The puppets lie to your face, and then they want you to vote for them. They have NO accountability, only to the Developer......Shame on them. Vote all three out, then let's see what happens..............Actions have consequences...............

And when those people come to visit their relatives, the big highlight IS THE ENTERTAINMENT on the Town Squares. The vibe, the atmosphere, the people , the venders, the dancing and music, makes the Villages so Special.

Most people who come here to visit relatives most always go to the town squares in the evening. That's the HIGHLIGHT of the Villages. The vibe, the atmosphere, the people,the restaurants, the music and dancing , the market nights, etc. Never mind the relatives, what about the people who live here? I always enjoy taking a ride into the squares to see whats going on and relaxing to the music, or taking a stroll. It is a very big part of what the Villages is!

Taxes going down
 

Glad to see somebody’s taxes going down. I bought in 2014 and have yet to see them go down. We must be on different planets.

Where is this 25% increase coming from. Every year we hear the same stuff tax increases the developer is getting to good a deal blah blah blah. Been here almost 11 years and my expenses haven't gone up much at all and my taxes are just fine no 25% tax increase. People didn't do their homework or read online before moving here. I knew what they had here as I researched for a good year before moving here chatted on TOTV with a few people sat in the Square in Spanish Springs one night chatting with a gent and he was spot on with what my costs would be. Is it 100% perfect here no but it's 100% better then living in Suffolk County NY where my taxes alone were at least 2x what we're paying here. All I can say is IF so many people are unhappy with the Developer & his Family and his relationship with the County Politicians perhaps they should put their house up for sale. As for us we have one move left and it's in Bushnell! Ok I'm ready for the stones now start throwing!

Yes, 25% 2019 property tax increase: Sumter Leaders Agree to Increase Property Tax by 25 Percent

I would prefer voting out puppet politicians over selling.:pray:

A portion of your total tax bill was increased I can assure you my total tax bill has not gone up 25% since we moved here in 2009 ! Yes some things did increase but others decreased and no where near 25% increase. I’m quite sure very few people can say their total bill went up 25%.

As always a voice of reason. These new voices seem to be trying to paint a different picture but you are right.

We have had a lot of new voices on this issue on this thread. I am always a skeptic and wonder who and what the agenda is behind this push to get the incumbents out. I am pretty sure I know. I hope the same majority will still vote the way they have for as long as we have lived here. This new group who wants change looks real wrong to me.

This is a CDD which is an unusual and workable way to run things. I think it beats the hell out of how most municipalities are run. There seems a push to make it more like Orlando? No thank you. I like this way and the CDD way of doing stuff. Long live the Morses and I hope the incumbent commissioners continue.

Let me ask the question another way. For past 10 plus years real estate taxes went down a bit each year as the county grew rapidly.

My understanding is last year real estate taxes went up 25%. Lets not confuse the issue and talk about what has happened since 2009.

Is my understanding of 2019 right or wrong? Very simple question.

Your understanding is absolutely correct.

There have been articles showing how much money was raised by each candidate and who contributed, this is public information. The article I saw was a long time ago and each of the incumbents had raised 138,000 and this came from all the service suppliers in the Villages; Munns, T&D Pool supply, various law firms. Anyone who benefits from the current system.

I have very mixed emotions about long term politicians remaining in office time after time, after time...the absence of term limits at all levels in government is a problem

it's very easy for a LT politician to get a little too self-important and ignore the wishes of the common voter...let alone be influenced to vote in favor or against something to please a heavy contributor to their campaign re-election fund

we always swopped the purchasing agents/buyers and vendor relationships every few years....to prevent funny stuff from happening

We love living here with all the available activities (pre-Covid), the well kept landscaping, the covenants and restrictions, and the LOW taxes. Beware of anti-developer sentiment. Change is not always good.

:bigbow:

My tax bill went up 6.2% from the previous year period. That's a far cry from 25%. I pulled the bills out and checked!

OK and good for you but it is common knowledge that taxes went up by 25% last year.

