Disclaimer: This article includes analysis and commentary based on publicly available budget data and statements. It aims to clarify misleading claims and promote informed civic dialogue.
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis has spent the past year lambasting local governments for raising property taxes, accusing cities and counties of exploiting rising home values to pad bloated budgets. But a closer look at the state’s own finances reveals a glaring contradiction: DeSantis has repeatedly signed state budgets that rely on increased property tax revenue to fund public schools.
At a recent event in Tampa, DeSantis declared, “It’s a one-way ratchet… you get stuck paying higher taxes,” referring to how rising property assessments lead to bigger tax bills even when rates stay flat. He’s even dispatched state personnel to audit city budgets for “waste, fraud, or abuse”.
Yet the very budgets he’s approved tell a different story.
📊 The Numbers Don’t Lie
- In 2019, DeSantis signed a budget allocating $7.9 billion from local property taxes for K–12 schools.
- The current budget includes $10.9 billion for the same purpose—a $3 billion increase.
- These funds come from the “Required Local Effort” (RLE), a state-mandated property tax levy that local governments must collect to fund education.
While the average RLE tax rate has technically dropped, it remains above the “rollback rate”—the rate needed to keep revenue flat year-over-year. In other words, the state is quietly benefiting from rising property values, even as DeSantis publicly condemns cities for doing the same.
📰 Calling Out the False Claim
The Daytona Beach News-Journal recently echoed DeSantis’s framing, suggesting that cities were uniquely responsible for property tax hikes. That framing omits the fact that the state itself has profited from the same mechanism. The omission misleads readers into believing that local governments are the sole drivers of rising tax burdens, when in fact the state’s own budgetary structure depends on it.
🔍 The Bigger Picture
DeSantis has floated the idea of eliminating property taxes altogether, a move that experts warn could devastate funding for schools, police, and fire departments. Replacing the lost revenue might require doubling the state’s sales tax—a regressive shift that would disproportionately impact low- and middle-income Floridians.
🧠 Final Thought
If DeSantis wants to lead a serious conversation about tax reform, it must begin with transparency. Criticizing cities while quietly banking on the same revenue stream is not reform—it’s deflection.
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