What the Amendment Proposes

If approved by 60% of voters, this legislatively referred constitutional amendment (originating as House Joint Resolution 5019) would alter how Florida manages its reserve funds:

• Increases the Fund Cap: It would raise the maximum amount of general revenue that can be held in the Budget Stabilization Fund from the current 10% limit to 25%.

• Mandates Annual Transfers: It would require the legislature to transfer either $750 million or the amount needed to reach the new 25% cap, whichever is less, into the fund every year.

• Rules for Withdrawal and Suspension: The legislature could withdraw these funds for emergencies or critical state needs with a two-thirds vote, and the mandatory annual transfer could be suspended under certain conditions (such as if funds are withdrawn in the same year).

Background and Perspective

The measure reached the ballot with significant bipartisan support in the Florida Legislature. HJR 5019 passed the Florida House of Representatives by a vote of 100-1 and the Florida Senate by a vote of 29-4.

The core debate surrounding the amendment is the balance between fiscal conservatism (building larger reserves to protect the state's bond rating and buffer against recessions) versus the flexibility to fund annual spending priorities (the choice to spend dollars now on various programs).

For the official text, check the Florida Division of Elections website.

What it does: Amendment 2 would exempt certain "tangible personal property" (TPP) — think tractors, irrigation equipment, tools, machinery, and other farm/agritourism equipment — from local property taxes, if that property is:

• Habitually located or typically present on land classified as agricultural,

• Used to produce agricultural products or for agritourism activities, and

• Owned by the landowner or leaseholder of that agricultural land.

The amendment lets the Legislature further define and limit the exemption by statute. If approved, it first applies to tax years beginning January 1, 2027.

Current law, for context: Agricultural land is already taxed on "current use" value rather than market value (the "greenbelt" classification), and Florida already exempts the first $25,000 of TPP value for any business or agricultural operation. Amendment 2 would go further, removing the tax on qualifying equipment entirely, with no dollar cap.

Fiscal impact: Florida's Revenue Estimating Conference projects no impact on state revenue, but a recurring loss of at least $28.7 million per year in local government revenue statewide. That money that would otherwise fund county and municipal budgets: fire and EMS, sheriff's offices, parks, roads, and other local services. This hits counties like Hillsborough with significant agricultural land in the eastern and southern parts of the county, including around Plant City, especially hard.

We recommend voting NO because:

1. It drains local budgets with no guardrails. The Legislature's own economists put the cost to local governments at nearly $29 million a year. That gap would have to be made up somewhere, whether through cuts to local services or higher taxes on everyone else, including renters and small homeowners who don't benefit from this exemption at all.

2. It's written to help the biggest operators most. Because the exemption has no cap, it delivers its largest dollar benefit to landowners with the most equipment. A modest exemption cap could have targeted relief to small and mid-size farms; this version doesn't.

3. It's another constitutional carve-out for a policy problem the Legislature could solve by statute. Tax exemptions and their limits are exactly the kind of thing that belongs in the tax code, where lawmakers can adjust caps, add guardrails, or sunset the exemption if it doesn't work as intended. Locking it into the constitution removes that flexibility and puts it out of reach of ordinary legislative correction.

4. It's part of a pattern this cycle. Amendment 2 doesn't sit alone on the ballot. All three amendments narrow the property tax base local governments depend on. Taken together, they shift more of the burden for funding local services onto the taxpayers and revenue sources that are left, while removing local elected officials' ability to weigh in on trade-offs specific to their communities.

5. Local control matters. Hillsborough's Board of County Commissioners and other local bodies are best positioned to weigh agricultural tax policy against the county's own budget needs.

The Florida Democratic Party State Executive Committee voted to formally oppose Amendment 3, the property tax measure headed to voters on the November 3 ballot. 

Party members adopted the position over concerns that the amendment would strip billions of dollars from the local budgets that fund police, fire rescue, EMTs, and other essential services Floridians depend on every day. 

Statement from Florida Democratic Party Chair Nikki Fried:

“Florida Democrats are focused on improving the lives of working families and seniors across the state. We need real affordability relief, but Amendment 3 would hurt our local communities and cut local services while giving huge tax breaks to billionaires and corporations.

This is a scam that would either raise other taxes on working families or rob their communities of essential services like public hospitals, EMTs, fire rescue, disaster preparedness, road maintenance, children services, libraries, and parks.

