A new online calculator shows how each city and county across Florida would be impacted by Amendment 3.
Read more Maxwell: Required audits are MIA as DeSantis’ ‘emergency’ spending spree continues
The Florida Policy Institute released the tool Tuesday morning, contending that voters deserve the full picture of the fallout of slashing their property tax pools, the most important funding source for core city and county services. It’s available at https://amendment3.floridapolicyinstitute.org/.
“We hope that this tool will help bring the potential impacts to amendment 3 and the property tax cuts home for many people,” said Sadaf Knight, the CEO of Florida Policy Institute, which is advocating against the amendment.
Amendment 3 creates a $150,000 tax exemption on primary homes in 2027 and a $250,000 exemption in 2028. Such new rules would lead to thousands of dollars in annual savings for taxpayers on their property tax bills but could also lead to increases in fees or other taxes, as cities and counties look for ways to fill budget holes.
Because the measure is an amendment to Florida’s constitution, it requires 60% support statewide to become law.
The calculator states that $825 million in local funding would be lost over the first two years of the new rules in Orange County alone, including $90 million in a tax county residents pay to fund the Sheriff’s Office and $142 million in a tax paid to help fund county fire rescue and EMS services.
In Seminole, it states county governments and special districts would lose $283 million over two years.
Read more New Apopka mayor ousts city administrator, finance director in ‘reorganization’
What the calculator doesn’t show, however, is how much a property owner would be in line to save on their tax bills if 60% of Florida voters support Amendment 3.
A separate tool from myexemptioncheck.com shows how a property tax bill would be impacted by the new exemptions created by the amendment. That is available at https://myexemptioncheck.com/pages/amendment-calculator.
In Orange, a home assessed at $400,000 would have a savings of $1,096 in 2027 on their non-school taxes, and $2,192 in 2028, it shows.
Opponents of the measure, however, argue that Amendment 3 would just lead to other tax increases and fee increases as cities and counties try to make up the money in other ways to fund their services.
“We’re facing a very real affordability crisis, but Floridians should know that cutting property taxes … is not the solution for our affordability challenges,” Knight said. “Vital services in every part of our state will be impacted.”
Read more Zaxby’s, Jimmy John’s among $63M in upgrades for Florida’s Turnpike rest stops