This message is misleading on several points. For one thing property tax is NOT indexed to CPI. In fact, property taxes were reduced for 10 consecutive years and they have been decreased again this past year.
Impact fees are not only applied to residential property, by state law, they must be applied to ALL property being developed. The biggest negative impact will be on commercial property development. This not only applies to businesses that service Village residents, it applies to all business locating in Sumter County. Why should a manufacturering or distribution company, for example, locate in Sumter County and pay higher impact fees for the privilege. Surounding counties have learned the hard way that high impact fees discourage companies from building in their county. We want businesses to locate in Sumter County. The more businesses there are in Sumter County paying property taxes, the less individual homeowners have to pay to run the county.
Ultimately the goal should be that factories and wharehouses and distribution businesses, etc., not homeowners, should be contributing a larger share of the total costs of running the county. That will provide real long term relief from higher property taxes.
Think and understand the REAL issue and don't be fooled by slogans and one-sided rhetoric.
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Originally Posted by kappy
How would you like to save $348 or more every year? Silly question; we all would. It’s simple. That $348 is the amount of tax that the County imposed on your home by the 2019 25% tax increase if your home had a taxable value of $255,700. Of course, that amount will increase or decrease based upon whether the taxable value was more or less than the $255,700 value used in The Villages Daily Sun article on January 13, 2021. Actually that tax payment would increase annually by 3% or the CPI, whichever is lower. If the CPI averaged only 1.5% every year, after 10 years, you would be paying almost $400. And the reason for these payments is the unfair 25% tax increase imposed on all Sumter County homeowners in 2019 due to The Villages expansion below Rt. 44.
The County Commissioners chose to impose that enormous tax increase instead of raising the Sumter County impact fees to the 100% rate from the current 40% rate. The increased costs associated with any new development should be borne by the people who are getting the benefits of that new development. That is, the new homeowners, not homeowners who have already paid for the roads that they are using. Taxes are paid annually; impact fees are paid only once, at the time that each new home is built. Increasing the impact fee to the 100% rate would only add $1458 to each new home built in The Villages That amount will not stop people from buying homes in The Villages.
How do we accomplish this annual tax savings? Just go to the Sumter County website and call or email the Commissioners and let them know that you want them to roll back the 25% tax increase and raise the impact fees to the 100% rate. After all, the road costs generated by the new development below Rt. 44 should be paid for by the beneficiaries of that expansion.
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