|
Tax Plan Passes: The People Have Spoken By Jim Ash Realtors gathered in a hotel bar at the bay front Renaissance Vinoy Resort cheered as the results were splashed across large-screen TV's. Fireworks could be seen exploding over Tampa Bay. "The people of Florida have spoken and they have demanded relief, tax relief," Lt. Gov. Jeff Kottkamp told a cheering crowd of about 50 supporters. "This is a great day for Florida." With 99 percent of the precincts reporting, here was the vote on Amendment 1: Yes: 2.63 million votes, 64 percent No: 1.47 million, 36 percent The victory was more about the dismal state of Florida's economy and lawmakers will have to be more creative than ever to keep schools afloat, warned Florida Education Association chief Andy Ford, one of the measure's chief critics. "Tonight the voters of Florida have indicated that they are strapped financially and that they need immediate relief ... even at the cost of funding our schools and other vital services," he said in a written statement. Buoyed by the results, lawmakers are poised for another round of tax- cutting proposals, including measures that would make it easier for property owners to challenge their assessments in court and giving breaks to waterfront hotels and marinas. "This is not the end of the fight," said Sen. Mike Haridopolos, R-Indialantic and a key Senate negotiator for the proposal. "I think it sends the message that the people of Florida are ready to put a limit on the money local government spends." The results mean that for the first time, homeowners will be able to take their accumulated Save Our Homes assessment savings with them when they move. Homes worth more than $50,000 will get a boost to their $25,000 homestead exemption, but not for school taxes, saving the average homeowner $240. Commercial and non-homestead property owners will see a 10 percent annual Save Our Homes-like cap on their assessments. Businesses will get a $25,000 exemption on the tangible personal property taxes they pay on items such as equipment, wiping more than 1 million small businesses off the rolls entirely. Opponents, including teachers, firefighters and government worker unions, were bracing for the worst. Teachers predicted more failing schools and local governments warned about loss of services and cutbacks in police and fire protection. The race was close until the polls opened. Crist adviser and former Chief of Staff George LeMieux said earlier in the day that internal polls as late as Sunday showed the measure reaching only 59 percent, just 1 percent shy of the 60 percentage points needed for passage. The passage was not only a personal victory for Crist, but a testament to the power of fundraising. Supporters at Yes on 1 racked up more than $4.1 million, including $1 million donations each from the Florida Association of Realtors and Florida Power & Light. Opponents, including the Florida Education Association and the Florida Professional Firefighters and the Florida League of Cities, raised a little more than $2 million. Tax Chaos Reigns, Not Reform By Pamela Hasterok Three blind mice .., Gov. Charlie Crist, Senate President Ken Pruitt and House Speaker Marco Rubio are acting out the nursery rhyme on front pages across the state. They've been running blindly about since Monday, when a Leon County judge threw their property-tax measure off the ballot for being misleading and inaccurate. The state appealed the ruling, but what happens next is still a mystery. The governor wants to rewrite the state constitutional amendment during next week's special session so Floridians can vote on it Jan. 29. The Senate president wants just to defend the amendment in court. The speaker wants to do both. The House would like the satisfaction of proving the judge wrong, but also wants to rewrite the amendment to offer bigger tax cuts. The Senate is concerned more cuts could derail city and county budgets. It prefers to let the court settle the question and to keep the issue out of the special session to cut $1 billion out of state spending. Crist just wants to make good on campaign promises to lower taxes for Floridians. Rewriting the amendment is the fastest way to get it to voters. The original amendment would have allowed a homeowner to write off $195,000 of assessed value on their property up to $500,000. In return, they would relinquish the Save Our Homes cap that limits a homeowner's tax bill to a 3 percent increase per year. Only current homeowners could keep the cap, and it would last only as long as they stayed in their home. Eventually, Save Our Homes would be eliminated. But the amendment didn't say that -- it said it would preserve and revise it. That's the misleading part. It also said every homeowner would get at least a $50,000 exemption. That's the inaccurate part. Anyone keeping the assessment cap would receive a $25,000 exemption. Republican lawmakers knew their amendment was deceptive and that it contained an error. They passed it anyway, wanting voters to believe that Save Our Homes was safe even though the amendment ultimately eliminated it. They thought we wouldn't figure it out. The only thing that stands between many Florida homeowners and an apartment is the assessment cap. It's the guarantee that they can afford their property taxes. At a recent public hearing in New Smyrna Beach, folks figured it out, all right, and they were plenty peeved. Monday, so was Chief Circuit Judge Charles Francis. "The summary is just not correct," he wrote. The state's appeal will likely end up in the Florida Supreme Court. Unless the high court rules favorably before Oct. 28, the question won't make it to the Jan. 29 ballot. So Republicans, who control the Legislature, must choose. Take their chances that the court will find for them or write a new amendment. But lawmakers have a third option. They could wait until the tax commission they appointed this spring recommends how to fix Florida's unequal tax system. Their solution could go on the November ballot next year. Meanwhile, chaos reigns. Will voters see tax reform on the ballot in January or November or at all? Will the Legislature's solution actually help homeowners? Floridians are waiting for Crist, Pruitt and Rubio to turn from mice into men and lead the state out of the mess they created. Judge