Qualifications
 

Forgetting whether the Commissioner's were/are pawns of the Developer I did the homework necessary to determine in my opinion if they were qualified for these positions. To make this determination I pulled all of the public information I could on each one of the Commissioners and based on this research I came away with the opinion that only 1 "may" have the background to hold an important role as a Commissioner. It is important to not even have the slightest appearance of a conflict of interest to serve the residence and in these cases the appearance of a conflict of interest is over the top. I will give one rather simple test and that is there should never be a "surprise" when Managing! and the fact that reserve funds were not made available over the years for repairs and instead they (the Commissioner's) allowed this to go unattended over the years and surprised the residents would in itself be a cause to let them go. Then to try to fool the residents further by saying "oops" maybe we overstated the need and will reduce the new 25% surprise is just another indication that you can't do the job or you are further extending your errors by trying anything to get reelected. It is a truly a strong indication the current Commissioner's are not the ones to make decisions for the residents. :ohdear:

Pull your tax bills and do the math. Bet it wasn't a 25% increase in your total bill year to year!

There is an opinion piece on that other site written by Scott Fenstermaker. It explains a lot. "The odor of the latest ad"

Oren Miller has NO intention of defunding the town-square entertainment. I have personally asked him about that false rumor that is being circulated by his opponents. It is not true.

The EMS team does not accept donations from corporations and similar entities. They will represent the residents. Consequently, they have collected a pittance compared to the roughly quarter of a million dollars the Developer has contributed to his puppets. Wake up as to what is going on here!

Verify all the above on the Sumter County elections website.

Nobody with a minimal understanding of the situation claims your total tax bill went up 25%.

Your total tax bill is totally irrelevant in evaluating the County Commissioners. They are responsible only for your County Tax. That tax went up 25% for one reason: to divert hundreds of millions of dollars of our taxpayer dollars to the Developer by preserving his sweetheart impact fee while increasing our taxes to pay for County infrastructure that should be paid for with his impact fee.

He never said it, so don't worry about it. To learn about the EMS team, just click here: Fair Government For Sumter.

To understand who is funding the Developer's puppets, click here and click on their names: Candidate Reports

Then Google: Good Government for Florida, Inc., and look at who is funding that to further circumvent the $1,000 per-candidate contribution limit.

Also, look at who was behind running fake candidates Wahl and Prince to disenfranchise over 45,000 voters.

He absolutely said he would not vote to have $120,000 of Sumter County Tourism tax go toward Square Entertainment. See proof below. Now... recently he changed his position and said, based on resident feedback, he has reconsidered his position. So, I think he listened to people who were concerned by his initial stance.

Advogado - when you make statements like "he never said that" and there is proof that he did say it, it makes people question other comments you might make about the race.

Good point on your part. When I talked to Oren, he said he was not in favor of defunding the Squares. I was under the impression that he had never said the contrary. You are right; I should not have made the statement that I did without double checking. Sorry about that.

No harm no foul. I give you a lot of credit for your post.

Skip. Just pulled my tax bill and the Sumter County property tax portion which the the one we are discussing increased by 25.5% from 2018 to 2019. Calculated by dividing 2019 millage rate of 6.7 by the 2018 millage rate of5.3365 which if my math is correct comes to an increase of 25.550454%. If yours didn’t, I am surprised

I said total tax bill because that's what I pay period! I also said some items go up and others go down.

Oren Miller
 

How your current county commissioners respond to residents

How the commissioners treat visitors - YouTube


Oren Miller will
listen to you

good post! informed yet quite pleasant. imagine that in today's society :icon_wink:

dittos. some will complain about anything & everything. it's still very inexpensive compared to other parts of the country. imagine having to pay up to 10grand a year in property taxes alone, & theVillages is suddenly a wonderful place to be. all we need is in one beautiful area, & we could'nt be happier

And the real estate tax part of the bill went up by 25%.

You are absolutely correct. I have posted about this in the past. The "county tax" went up by 25%, perhaps more if your assessed value also increased. The "school tax" remained essentially unchanged, and is about the same amount as the "county tax". There are some other non ad valorem line items that remained essentially unchanged. And, of course, the bond payment, if you haven't paid off your bond, also shows up on the "total tax bill" along with the items above. If you computed the increase in the "total tax" bill and you haven't paid off your bond then the increase may very well be below 10%, depending on the value of your house and the amount of your bond payment. The "county tax" did increase by 25% (or more) - this cannot be disputed.

Some people like to play with numbers and think we should forget about the county tax increase as something of a good thing.