Florida State Supreme Court Blocks Vote on Increased Homestead Tax Exemption

Last Thursday, the Florida State Supreme Court rejected the ballot initiative to double the property tax exemption from $25,000 to $50,000. In a 5-2 ruling, the justices said the amendment’s ballot language falsely assured voters that it would provide “property tax relief,” pointing out that city and county governments could just increase the tax rate to make up for the increased exemption.

CSE South Florida Director John Hallman commented:

“This logic is unbelievably flawed and political. Over the past ten years Florida property taxes have soared 78%, yet the population increased just 21%. In the past decade alone, local government levied an additional $8 billion in taxes. In rejecting this ballot initiative, the State Supreme Court argued that a targeted tax cut would lead to other tax increases. If we follow this logic we will never see tax cuts or reductions in the size of state and local government. The State Supreme Court is endorsing the current size of government in Florida. That’s not a legal argument, it’s a political one, and it’s totally inappropriate.”

“Just as the Federal government continues to balloon in size, so do local governments. In fact, the temporary loss in revenue from increasing the property tax exemption could have been absorbed by the forecasts of increasing property values in Florida. We cannot make government fiscally responsible if we continue to feed it more and more. At CSE, we’re not going to rest, and we will work to find ways to let Florida voters say ‘yes’ to tax cuts and say ‘NO’ to big government and its supporters on the Florida State Supreme Court.”