Gov. Ron DeSantis and several Republican candidates were at St. Petersburg College Monday to push for Florida's property tax cut amendment. They say it would increase the efficiency of local governments.
Amendment 3 would increase the non-school homestead exemption on primary residences to $250,00 by 2028.
DeSantis said in 2019 that the total amount of property tax revenue going to local governments was $33 billion. This year, that's up to $62 billion.
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"All homestead revenue is a minority of all the property tax revenue. In fact, it's probably about — between 30% and 35% of all revenue," he said. "If you just eliminated all homestead revenue, they would still have more revenue going to local government than they did at the beginning of the day in 2019."
DeSantis said one of the provisions of the amendment says that all remaining property tax revenue can only be used for core services like police, fire and water service.
Commissioner of Agriculture Wilton Simpson, who is running for re-election, echoed DeSantis' desire that all property taxes should be eliminated.
"Homestead property tax should be zero in the state or any state. When you get your home paid off, you think you own it. Don't pay your property taxes for 4 or 5 years and see if you still own it," he said. "And you're always renting from the government and based on these taxes that we pay today, you're trapped in the home that you currently have because you certainly cannot afford to pay 2 or 3 times more property tax."
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Ashley Moody, who is running for U.S. Senate, said its passage would increase government efficiency.
"Our way and approach to government is that we should try and keep government out of your lives as most as we can and keep government out of your pockets," she said.
But the independent group Florida TaxWatch estimates it would decrease revenues for cities and counties by more than $45 billion over five years.
And local counties would see a reduction in revenue over the next two years ranging from $250 million in Sarasota County to $714 million in Pinellas to nearly $1 billion in Hillsborough County.
Local governments say it will affect the services they provide and they could be forced to raise other fees to compensate.
Amendment 3 must be passed by at least 60% of the voters on election day to take effect. It would increase the homestead tax exemption for non-school taxes to $150,000 in 2027 and $250,000 in 2028, with the amount indexed to inflation starting in 2029.
