I claim no expertise in taxation, but I know the odor of BS when I smell it. The Developer’s puppets on the Sumter County Commission (Butler, Burgess, and Printz) have waited until the last minute to run their most BS-filled ad of all.
If you missed it, take a look at it and then think about it. It is on page A-9 of Saturday’s edition of the Developer’s Daily Sun. The ad makes the preposterous claim that the puppets are “THE REAL REPUBLICAN TAX CUTTERS”, apparently hoping that voters have collective amnesia about the puppets’ increasing our County Tax by 25 percent.
Who paid for the ad?
Answer: The Developer paid for it, through around $200,000 in campaign contributions to the puppets. The contributions were made through his companies, suppliers, and associates — thereby circumventing the $1,000-contribution-per-candidate limit. In addition, the Developer has utilized a hired-gun political action committee (deceptively named “Good Government for Florida”*) to throw in $55,700 more, bringing the total of the contributions to a quarter of a million dollars.
BTW, a significant chunk of that $55,700 went for a video that the PAC ran on Fox News. Try to catch the Fox video if you missed it. It is hilarious. It implies that, if the puppets are not re-elected, there will be chaos — with Villagers looting and rioting in the streets.
Why would the Developer spend all that money to keep his puppets in office?
Answer: Because having the puppets in the County Commission is worth a fortune to him. In Florida, developers have long recognized the importance of having County Commissioners in their pocket. As a consequence, several developers and commissioners in other counties have ended up in prison.
In Sumter County, his puppets have rewarded the Developer for his political support by uncritically rubber stamping whatever approvals are needed for his massive expansion of The Villages (or for building an apartment complex where a country club once stood). But on top of that, the puppets have given him, in essence, hundreds of millions of our tax dollars. The puppets have done that by paying for the county infrastructure, necessitated by the massive expansion of The Villages, through a massive tax increase on residents–while maintaining a sweetheart impact fee for for the Developer.
For people who still don’t know about an “impact fee”, it is a tax on builders payable when the builder pulls a building permit. It is SUPPOSED TO pay for county infrastructure necessitated by the new construction. Thanks to the puppets, the Developer pays only $901 per house. By contrast, he would pay around $22,000 per house in Collier County. Multiply the difference by 60,000 houses to begin to understand the huge benefit that the Developer is getting, at our expense, by controlling the County Commission.
Is our County Tax the “lowest” as claimed in the Daily Sun ad?
Answer: No, the Sumter County Tax is the highest COUNTY TAX in the tri-County area. Here are the millage rates:
- Lake: 5.118
- Marion: 4.42
- Sumter: 6.7
Remember, the only tax on your tax bill that is set by County Commissioners is the COUNTY TAX. That is, the County Tax is the ONLY tax on your tax bill that is relevant in evaluating their performance.
So, what kind of funny math are the puppets using in their Daily Sun ad?
Answer: The puppets are claiming credit for the TOTAL taxes on our local tax bill being relatively low, even though the County Commission had nothing to do with that. In fact, overall taxes are relatively low despite the puppets on the County Commission. The taxes other than the County Tax are relatively low because Sumter County is largely a retirement community. Therefore:
- We have few kids to pay to educate.
- We are too old to commit a lot of crimes and run up costs of law enforcement and incarceration.
- We are relatively prosperous and don’t demand a lot of county services.
- A lot of Villagers are part-time residents. They demand almost no county services, but they are paying the full shot on their property taxes because they have no homestead exemption.
Furthermore, and at the risk of getting too technical: If you are a Villager, take a look at the Maintenance Assessment on your tax bill and at your amenity fee that you separately pay. In other counties, significant amounts of that Assessment and fee would be paid in the form of the County Tax. So, those amounts need to be added to the Sumter County Tax when doing comparisons with other counties. Examples of those amounts are what we pay for: recreation facilities, area maintenance, potable and irrigation water supply, security, sewer and wastewater management, and street lights.
The bottom line: If it went for a good purpose, like better pay for cops, firefighters, and teachers or improving roads, most of us would not mind a modest property-tax increase. However, we greatly resent a huge tax increase for the purpose of preserving the Developer’s sweetheart impact fee, thereby giving him, in essence, hundreds of millions of dollars at our expense.
It is time to elect County Commissioners who represent the people, not the Developer, by voting in the EMS team: Real Republicans Estep, Miller, and Search.
*For more on Good Government for Florida, Inc. click on https://www.villages-news.com/2020/08/09/who-in-the-hell-is-good-government-for-florida-inc/
Villager Scott Fenstermaker is a frequent contributor to Villages-News.com.
