Tavares, FL - Mon., Sept 10 - Updates added at 7:30 pm, with link to Ritchie posting.
Please attend tomorrow’s Lake County Board of Commission
EVENING meeting at 5:05 pm when they MAY Approve a Property Tax millage rate Increase. Be there to give public input or just watch government in action.
Tuesday, Sept. 11, 2012 at 5:05 pm (not the morning meeting) in the Lake County round administrative building , 315 W. Main St., Tavares.
UPDATE: At 7pm, Monday, Lauren Ritchie, columnist fro the Lake Sentinel paper posted a blog article about tomorrow's meeting. I have no idea why she has Sean Parks in the web address, since she interviewed Leslie Campione, not Parks: http://articles.orlandosentinel.com/2012-09-10/news/os-lk-county-budget-taxes-20120910_1_rollback-rate-county-budget-commissioner-sean-parks
Some people get mad when I say a millage rate is a tax increase, but if the normal method to calculate your property tax is to multiple the property value (on your TRIM Notice) by a standard millage rate, but then government officials decide to increase the millage rate to get more revenues, that to me is an increase, even if valuations are lower. I don't see sales tax rates being increased due to lower retail sales. I said that just to make tax and spend folks aggravated.
Unfortunatly, taxpayers do not get to vote on changes in property taxes, as long as specified caps are not exceeded. But, you can give public input.
The Lake County Board of Commissioners will listen to public input tomorrow at the first of two required public hearings ( Sept 11 and Sept 25th, both at 5:05 pm in the round County Administration building in Tavares) to decide next year’s property tax millage rates.
On the recent TRIM notice received by Lake County property owners, the County listed a proposed average millage rate increase from 4.7309 mills to 5.0786 mills.
We believe the County Board should stay with the current 4.7309 millage rate, This is not the time to increase tax rates.
Both the Lake County Republican Party and the Lake County Realtors have sent letters to the Board of Commissioners requesting that millage rates NOT be increased.
I don't favor chopping County Department staff - they have taken many cuts over the last five years But I have been going to Board meetings since about 2008, and here are some reasons why millage rates should stay the same and not be increased:
1. The Sheriff has not cut his budget anywhere as much as the County Departments, but he has half the budget: The County Board has not attempted to get the Sheriff to reduce his spending any where near the levels of reductions by other departments, yet he is HALF of the county budget. When I sent this out earlier today, a local, well known reporter complained that the Sheriff DID reduce his budget, but I say it was only 5%, and his total reductions over the last five years are much less than the reductions by the County operations budget and staff reductions. Thus he is getting a bigger and bigger share of the budget pie, but there are no public hearings on his budget, it is not published on the website (a detailed version) and no public accountability explaining the grants and property seizures that should be used to offset budgets. Many people are happy about the work the Sheriff is doing, but we have no clear analysis from him why he can't reduce his budget at the rates implemented by the County Operations or School District.
2. Lake Express Subsidies should be cut: The County Board is also still subsidizing Lake Express for $1.5-million.
3. The County is subsidizing a vanpool that benefits only one employer in Sumter County. I am not sure how much that costs, but I think $100,000 to $200,000.
4. Sell some Public Lands - The County is making interest payments onf $30-million or so for bonds used to finance public lands. So far, they have refused to discuss selling off some of the public lands purchased with $30-million in bonds awhile back, even though the County Attorney tells me they CAN sell off some of the land to pay down debt. Many of the land areas are not accessible to the public because they did not budget for parking, porta potties, etc, so why keep the lands if they won't make them all accessible?
5. Medicaid Payments Due to the State have dropped from $4-million to under $2-million. The $4-million was used in earlier budget hearings to justify part of the millage rate hikes. Now that amount is less than $2-million, thus they saved $2-million which can go towards meeting the claimed budget shortfalls.
6. The County does have large reserves, due to a higher percentage initiated by Jimmy Conner about 3-years ago. He got a 15% setaside for reserves implemented instead of 10%, which is prudent. Now may be the time to use a couple million dollars from that fattened reserves.
7. County unemployment is 9.9% (not including all the dropouts from unemployment claims), there are 2-3,000 homeless kids in the school system, and housing values have dropped another 5.9% in Lake County, so why tax people at last year's rates vs using rates reflecting the dropping ability of people to pay them.
If you visit this webpage below, you can see links to the 60 page budget book and also prior budget presentations. If you look at them, you can get an idea where the spending goes, since they have pie charts, etc.
http://www.lakecountyfl.gov/departments/county_manager/budget/fiscal_year_2013.aspx
Please attend BOTH meetings a provide public input, even if you want them to use the higher millage rate because you aren't worried about the economy.
ALSO, be sure to schedule attendance at the SECOND meeting on Sept 25th, at 5:05 in the round County Administrative building because that is when the final decision is made.
Meeting Details:
Tuesday, Sept. 11, 2012 at 5:05 pm (not the morning meeting) in the Lake County round administrative building , 315 W. Main St., Tavares.
Tuesday, Sept. 25th, at 5:05 pm at same location as above.
Vance Jochim
Lake County Fiscal Rangers
Chief Fiscal Watchdog
Volunteers Searching for Ways to Improve Local Government Fiscal Management, Efficiency & Effectiveness
PO Box 1042
Tavares, FL 32778
Mobile: 352-638-3578
TWITTER: @FiscalRangers
"FiscalRangers" page on Facebook
YouTube: NEW 6/2012 - Videos of local political candidate forums and other meetings, like North Lake County Hospital District & Lake County Legislators' Delegation annual forums - visit the youtube channel "FiscalRangersFlorida"
CLICK HERE to see recommended internet links related to Local Lake County government fiscal issues.
