LARGO, Fla.\u00a0\u2014 A Largo town hall meeting on the state\u2019s proposed homestead property tax exemption increase drew outbursts from residents and sharp disagreement over how the measure could affect city services.<\/p>\n
The meeting focused on Amendment 3 and its potential impact on Largo\u2019s budget, including police and fire services. Even before it took place, the meeting stirred up controversy.<\/p>\n
The town hall was originally planned as a panel discussion with city leaders and former state Sen. Jeff Brandes. State Rep. Berny Jacques wrote a letter to the mayor expressing concerns, saying Brandes is a staunch critic of Amendment 3 and that the panel lineup made it appear the city was taking and promoting a position against the amendment. Jacques said that would violate state law.<\/p>\n
The city responded by inviting Jacques to join the panel.<\/p>\n
During the meeting, Jacques said he was not convinced Largo officials were only providing information.<\/p>\n
\u201cSomething tells me that they\u2019re still trying to do it, and this is evidenced by the fact that the leaders of city hall brought forth and featured the chiefs of the two most popular departments of the city to tell you that property tax, if it\u2019s cut, will somehow harm the things that we care about the most,\u201d Jacques said.<\/p>\n
Jacques said those services include public safety.<\/p>\n
Information from the city shows Largo collected $44.1M in property tax revenue in fiscal year 2026 – less than the $69.6M that makes up the combined police and fire budgets. The city also said those departments would not be immune to cuts.<\/p>\n
Largo\u2019s fire and police chiefs told residents any cuts would likely include personnel, which makes up large portions of department budgets.<\/p>\n
Largo Mayor Woody Brown said if Amendment 3 passes, the city expects to lose $10 million in the first year and $15 million in the years that follow.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt would mean we\u2019d have to stop doing stuff,\u201d Brown said. \u201cWhat that looks like, I\u2019m not sure, but it would affect every single department.\u201d<\/p>\n
Brown said the meeting was intended to educate residents about possible impacts, not influence their votes.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe know what the rules are,” Brown said. “We just present the facts.”<\/p>\n
Before the panel discussion, attendees met with representatives from city departments to learn more about how property taxes fund city services.<\/p>\n
Largo resident Eugene Martin said he came to stay informed but is leaning against the amendment.<\/p>\n
\u201cI just don\u2019t like having our funds and direction controlled by the state,\u201d Martin said. \u201cI\u2019d like to see it controlled by my community.\u201d<\/p>\n
Jacques said the decision will be up to voters in November and said municipalities cannot campaign on the issue.<\/p>\n
\u201cLeave the electioneering to the politicians,\u201d Jacques said. \u201cLeave it to the advocacy groups. We don\u2019t need our taxpayer dollars going towards telling people that tax cuts are bad.\u201d<\/p>\n
Jacques told residents that homestead property tax made up less than 20% of Largo\u2019s property tax collections this year and less than 4% of total revenues.<\/p>\n
He said DOGE audits have shown cities are spending money in unnecessary ways and that, if Amendment 3 passes, cities will have to review their budgets to determine what they need and what they do not. Largo and other municipalities have said that is easier said than done.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"LARGO, Fla.\u00a0\u2014 A Largo town hall meeting on the state\u2019s proposed homestead property tax exemption increase drew outbursts…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":396840,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[274,2287,115,596,2718,202,204,203,199,201,200,135,278,835],"class_list":["post-396839","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-st-petersburg","tag-app-top-stories","tag-local-politics","tag-news","tag-pinellas-county","tag-sarah-blazonis","tag-st-pete","tag-st-pete-headlines","tag-st-pete-news","tag-st-petersburg","tag-st-petersburg-headlines","tag-st-petersburg-news","tag-tampa","tag-top-stories","tag-vod"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/396839","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=396839"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/396839\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/396840"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=396839"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=396839"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=396839"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}