[Topspinmo]

Originally Posted by Advogado

Developer's Puppet Commissioners' Enactment of a 25% Tax Hike
Last year, the Sumter County Commission increased our county property taxes by 25%. This obscenely large tax increase caused me to look into local politics for the first time. In doing so, I woke up to the fact that the Developer had packed the County Commission (as well as all the key positions in the local Republican Party) with his puppets and that the tax increase was a means of offloading, on to the residents, infrastructure costs that should have been borne by the Developer. This scam gives the Developer hundreds of millions of dollars at taxpayer expense. (For a further explanation, you can take a look at my September 24, 2019 speech to the County Commission, which I recently discovered is on youtube, albeit with my name misspelled: Scott Fensterbaker--How can five guys screw 125000 people? - YouTube ) .

Developer's Puppet Commissioners Defeated by the EMS Team

As a result of voter outrage over the tax increase and despite the Developer's enormous spending and dirty tricks, the Developer's puppet Commissioners (Butler, Burgess, and Printz) were defeated by Republican reform candidates Estep, Miller, and Search (known as “the EMS Team”). The EMS Team promised to roll back the tax increase, making up the lost revenue by increasing the Developer's impact fee to a reasonable level. Residents were satisfied not only by the victory of the EMS Team, but also by the fact that a criminal investigation of election tactics used by the Developer in his unsuccessful attempt to keep his puppets in office is underway.

Developer's Efforts to Preserve the Tax Increase and His Sweetheart Impact Fee

Now, it appears that the two remaining Developer puppets on the Commission (Gilpin and Breeden) and County Administrator Bradley Arnold (who was hired by the Developer puppets) are attempting to preserve the Developer's sweetheart impact fee and derail efforts to roll back the tax increase. As a consequence, I have emailed the following letter to the EMS Team:

An Open Letter to the EMS Team

To: Commissioners Estep, Miller, and Search:

Apparently, the two Developer's puppets who remain on the Commission are now arguing that raising impact fees would discourage economic growth to the detriment of Sumter County, and therefore, the Developer's sweetheart rate should be continued and our 25% tax hike not rolled back-- as you guys pledged to do. The Developer's puppets' argument is absolute BS, and I hope that you are not buying it.

A simple explanation of the economic effect of impact fees is found on the Flagler County website (Page not found | FlaglerLive

"Impact fees are generally accepted except by developers and some real estate professionals, who call impact fees a “hidden tax” that slows or discourages growth by pricing people out of homes: if the price of a home is $10,000 or $15,000 greater than it would be without impact fees, some homeowners who might otherwise have been able to afford a house consequently would not.
Impact fees are taxes. They are hidden only in so far as they fall into a large category of “fees” that local governments impose that are indistinguishable from taxes. Semantics aside, they’re not quite hidden: Governments clearly advertise them and, of course, impose them at the time of construction.
The evidence, however, is strongly against the argument that impact fees either slow or discourage growth: Florida’s highest-growth decades followed the imposition of impact fees in the late 1970s. And Flagler County led the nation as the fastest-growing county for several years during the middle of the 2000s despite relatively steep impact fees.
Impact fees may well spur growth and increase home values: while it’s true that impact fees will add to the cost of a house, and that cost will be passed on to home-owners, the higher value of the new house will also improve the values of existing, neighboring homes. In that sense, impact fees raise the value of homes. Existing residents who have presumably paid their impact fee will also be appreciative of a government that keeps their other taxes relatively low, while generating revenue through one-time impact fees on new residents and businesses.
Absent alternative means of paying for growth, the absence of impact fees would artificially lower the price of new construction by shifting the burden of growth’s cost onto existing homes or creating considerable deficits between the impact of growth and available services, thus lowering the quality of life–and with it, home values and the attractiveness of a locality, which would potentially hurt further construction and home-ownership."

Please do not lose sight of what you were elected to do and be taken in by the Developer's puppets' specious arguments. You need to rollback the 25% tax increase (completely if possible) and make up the lost revenue by increasing the Developer's sweetheart impact fee-- to cover not just roads but also ALL county infrastructure necessitated by the Developer's massive expansion of The Villages. Your doing so will be your legacy. Your not doing so will let down the residents of Sumter County and destroy both your reputation and your legacy. Remember, you were not elected to be friends with the Developer or with the Developer's remaining puppet Commissioners. What was going on at the County Commission for a number of years was political malfeasance at its worst. You were elected to clean it up, not to be nice guys.

