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Tax break for you, tax break for me ...

By HOWARD TROXLER
Published October 21, 2007

You will be glad to know that our Legislature is coming back this week to keep working on that property tax thing.

The key question is:

Who will win, the House or the Senate?

Ha! Just kidding.

The key question is what the tax laws ought to say. Nobody outside of Tallahassee cares which side "wins."

Hope they remember that.

One word of caution. If you think this special session is going to fix Florida's problems with property taxes, you'll be disappointed.

The best that will come out of all this is some new tax breaks - no fundamental change in our tax structure.

                                                                        * * *

If lawmakers pass anything at all, it'll include a further tax break for homeowners.

The original idea, which the Senate still likes, is to "double" the homestead exemption, from $25,000 to $50,000.

I put the word "double" in quotes because it isn't really double. The new tax break doesn't apply to school taxes.

This deal also has two other big tax breaks. Nobody would lose their Save Our Homes tax cap by moving - that cap would become "portable." And first-time home buyers would get an extra break.

The House is considering a different exemption: 40 percent of the median home value in each county. Again, school taxes wouldn't be cut.

The median value is $174,300 in Pinellas, $184,871 in Hillsborough, $155,141 in Pasco, $146,506 in Hernando.

But maybe you are asking: Don't homeowners already have the best deal? Shouldn't we be doing something for everybody else? Ah. Read on.

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If you own a NON-homestead piece of property in Florida, they're talking about you, too.

The House has thrown in a proposed cap on how fast taxable values can grow for nonhomestead property.

The cap on growth would be 5 percent a year, kind of like the existing "Save Our Homes" cap for homesteads.

So every property owner in Florida would have a cap in how fast the taxable value could go up - 3 percent max for homesteaders, 5 percent for everybody else. Total local tax cuts to local government in all this, over the next four years: about $11-billion.

One nitpick about this new tax cap:

When you buy a new homestead, your property gets reappraised to the full market value. But that wouldn't always be the case for nonhomestead owners.

They would face a reappraisalonly when residential properties were sold. The rest would not get reappraised unless there would been a "substantial modification." Seems like a new privileged class.

One other thing: We already have an annual cap on local tax collections in this state, under the first property tax "reform" bill that passed earlier this year.

So, nonhomestead folks are already better off, even if it doesn't feel like it yet.

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After spending last week in Tallahassee, I wonder whether the best way to bring about major tax reform in Florida is not through the Legislature.

There's another outfit that can put ideas on the 2008 statewide ballot. It's called the Taxation and Budget Reform Commission. It meets every 20 years. And it just happens to be meeting right now.

More about those folks soon.

[Last modified October 21, 2007, 00:43:20]