Here is some information about the constitutional proposal to reform school taxes that was approved by the Taxation and Budget Reform Commission. This amendment will appear on the November 8, 2008 ballot.
If approved by the voters in November 2008, the Required Local Effort
(RLE) property tax for public schools will be abolished. The RLE accounts for 35 per cent of the property taxes paid by Broward taxpayers.
2. The repeal of school property taxes will not include the
discretionary local millages levied for operating revenue (There are two such millages now in effect totaling .76.)Nor does it include the two-mill levy for capital outlay.
3. The Legislature will be required to replace the revenue previously generated by the Required Local Effort from revenue generated by an additional one cent sales tax called for in the amendment, and through any of the following options: repeal of sales tax exemptions, reductions in state spending, and/or new revenue resulting from economic growth.
4. Services still will be exempt from sales taxes. Said another way, the amendment does not call for a tax on services.
5. Specific criteria and requirements will be imposed on the
Legislature for any sales tax exemptions that are granted in the future.
6. Property taxes for school purposes will be capped at five mills.
This five mills will include the current 2 mills for capital outlay and the discretionary millages noted in item "2" above. The Legislature would have the authority to increase these millages, but only up to a limit of five mills. (The current millage limit in the constitution is 10 mills.)
8. The cap on the increase in assessments for non-homesteads will be lowered to five percent for all taxes except for school taxes.
9. A public school revenue "hold harmless" will be imposed requiring the Legislature to appropriate in the General Appropriations Act for Fiscal Year 2010-2011 "an amount not less than the amount appropriated in the 2008-2009 fiscal year for the funding of public schools under the Florida Education Finance Program as increased by the average historical growth for such amounts during the prior two state fiscal years."
10. Currently, the RLE generates some $9.6 billion in revenue while
the additional one cent will generate between $3.3 and $3.6 billion. The Legislature would have to find another $5 billion to fill the gap. The options open to the Legislature are noted in "3" above.
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