Talk of The Villages Florida - View Single Post - I.R.S. Rules Against The Villages
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Old 06-13-2013, 01:51 PM
manaboutown manaboutown is offline
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This seems to explain it pretty well. Although I just ran across it most of you have probably seen it since it is a couple of days old.

IRS rule ending some Villages tax-free bonds won't affect all CDDs - OrlandoSentinel.com

an excerpt:

"Consider, for example, that the Village Center District in 1998 paid the family of developer H. Gary Morse $31 million for items that the Sumter County property appraiser valued at $1.1 million. They included retention ponds, a nine-hole golf course, an RV parking lot, a pool, a tennis court and a guardhouse.

What is the "wholly public purpose" in buying those items? Those are things the residents already paid for in the price of their house, and they're not necessary infrastructure, such as a road or wastewater plant. The ownership and maintenance of the things bought by the bonds should have been simply transferred to the CDD where they are situated, along with the right to collect the amenity fees to cover the expenses.

Instead, the residents paid ridiculously inflated prices for their golf courses and pools a second time, and then, because of the interest on the bonds, they paid thrice."
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