Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier has rewritten the description of a proposed property tax amendment that will appear on the ballot in November following a judge’s order that called it a “misleading and inaccurate” summary.
Amendment 3
The proposed Amendment 3 would amend the Florida Constitution to increase the tax exemption on homes owned by taxpayers that serve as their primary residences — or homesteads.
Right now, homeowners can claim a $50,000 discount on their home value before calculating and paying property taxes. If Amendment 3 passes, that amount would increase to $150,000 at the start of next year, and then $250,000 in 2028.
Businesses, second homes and apartments would not be eligible for the bigger tax exemption, but the amendment would cap their assessed value from growing more than 5% per year. (Currently, it’s capped at 10% per year for non-homestead properties.)
It would be effective if it gets at least 60% of the vote in November.
The changes
Circuit Judge David Frank wrote in a decision on Aug. 3 that the Legislature’s summary for Amendment 3, titled “Save Our Homes from Excessive Property Taxes,” was “clearly and conclusively defective” for containing errors and obviously taking a stance on what by law must be presented to voters neutrally and objectively.
Frank found problems from the first words of the description, likening the title to “a political slogan” that “advocates a policy position.” He compared it to a previous court ruling on a ballot measure to “Save the Everglades” in 1994 that struck down that language.
The new title is much more neutral: “Increased Homed Exemption; Lower Cap on Increases in Non-Homestead Property Assessments.”
The changes also omit factual errors that Frank identified in the original, including a statement that the amendment would “ensure funding for core services” like fire and emergency response.
But Frank wrote that the cap would limit revenue to fund those services. “By substantially reducing the local property tax base,” he wrote, “the proposed amendment is likely to decrease the revenues available to local governments to fund core services. The amendment cannot fairly or accurately be described as ‘ensuring funding.’”
Several municipalities have affirmed that they won’t be able to fund those “core services” if the amendment passes. And groups representing firefighters and police departments have come out in opposition to the amendment.
Reactions
In a prepared statement, Uthmeier expressed unhappiness with the amendment in the form adopted by the legislature. Gov. Ron DeSantis, who had pushed for the property tax cuts, distanced himself from the final version of the proposal, leaving it without a unified champion despite passing with about three-quarters support from both chambers of the legislature.
“Under Florida law, we don’t have the ability to rewrite the full amendment, just the ballot summary and title consistent with the court’s ruling,” Uthmeier wrote in a prepared statement.
“The amendment could certainly have been rolled out with greater transparency and the meaningful involvement of key stakeholders, including our law enforcement agencies. No one wants to defund our incredible sheriffs, yet there were no discussions to involve them in this process. If it does not pass, I look forward to working with the legislature and our law enforcement leaders on comprehensive tax relief that protects public safety.”
The Florida Policy Institute, a left-leaning think tank that opposes Amendment 3, said in a statement on Friday that the change “more accurately represents the underlying policy for voters.”
“However, the amendment’s harmful potential impacts remain the same,” the group wrote. “Amendment 3 is indeed a cost shift that would erode the property tax base, open the door to new tax increases or fees, and leave renters behind. … It would leave a $12-billion hole in local budgets and lead to widespread cuts to local services — things like fire rescue, disaster response, hospitals, parks, and libraries.”
