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Growth management bill could make raising local taxes easier

It would let local government bodies pass by simple majority vote the tax hikes needed to improve infrastructure strained by growth.

PENSACOLA - A bill revamping growth management would make it easier for local officials to raise taxes needed to pay for Florida's continuing population boom, says the head of a state Senate panel drafting the legislation.

It would lift requirements for referendums or votes of more than a simple majority by government bodies to pass local option sales taxes and other assessments, chairman Mike Bennett of the Senate Community Affairs Committee said Friday after the last of three public hearings.

The bill, yet to be completed, would cover a broad range of planning issues, but Bennett came away from hearings in Tampa, West Palm Beach and Pensacola convinced that local officials also need more financial authority to carry out their responsibility of keeping up with growth.

"The first thing we've learned from these hearings is that the local officials need to have more flexibility in using the tools they've already got," said Bennett, R-Bradenton. He added that Floridians are "more willing to spend the money than a lot of people thought they were."

Local governments have the power to increase revenue by $6-billion a year - $4-billion not counting property taxes - that could be used to build schools, roads, sewers and other infrastructure strained by growth, but they have not used it, Bennett said.

He said the Senate legislation still would allow, but not require, officials to put tax proposals to votes of their constituents if they can't stand the heat.

Santa Rosa County Commissioner Bob Cole told the lawmakers that he, for one, can take it.

"I was voted into office to make decisions for the people of my county," Cole said. "The constituency still has a right to vote, not on the tax, but whether or not to keep me as a county commissioner."

However, one of Cole's constituents, Stacia La Due of Milton, urged the panel to keep referendum requirements.

La Due said voters in fast-growing Santa Rosa, just east of Pensacola, recently approved a local option sales tax for capital projects because commissioners spelled out exactly how it would be spent. She was afraid, though, that they might squander money on pet projects if they could raise taxes on their own.

Bennett also floated the idea of a referendum to temporarily raise the statewide sales tax.

"If you show people just exactly what we're going to fund with this money and this tax will disappear in this finite period of time, I think people will vote for it," Bennett said.

It would, however, need a three-fifths vote in the House and Senate to get on the ballot as a state constitutional amendment.

The Legislature begins its regular annual 60-day session March 8. Bennett was joined Friday by Sens. Charlie Clary, R-Destin, and Al Lawson, D-Tallahassee. Rep. Mike Davis, R-Naples, who is working on growth management issues in the House, also attended.

[Last modified February 26, 2005, 01:14:15]