{"id":408778,"date":"2026-09-24T00:20:16","date_gmt":"2026-09-24T00:20:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/408778\/"},"modified":"2026-09-24T00:20:16","modified_gmt":"2026-09-24T00:20:16","slug":"florida-governor-candidates-clash-on-property-taxes-insurance-at-fort-lauderdale-summit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/408778\/","title":{"rendered":"Florida governor candidates clash on property taxes, insurance at Fort Lauderdale summit"},"content":{"rendered":"

Florida\u2019s two gubernatorial nominees offered sharply different visions for the state\u2019s economy Wednesday at the WLRN Sunshine Economy Summit in downtown Fort Lauderdale, where affordability, property taxes, and hurricane insurance dominated the conversation.<\/p>\n

Democrat David Jolly and Republican Byron Donalds spoke in back-to-back 30-minute panel discussions, but were kept separate throughout the event.<\/p>\n

Property tax exemption<\/p>\n

One of the sharpest divides came over Amendment 3<\/a>, a ballot measure that would raise the homestead tax exemption to $250,000 over two years \u2014 a question Florida voters will also decide this November.<\/p>\n

Donalds said he supports the measure.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think voters need relief. I think the property owners need relief,\u201d Donalds said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI anticipate I will vote against Amendment 3,\u201d Jolly told the audience. \u201cI don\u2019t think the math works, and I think we know that because even Ron DeSantis now won\u2019t campaign for Amendment 3, and our sheriffs have come out and said, \u2018Please don\u2019t do this. It\u2019s going to defund services.\u2019\u201d <\/p>\n

Hurricane insurance<\/p>\n

Disaster relief and insurance costs also emerged as a major point of contrast.<\/p>\n

Jolly is proposing a sovereign wealth fund that would absorb hurricane and wind insurance burdens for Floridians.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are not going to solve this without government taking on a larger role in backing this. Otherwise, people are going to be priced out of their homes,\u201d Jolly said.<\/p>\n

Donalds said that plan won\u2019t work. He is instead calling for the elimination of a premium surcharge that contributes to the state\u2019s catastrophic fund.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe get through this hurricane season, the Cat Fund is estimated to have somewhere between 13 and 13-and-a-half billion dollars. So why do we have a 25% kicker on top to keep filling the Cat Fund, whose statutory limit is $17 billion? My view is to get rid of the kicker. That would lower premiums for every policyholder in the state,\u201d Donalds said.<\/p>\n

No debate<\/p>\n

Jolly announced earlier this week that he will not debate Donalds<\/a> \u2014 making this the first gubernatorial election in 50 years in which Florida voters won\u2019t see the nominees face off.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt just became obvious that this is not going to contribute to a more constructive political environment, and that\u2019s the bottom line. I understand some people have concerns about it. I just promise you, for me, this is a moment bigger than politics,\u201d Jolly told reporters after his panel discussion.<\/p>\n

Donalds said he wants the debate to happen.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe said something about how I lied about him \u2014 which is a lie, by the way \u2014 and so he doesn\u2019t want to debate,\u201d Donalds said in response to questions following his panel. \u201cWell, that\u2019s what debates are for: to clarify all that stuff. So I want to do it. I look forward to it. The ball\u2019s in his court.\u201d<\/p>\n

Jolly was direct when asked if his decision could change.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy decision\u2019s final,\u201d Jolly said.<\/p>\n

Despite their differences, both candidates share at least one position: a commitment to keeping Florida free of a state income tax.<\/p>\n

This story was reported on-air by a journalist and has been converted to this platform with the assistance of AI. Our editorial team verifies all reporting on all platforms for fairness and accuracy.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Florida\u2019s two gubernatorial nominees offered sharply different visions for the state\u2019s economy Wednesday at the WLRN Sunshine Economy…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":408779,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[249,251,250],"class_list":["post-408778","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-fort-lauderdale","tag-fort-lauderdale","tag-fort-lauderdale-headlines","tag-fort-lauderdale-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/408778","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=408778"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/408778\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/408779"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=408778"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=408778"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=408778"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}