Help Me Understand
 

Can anyone help me understand how the housing has grown so significantly in The Villages while the taxes have gone up a little or stayed flat? Where the heck is all of the additional taxes going and why are the other fee's going up??? Why no reductions?? Can anyone help me to understand this thing??:ohdear:

Taxes rarely go down, and if the do it’s minuscule before big jump. But, I agree when the add thousands of housing in county you would think taxes, especially school taxes would drop beings school are over half tax. But everywhere I lived taxes rarely ever when down. I don’t expect it down here. Politicians/ county officials like to sneak in money grabbing stuff like hefty raise for themselves and tax breaks for their supporters.

Assuming you are talking about property taxes, while there was a big jump in the County Tax this year, they have gone down the previous 5 years. I don't know about the years prior to that as I wasn't here.

Maybe a government course is needed to understand how budgets work. Or going to the County treasury and ask for an explanation. Asking on here and expect answers from people who only know "when I was up north" it worked this way. When you have growth like we are experienceing it is almost impossible to keep the reserves, build infrastructure, expand facilities, maintain insurance, hire and maintain personnel etc. Commissioners salaries are a drop in the ocean but seems to be the focus. If new folks are elected it will be interesting to see how they react after they find out how difficult the job is and steep the learning curve really is. But as stated earlier, taxes won't go down as long as the growth continues.

Just wondering where you have been. This topic was beaten to death over the last 6 months. Do a search!

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In my opinion, The Villages attracts new residents because it offers a lot that make people happy.

No, no one can help you.

I suggest you either accept things as they are and appreciate your blessed life or move somewhere else.

For example, a lot of people get a tent and squat in beautiful Ocala National Forest. There are a lot of ways to enjoy this wonderful state.

This has been explained in a number of other threads, but here is a synopsis:


The Villages is massively expanding. This massive expansion of The Villages is going to earn the Developer over a billion dollars. However, the massive expansion of The Villages is necessitating a massive expansion of county roads and other county infrastructure. There are two possible sources of funding to pay for this county infrastructure expansion:

(a) The Developer, who could pay for it with a reasonable impact fee. An impact fee is a per-house tax charged when a building permit is issued and which is supposed to pay for infrastructure necessitated by the house. The Developer's impact fee is currently set at a “sweetheart rate”. OR

(b) The Sumter County taxpayers through a huge increase in our property taxes.

The current County Commissioners have all been put in office with the backing of the Developer. Not surprisingly, the County Commissioners unanimously voted for alternative (b). Also, not surprisingly, those county commissioners who are now up for re-election are having a great deal of trouble getting enough signatures to even get on the ballot.

Just started a thread, not looking for help.

Is this a fact or mere speculation?

So rather than the developers ponying up higher impact fees, they asked the commissioners to commit political suicide and the commissioners agreed to it?

Could be true in this day and age when up is down and on is off but I'd like to know if this is Indeed another example of our Twilight Zone existence.

This has nothing to do with whether or not The Villages is a nice place to live. This is a Sumter County-tax issue and the question is: Do the County Commissioners represent the Developer or the residents of Sumter County?

Are the Developers not residents of Sumter County?

This is a fact. Take a look at how the incumbents, through the Developer's in-crowd that runs the local Republican clubs, are getting endorsements and are soliciting ballot-qualifying signatures (because the incumbents haven't been able to get the signatures in the normal way). All this is in violation of Republican party rules. As a Republican, I am outraged. For details, go to the on-line newspaper. Please wake up as to what is going on here.

As to "political suicide", my guess is that the Developer and his Commissioners thought they had Sumter County so sewn up that they could get away with it. The huge amount of money involved was, probably, in their estimation, worth the risk. But, surprise for them, it is not working out that way.

You are right. I should have said "other residents". I was trying to keep my post short and simple by drawing a distinction.

The point is that the Developer benefits by having his Commissioners keep his sweetheart impact fee low and offloading what should be his infrastructure costs on to the rest of us. If you would like a further explanation, check the last POA Bulletin, which is available on line. Please take an objective look at what is going on here.

Another 100 post thread begins its life..........