"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/250032","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=250032"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/250032\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/250033"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=250032"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=250032"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=250032"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}