a page on their website<\/a> to help voters understand how the money is spent.<\/p>\nWhat the 1-mill means for teachers<\/p>\n
Current DCPS teacher Monica Gold says the bonus has made a real difference in her finances \u2014 though she is still working a second job to pay off student loans.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe mill rate \u2014 that does contribute to helping me with my finances,\u201d Gold said. \u201cI would be in a far worse place without it. I\u2019m very, very grateful for it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Former DCPS teacher Darellee Naccarato says the bonus allowed her to avoid taking on extra work.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt made a significant dent with my own children, helping make sure that they had what they needed, our family to not struggle and for me not to need a second job,\u201d Naccarato said.<\/p>\n
District argues renewal is critical to teacher retention<\/p>\n
Dr. Bernier says the 1-mill has helped the district lower teacher vacancies and improve retention. He also pointed to competition with neighboring counties.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re competing with talent with Clay, Nassau and St. John\u2019s who all have that same bonus structure,\u201d Bernier said. \u201cIf that was removed, I think our vacancies would increase. So I\u2019m hoping that our community values its teachers.\u201d<\/p>\n
Bernier credited teachers with helping Duval County Public Schools earn an A grade and said he looks forward to seeing the community continue to support public education in November.<\/p>\n
Former teacher plans to vote yes<\/p>\n
Naccarato, who worked in Duval County schools until recently, said she plans to vote to keep the tax in place.<\/p>\n
\u201cI totally understand that people need money themselves and they\u2019re squeezed,\u201d she said. \u201cBut our public schools are what supplies all of our workers in our community. It\u2019s just so important to get behind schools and keep that public education money where it belongs.\u201d<\/p>\n
Voters will decide on the fate of the 1-mill in November.<\/p>\n
Copyright 2026 by WJXT News4JAX – All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"JACKSONVILLE, Fla. \u2013 Duval County voters will decide in November whether to renew a 1-mill property tax that…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":390974,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[156313,48092,2715,116,118,117,8191],"class_list":["post-390973","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-jacksonville","tag-1-mill","tag-duval-county-schools","tag-elections","tag-jacksonville","tag-jacksonville-headlines","tag-jacksonville-news","tag-property-tax"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/390973","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=390973"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/390973\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/390974"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=390973"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=390973"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=390973"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}