Contact the EMS Team to Show Your Support for the Tax Rollback

I would suggest that concerned residents contact Mssrs. Estep, Miller, and Search to show support for the tax rollback. Contact information is here: About the Commissioners | Sumter County, FL - Official Website .
I would suggest that you not waste your time trying to convince Commissioners Gilpin and Breeden to roll back the tax increase. They remain firmly ensconced in the Developer's pocket. If it were not for the risk of contracting Covid-19 by being in a crowd, I would also encourage everyone to also attend Commission meetings until the tax hike is rolled back, but that is not a good idea right now.

I still pay more taxes, so no, about time Sumter county started paying there fair share. Another thing get use to it, taxes are going to go up ⬆️. It’s there only answer.

[Northwoods]

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[Northwoods]

They have to "roll back" the 25% tax increase. It's what they ran on. If they don't, they will have a very hard time getting re-elected next time.

[Velvet]

Just wondering, if any studies were done previously to see how people would react to such a large at one time increase. This response would probably have been forecasted. The frog and the hot water story.

Originally Posted by Aloha1

So you say. And yet the infighting between the new Commissioners has already begun. Remember the parable about the goose who laid the golden eggs.

An example below of how the new commissioners are working together and not squabbling. The only no vote was Gary Breeden, one of the developer's puppets.
______________________________
Sumter County commissioners voted 4-1 Tuesday night to establish a no-kill animal shelter, culminating a five-year goal of newly elected Commissioner Oren Miller.

[Dilligas]

Originally Posted by Marathon Man

And, the appropriate taxes to be payed by residents. Therefore, calls for a rollback are premature. Data driven decisions are always best.

If you roll back the 2019 millage rate tax increase, then the last 10 years of no or very little increases (& decreases) will be assessed and small annual increases every year will be retroactively assessed. We have been and are still one of the lowest rate counties in Florida.

[Girlcopper]

Originally Posted by tophcfa

I wouldn’t mind subsidizing the developers impact fees, if it was the impact caused by building lots of new Championship golf courses. However, I have absolutely no desire to subsidize the impact fees necessitated by building tens of thousands of new homes, and now apartment complexes as well.

Roll, roll, roll them back, or build more Championship golf, south of 44. Hmmm, sounds like a song I herd before.

Not everyone cares about golf and have other interests. Nothing wrong with new homes and apartments. We dont live in a bubble

[Advogado]

Originally Posted by Marathon Man

And, the appropriate taxes to be payed by residents. Therefore, calls for a rollback are premature. Data driven decisions are always best.

Calls for a rollback are not premature. Revenue to the County will remain the same. The difference will be that the Developer (through a realistic impact fee), not the current residents (through their property taxes), will be paying for County infrastructure necessitated by the Developer's massive expansion of The Villages.

[kappy]

Although costs go up annually, Sumter County did not have a tax increase for many years due to the fact that additional revenues from all the new houses sold in the county each year were more than enough to cover any increase in expenses. If the impact fees were raised to where they should be resulting in a full 100% roll back of the increase, the developer would simply pass that increase to each new home built. In effect, the new homes would be paying for the increase in road construction, thereby paying for the increase that those new homes created.

The three new commissioners ran on a campaign of a 100% roll back. Many Sumter voters actually changed parties to vote for the EMT team. Do you honestly believe that the additional purchase price of each home caused by the charging the developer an increased impact fee will stop people from moving to The Villages? I doubt it!

The email address for Commissioner Gary Search is: gary.search@sumtercountyfl.gov. (I do not know why this address is not on the county website).
The email address for Craig Estep is:craig.estep@sumtercountyfl.gov.
The email address for Oren Miller is: oren.miller@sumtercountyfl.gov.

It only takes a few minutes to send an email to the three commissioners. In fact, you can address it to all three and not have to send three separate emails. I sent my email yesterday and indicated that the citizens of Sumter County who voted for them expect them to keep their campaign promise to roll back the tax increase by the full amount of the increase, not 60%, or 75% but the full 100%.

[Topspinmo]

Originally Posted by John41

Impact fees are not the same for every 55+ developer. They must reflect the actual cost which will vary.
See Parts (f) and (g) below.
________________________

