Politics

Calling it a tax cut doesn't make it so

By STEVE BOUSQUET, Tallahassee Bureau Chief
Published October 6, 2007

Legislators had a golden opportunity in this week's special session to cut property taxes. But they didn't do it.

They prattled on about the need to reduce the property tax burden on homeowners, and did nothing about it.

The Republican majority made a comparatively tiny cut in the public school budget of about $290-million. They called it an adjustment to an increasebecause it was a reduction of an increase approved in May.

It's true that even with this less-than-1 percent cut, the K-12 public school budget is a lot bigger than it was a year ago.

But one reason it's so much bigger is that it is infused with nearly $8-billion from local property taxes, and nearly $547-million more in local property taxes than the year before.

The state has a name for this: required local effort.

Every year, the Legislature sets a tax rate that school districts must levy to run schools. Paying for public education is a marriage between the state and school districts, but a steadily increasing share of public school operations comes from property taxes - as opposed to sales taxes.

"We are reducing state dollars. We are not reducing local dollars," Rep. Joe Pickens, R-Palatka, said Thursday in response to questions from Democrats.

Republicans rationalize the big bottom-line increase in property taxes for schools by noting that they have reduced the tax rate year after year.

Pickens said that the state-calculated tax rate for local schools has declined by about 25 percent in recent years.

But in the explosion of real estate values, even a slight drop in the tax rate brings another windfall in real dollars, because the value of property has surged upward so dramatically.

This is the same tactic that legislators have criticized cities and counties for: lower the tax rate, rake in more money from higher valuations, wink and call it a tax cut.

Republicans could have reduced the tax rate a lot more, to ensure the state would not collect a cent more in property taxes. But that would force them to make up the difference with state money.

Democrats consider the Republicans' reliance on local property taxes to run schools inconsistent at best, hypocritical at worst.

"We have increased the required local effort every year," said Rep. Jack Seiler a Democrat from Wilton Manors. "We're playing the same game that we're accusing local governments of playing."

To be precise, Pickens said, the budget revisions will fractionally lower the state's share of the K-12 budget, from 53.4 percent to about 53.3 percent.

That means the local share, the part paid for with your property taxes, is edging up.

Legislators will take a final vote on this reduced budget early next week. They will declare victory by noting how they largely spared public education from the reductions.

But they did it by depending so heavily on the local property taxes they say are hurting Floridians so much, and a day of reckoning is approaching.

No one knows that better than Rep. Ray Sansom, R-Destin, the House budget chief and next House speaker, who says legislators must find a way to replace a big chunk of that local property tax money with a different tax source.

"If we don't," he said, "we're hypocritical."

Steve Bousquet can be reached at bousquet@sptimes.com or 850 224-7263.

[Last modified October 5, 2007, 23:25:13]