APOPKA, Fla. \u2014 City of Apopka residents who were expecting a decision on the city’s millage rate will have to wait a bit longer for that decision.<\/p>\n
City leaders voted Monday evening to pause the conversation and pick up discussions on Thursday. This follows city commissioners failing to make a decision last week.<\/p>\n
Commissioner Nadia Anderson made her voice clear \u2014 she was not voting for the millage increase, which needs a unanimous 5-0 vote from the commission to become final.<\/p>\n
So now it’s back to the drawing board. Neighbors who attended Monday’s meeting mostly spoke against the increase, but there was some support, however.<\/p>\n
Someone who believes the city can reap the benefits is Jim Grumberg.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf we don\u2019t start thinking like a big city now, we\u2019re not going anywhere,” Grumberg said. “We need to grow up.\u201d<\/p>\n
Grumberg said he is retired and on a fixed income. Investing in city services and infrastructure is crucial, he believes.<\/p>\n
\u201cI have a nice house, and my taxes are going to go up, but that\u2019s OK because it\u2019s an investment in the city,” he said.<\/p>\n
Commissioner Yesenia Baron said she is for the millage increase and listed a few areas that should be prioritized.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have to repair Golden Gem Pond. We have to make sure that our downtown becomes what we want it to be, a walkable place, a safe place where our residents can come to and enjoy,” said Baron, who represents District 4. “I want to make sure that we are not creating new positions.\u201d<\/p>\n
Commissioner Anderson said she believes the budget should be looked at with a magnifying glass.<\/p>\n
\u201cI still don\u2019t understand why this big elephant in the room where our council is not addressing these obsessive positions in the budget,” Anderson said.<\/p>\n
In the city\u2019s 2027 Preliminary Budget Request \u2014 a public information office position is included. It lists a line item for regular salaries and wages at just over $195,000. Anderson says this position raises a red flag for her.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are responsible to make sure that we are balancing the budget correctly,” she said.<\/p>\n
Resident Emilio Parrales is against the millage rate increase. He said some people in the community cannot afford a tax hike.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe elderly are losing their homes because they can\u2019t afford all these increases and these taxes that they\u2019re trying to put on us,” Parrales said. “I hope the people of Apopka know exactly what they\u2019re getting into.\u201d<\/p>\n
The official paperwork must be submitted to the Orange County Property Appraiser by Aug. 4.<\/p>\n
If the commission can’t vote unanimously on the .75 increase, it goes down the line to then discuss a .50 increase, then .25 increase and so forth.<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"APOPKA, Fla. \u2014 City of Apopka residents who were expecting a decision on the city’s millage rate will…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":354623,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[3140,43147,115,1335,139,141,140,99],"class_list":["post-354622","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-orlando","tag-app-local-state-politics","tag-devin-martin","tag-news","tag-orange-county","tag-orlando","tag-orlando-headlines","tag-orlando-news","tag-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/354622","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=354622"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/354622\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/354623"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=354622"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=354622"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=354622"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}