Senate President Ben Albritton, who presided over the 30–9 vote to put Amendment 3 on the ballot, now says he’ll vote NO on Amendment 3. He warns rural counties could lose up to 30% of their resources, threatening law enforcement, emergency services, and infrastructure. I respect Ben and appreciate his willingness to speak candidly about the consequences. But perhaps this is exactly why the Legislature should have required comprehensive fiscal modeling and local impact analysis before putting it on the ballot. These questions deserved answers before the vote, not months afterward. floridapolitics.com/archives…

100% correct, nothing in Amendment 3 guarantees: • Renters won’t pay more • Police stay fully funded • Firefighters stay fully funded • Cities or Counties won’t become insolvent • Libraries, parks, and recreation centers stay open • Governments won’t raise millage rates • Governments won’t shift costs to fire fees, EMS assessments, stormwater fees, or other non-ad valorem charges • Longtime homeowners won’t end up paying more through new fees • Counties and cities won’t come back to Tallahassee asking for a bailout The 5% cap limits assessed-value growth. It does not cap the tax bill. If your case for Amendment 3 starts with “hopefully,” you don’t have a policy. You have a gamble.

Police and fire often consume more than half of a city’s General Fund, so yes, a city can choose to hold public safety harmless. But that means the cuts have to come from almost everything else. Largo is a good example. Its FY2024 General Fund spent about $33.5M on police and $25.5M on fire rescue, roughly 59% of total General Fund expenditures. Under the Amendment 3 scenario we’ve been discussing, Largo could protect police and fire, eliminate its library, parks, recreation and community-center functions, and still be roughly $5 million short. That’s the tradeoff people keep skipping over. “Just cut spending” sounds easy until you actually open the budget.

Brutal honesty is the best policy!

Big Amendment 3 week ahead. Tonight: Miami town hall at Miami Dade College. Wednesday: Bay News 9 with the always charming and incredibly handsome @BernyJacques, then Flagler County Tiger Bay. Thursday: University of Tampa…teaching a class 👨‍🏫 Friday: Orlando Economic Forum breakfast. Four days, five events, all focused on Amendment 3 and the questions Florida needs to answer now: What gets cut? What gets shifted into fees and assessments? What happens to housing affordability, public safety, infrastructure and basic services? Which cities can adapt, which are forced to consolidate, and which simply may not survive? This is not a small tax debate. It is a fundamental rewrite of how Florida communities work.