Dear Governor Crist, What about the Snowbirds? At the risk of losing your interest in continuing to read this, I am a Canadian, a Snowbird, and not a homesteader. I enjoyed wintering here over the last 5 years, but I no longer feel welcome in Florida. I listened last night to you and Senator Atwater […]

“Snowbirds say they get cold shoulder on taxes” (Interviewed by Geoff Kirbyson in The Bottom Line,September 2007) “The voters who could stop the elected officials from having this very large increase in spending, they didn’t care. The snowbirds, who were shouldering the increased load, couldn’t vote. Politicians were pandering to voters, with sentiments along the […]

“Tax system is not just ‘loony’; to snowbirds it’s outrageous”, Letter to Editor of Palm Beach Post, March 10, 2007

Ups and Downs since Black Tuesday Florida’s Taxation and Budget Reform Committee (TBRC) is empowered to place proposals/Amendments to be voted on by Florida’s taxpayers at November’s ballot. The TBRC passed a proposal to replace the school portion ($8B) of property taxes with a 1% increase in sales tax (about $4B), and the shortfall to […]

Black Tuesday in Florida! This morning (February 1, 2008) the Miami Herald trumpets that “Crist Budget May Lead to Tax Hike”  . Was it not only last Tuesday that Governor Crist (you know the one who promised Floridians that taxes and insurance will drop like a rock) promised that a YES on Amendment 1 will […]

3rd Court Challenge in Past Year to Florida’s Discriminatory Property Tax System On 1-11-08 another suit was filed challenging Florida’s property tax system. For the first time, however, suit was filed in Federal Court. In 2007 two separate suits (one by non-resident non-homesteaded out of state property owners and the other by homesteaded property owners) […]

Broader Legal Front Against Florida’s Two-tier Property Taxes Lots of new developments on the legal front, but before I get to the legal update, I came across an interesting article by John Brady from Madison, Connecticut writing in the NYT’s “Retire the property-tax” “The property tax is a concept whose better days are behind it. […]

Florida property tax reform is a pipe dream – Screws tightened again on part-time residents! Florida’s Legislature pulls the rug from under real property tax reform, while further off-loading out-of-control expenditures onto part-time resident, out-of-state property owners. Amazingly, Florida’s Legislators placed on the January 29th ballot a constitutional amendment of the following: (1) doubling the […]

A Rant on Florida Property Taxes (October 21, 2007 view) I called it a “soap opera”. One of the Florida legislature members called it a “toga party”. The Florida legislature is once again in special session on property tax tinkering or more correctly, offloading taxes from the already much advantaged homesteaders on to non-homesteaded property […]

Legal Challenge of Florida’s Discriminatory Property Tax System- An Update Up to about a year ago, there was no interest by any law firm to launch a legal challenge to the Save-Our-Homes Amendment In fact I remember Winnie Nelon, one of the early leaders of the tax reform groups, being quoted that her organization has […]