Gov. Ron DeSantis feels good about Attorney General James Uthmeier’s court-ordered revision of Amendment 3, and says he still expects the proposal to get the 60% support needed on November’s ballot.
The measure would increase the homestead exemption for non-school taxes to $150,000 next year and $250,000 in 2028.
“I do think that will end up on the ballot. I don’t think there’s any way a court can keep it off having made the changes that they’ve made. I know the Attorney General will submit that, or however that is supposed to work,” DeSantis said Friday at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Daytona Beach, where he was announcing road money and an air taxi partnership.
DeSantis spent more than a year selling his version of property tax reform, which would have included school tax relief and a trust fund for local governments. The Legislature cut those out of the plan.
Despite the changes, DeSantis says the amendment “should pass” and that he hopes it does.
“I’m going to be supportive of it, because I think it’s the only way we can guarantee people relief as taxpayers,” he said.
He has stopped short of campaigning for it, telling reporters in June that “what the Legislature did wasn’t my proposal.”
The Legislature’s title, “Save Our Homes From Excessive Property Taxes,” is gone. In its place: “Increased Homestead Exemption; Lower Cap on Increases in Non-Homestead Property Assessments.”
“This amendment increases the homestead exemption, for all non-school taxes, to $150,000 in 2027 and $250,000 in 2028, and adjusts for inflation thereafter. It requires the Legislature to prescribe a uniform procedure for counties and municipalities, for their respective levies, to increase the homestead exemption up to full assessed value, and allows special districts, subject to referendum approval, to do the same,” the revised language reads in part.
The summary runs three more paragraphs, addressing new residents, a cut in the annual assessment cap on non-homestead property from 10% to 5% and limits on how counties and municipalities can spend property tax revenue.
Leon County Judge David Frank ruled Aug. 3 that the original title was “more akin to a political slogan” than a description of what the amendment does.
“Simply put, the proposed ballot title does not state the basic legal purpose of the amendment; it endorses it and diverts voters from its actual effect,” Frank wrote.
He also objected to claims that the measure protects core services, safeguards small businesses and ensures “fairness for Florida residents.”
His ruling capped three consolidated lawsuits brought by the nonprofit Save Our Voters From Misleading Ballot Language, former Stuart Mayor Thomas Campenni, former Key Biscayne Mayor Michael Davey, former South Miami Mayor Philip Stoddard, former Democratic U.S. Rep. Al Lawson and former Republican state Sen. Jeff Brandes.
The ruling and the remedy suffice, said Jamie Cole, one of the attorneys who brought the first of those suits.
“The rewritten ballot question addresses the issues we raised, and is now fair and accurate. We commend the Attorney General for doing so. The new language accomplished what we set out to do, and we will not be objecting to the new ballot language. Now it is up to the voters to become fully informed and decide this important issue,” Cole said.
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