Florida Impact Fee Law
1163.31801 Impact fees; short title; intent; minimum requirements; audits; challenges.—
(1) This section may be cited as the “Florida Impact Fee Act.”
(2) The Legislature finds that impact fees are an important source of revenue for a local government to use in funding the infrastructure necessitated by new growth. The Legislature further finds that impact fees are an outgrowth of the home rule power of a local government to provide certain services within its jurisdiction. Due to the growth of impact fee collections and local governments’ reliance on impact fees, it is the intent of the Legislature to ensure that, when a county or municipality adopts an impact fee by ordinance or a special district adopts an impact fee by resolution, the governing authority complies with this section.
(3) At a minimum, an impact fee adopted by ordinance of a county or municipality or by resolution of a special district must satisfy all of the following conditions:
(a) The calculation of the impact fee must be based on the most recent and localized data.
(b) The local government must provide for accounting and reporting of impact fee collections and expenditures. If a local governmental entity imposes an impact fee to address its infrastructure needs, the entity must account for the revenues and expenditures of such impact fee in a separate accounting fund.
(c) Administrative charges for the collection of impact fees must be limited to actual costs.
(d) The local government must provide notice not less than 90 days before the effective date of an ordinance or resolution imposing a new or increased impact fee. A county or municipality is not required to wait 90 days to decrease, suspend, or eliminate an impact fee.
(e) Collection of the impact fee may not be required to occur earlier than the date of issuance of the building permit for the property that is subject to the fee.
(f) The impact fee must be proportional and reasonably connected to, or have a rational nexus with, the need for additional capital facilities and the increased impact generated by the new residential or commercial construction.
(g) The impact fee must be proportional and reasonably connected to, or have a rational nexus with, the expenditures of the funds collected and the benefits accruing to the new residential or nonresidential construct

If anything needs rolled back it’s the apartments at HH’s, that area was already built out residential 20 years go. Developers can do what the want in SS, LSL, BW with buildings already built, but over crowd and overcrowded area that he sold to district not right. But, if you get bunch of puppets in places where approval you get EVERYTHING they want.

[Reedpanos@gmail.com]

We all have a stake in this issue, so do not think it is a done deal. Our home prices are artificially depressed due to the thousands of new homes being sold by the developer at prices undercut by the 25% tax increase. Putting the increase in the impact fee on new home buyers increases both new homes and by market pressure existing home prices. That helps everyone except the developer.

[rmd2]

Originally Posted by John41

An example below of how the new commissioners are working together and not squabbling. The only no vote was Gary Breeden, one of the developer's puppets.
______________________________
Sumter County commissioners voted 4-1 Tuesday night to establish a no-kill animal shelter, culminating a five-year goal of newly elected Commissioner Oren Miller.

Big deal, a "pet" project that has nothing to do with their promises.

[Niferlou06]

Here is the email reply:
Thank you for your well thought out and insightful email. I have not lost sight of what I have come to office to do. I want to reassure you of that first and foremost. Additionally we are having a workshop on January 5th to address the issues of impact fees and what those effects may be on potential revenues to try and lower the burden on the ad valorum tax base. It is critical for us to find additional revenue streams and apply those to once again lower the burden on the ad valorum taxes in Sumter County. Thank you for your interest as I work toward identifying solutions to remedy the situation...Craig

[JoMar]

Originally Posted by Reedpanos@gmail.com

We all have a stake in this issue, so do not think it is a done deal. Our home prices are artificially depressed due to the thousands of new homes being sold by the developer at prices undercut by the 25% tax increase. Putting the increase in the impact fee on new home buyers increases both new homes and by market pressure existing home prices. That helps everyone except the developer.

Another "I got mine" so I don't expect you to "get yours" post. I like the post when one of the new commissioners said they need to find new revenue streams (which of course is us in a different format?). As we continue to fight the developer I can see the developer also finding new revenue streams and focusing less on what the residents care about and more around what works for them.....commercial properties, housing for commercial support, apartment complexes etc. Be careful what you wish for, you might just be successful.

[OrangeBlossomBaby]

Originally Posted by Niferlou06

Here is the email reply:
Thank you for your well thought out and insightful email. I have not lost sight of what I have come to office to do. I want to reassure you of that first and foremost. Additionally we are having a workshop on January 5th to address the issues of impact fees and what those effects may be on potential revenues to try and lower the burden on the ad valorum tax base. It is critical for us to find additional revenue streams and apply those to once again lower the burden on the ad valorum taxes in Sumter County. Thank you for your interest as I work toward identifying solutions to remedy the situation...Craig

...additional revenue streams. This is something they should ALWAYS have. The town I came from (yes, Connecticut, yes, boo-hiss taxes, shove that to the side and pay attention to what I'm saying, not to your emotions for once)...

is always in the black. They have a "rainy day fund" because they KNOW there will always be emergencies that they need extra funding for. We paid heavy in property taxes, but the town ALWAYS paid its bills and as a result, was able to get an A rating - which resulted in more services for less money overall.

When we were hit with 6 FEET of snow over a 1-week period, our town was able to plow us out and prepare the roads for the utility companies to put us all back online within a week. MOST of us had heat again within 24 hours. The town public works department worked 24/7 to get trees off the road, get splintered garage corners away from power lines, and move roofs that had collapsed away from stairwells.

And still - they didn't end up in debt to anyone, or have to raise the taxes. Personally I'd rather pay $1 too much in taxes every year, than have an emergency and the town not have enough to pay for the emergency.

Because when that happens, debt accrues interest, and the taxpayer is the one who has to pay that.