Rejects Tax-cut Wording By Marc Caputo The biggest tax-cut vote in state history has been blocked from the Jan. 29 ballot, for now, after a Leon County judge ruled that the Legislature's proposed constitutional amendment language was ''confusing'' and ''misleading'' to voters. ''Try as this court has,'' Circuit Judge Charles Francis wrote Monday, ``this Court cannot find that the language is clear, concise, unambiguous and fair.'' The reason: The Legislature's proposed ballot summary didn't tell voters that they would be phasing out the popular Save Our Homes tax cap limiting taxable homestead value increases at 3 percent a year. Instead, the ballot summary said voters would be ''preserving'' and ''revising'' Save Our Homes. Also, the ballot summary said ''everyone'' would get a minimum $50,000 homestead tax exemption. But the new exemption was meant to apply only to those who would opt into the new system -- which calls for a maximum $195,000 exemption on a home with a $500,000 assessed value. The Legislature is sure to appeal or fix the ballot language in the Oct. 3 special lawmaking session concerning state budget cuts. The man who brought the suit, Weston Mayor Eric Hersh, urged the Legislature to quickly correct the error, which stemmed from the rushed vote and secret negotiations that produced the tax-cut package at a June lawmaking session. ''This is a big opportunity to make this right,'' Hersh said. ``They need to tell people this eventually eliminates Save Our Homes. The problem is, they know it won't pass if they do that.'' Already, polls show a minority of voters favor the measure -- far short of the 60 percent threshold needed to amend the Constitution. Gov. Charlie Crist and House Speaker Marco Rubio of West Miami have announced separate efforts that together could raise upward of $10 million to campaign for the amendment. None of the Republican leaders -- Rubio, Crist and Senate President Ken Pruitt -- would say what they plan to do next. Rubio said in a written statement that the ballot summary ''accurately'' stated its purpose and vowed ``to provide tax relief one way or another.'' Amendment Vote Hersh, a Democrat, wants citizens to vote on the amendment during the November general election -- not during the Jan. 29 primaries. Fewer people are expected to vote in January -- especially Democrats. Their national party has said their vote in the presidential primary won't count because the Florida party broke the rules by scheduling a vote so early in the year. One campaign already has begun: The effort to stop Hersh. A Republican consulting firm, the New Jersey-based David Millner Group, ran Comcast TV ads telling viewers that Hersh needed to ``stop suing and start serving.'' Hersh is acting in his private capacity. His attorney, Jamie Cole, argued before Francis that the Legislature improperly set the date of the property-tax vote. But Francis declined to rule on that because he invalidated the ballot summary language itself. Francis also ruled against Hersh's contention that the Legislature overstepped its authority in limiting the taxing authority of local governments through a system of tax-rate rollbacks and caps. That part of the two-phase tax-cut package will yield less than the five-year, $15.6 billion savings the Legislature projected because various local government boards have taken super-majority votes to avoid steep cuts. Democrats joined Republicans to approve that part of the plan in June but balked at the ''super-exemptions.'' Democrats worried about school cuts and forcing people out of Save Our Homes if they saved even a dollar under the new system. Republican leaders changed that provision to give homeowners an ''irrevocable'' option to avail themselves of the super-exemption, dropping the estimated savings to about $9 billion through 2012. But Republicans refused to change the ballot summary language, even though House Democrats noted the language appeared misleading. Said House Democratic leader Dan Gelber of Miami Beach: ``Well, this is what happens when you rush things, limit debate and decide everything in secret. It doesn't inspire confidence in the leadership of the Florida House.'' Miami Exempted Gelber noted the Legislature accidentally exempted Miami from a list of cities that were to cut taxes the deepest. Miami Republican Rep. Carlos Lopez-Cantera said he's filing legislation to fix that and hopes the constitutional amendment language will be fixed. ''If we're going to be up there and we're going to take up the property tax issue, it kind of makes sense to fix this, too,'' Lopez-Cantera said. Miami Herald staff writer Natalie P. McNeal contributed to this report.
|
|
A Feast
|