Amendment 3 is bad for our cities and towns, bad for our rural counties, and just plain bad for Florida.”

Background: Local officials warn this amendment is a power grab. By draining the local revenue that pays for these services, Amendment 3 would put Tallahassee Republicans in charge of decisions that belong to Florida’s cities, counties, and the residents who elect their own local leaders, leaving communities to answer for cuts they never chose.

Amendment 3 would sharply expand the homestead exemption for non-school property taxes and set the state on a path toward eliminating those taxes entirely. State economists estimate the measure would cost local governments roughly $12 billion a year, the revenue cities and counties rely on to keep first responders staffed, hospitals open, and neighborhoods safe.

This loss would force an impossible choice on local communities: raise other taxes on working families or gut the services that keep them safe. Police departments, fire rescue crews, and EMTs are funded overwhelmingly through local property taxes. When that revenue disappears, the first cuts land on emergency response, disaster preparedness, and the everyday functions that hold a community together.

Voters will be asked whether the Superintendent of Hillsborough County Public Schools should stop being appointed by the elected School Board and instead be elected directly by voters in a partisan race, serving a four-year term.

Key mechanics:

• Current system: The School Board hires, evaluates, and can remove the superintendent at any time.

• Proposed system: Voters would elect the superintendent countywide, in a partisan election, to a fixed four-year term. The School Board would lose its hiring and firing authority over the position.

• Timeline: This November's vote only decides whether to make the switch. If approved, the first elected superintendent race would happen in the 2028 general election.

• History: Hillsborough elected its superintendent until 1966, when a referendum moved to the current appointed model.

Why now: The push followed public friction between former Superintendent Van Ayres and the state Board of Education over LGBTQ+ library books, and comes after Gov. DeSantis's unsuccessful efforts to reshape the elected School Board through targeted 2024 endorsements.

VOTE “NO” BECAUSE:

1. It removes the School Board's core accountability tool. Right now, if a superintendent underperforms, mismanages funds, or loses the community's confidence, the elected School Board can act. Under this referendum, a problematic superintendent would be locked in for a full four-year term.

2. It swaps professional qualifications for a politics. Hillsborough County Public Schools serves over 200,000 students and employs more than 25,000 staff. The current appointed model lets the Board hire based on demonstrated expertise in education administration, finance, and large-organization management. An elected model makes campaign viability, name recognition, and fundraising the deciding factors instead.

3. Making it a partisan race injects politics directly into classrooms. The office is currently nonpartisan. Converting it to a partisan election all but guarantees the superintendent's race becomes a proxy battle for state and national political fights.

4. The Hillsborough County Council PTA/PTSA opposes it. After reviewing the measure, the county's PTA council concluded the current appointed system provides a clearer, more direct line of accountability and urged a No vote, specifically flagging that the confusingly worded ballot language is easy to misread.

What the Referendum Does

Voters will be asked whether to amend the Hillsborough County Charter to restructure the Board of County Commissioners.

Proposed changes:

• Board size: Expands the Commission from 7 to 9 members, with a further increase to 11 members if the county's population reaches 2.5 million (it's currently around 1.6 million).

• Eliminates countywide ("at-large") seats: The Commission currently has 4 single-member district seats and 3 countywide seats. Under this measure, all seats become single-member districts with no more countywide seats at all.

• Voting impact: Right now, every Hillsborough voter picks 4 of the 7 commissioners: your own district seat plus all 3 countywide seats. You have a voice in electing a majority of the board. Under the new structure, each voter would pick just 1 of 9 (or 11) commissioners.

• Redistricting authority: New district lines would be drawn by the current Republican-majority Commission, giving that board significant influence over the political makeup of its own successor districts.

• Other provisions: Raises the vote threshold for the Commission to appoint or remove the County Administrator, County Attorney, and County Internal Auditor to "majority plus one," and changes procedures for the Charter Review Board and citizen-initiated charter amendments.

• We have already rejected this locally: Hillsborough's own Charter Review Board studied various expansion options, including hybrid structures that added seats without eliminating countywide seats, and opted not to recommend any changes.

VOTE “NO” BECAUSE:

1. It's a partisan power grab dressed up as "better representation." Countywide seats are the hardest ones to gerrymander. Eliminating them in favor of an all single-member map, drawn by the current Republican-majority board, hands that board significant control over the district lines its own successors will run in. Coverage of the bill has explicitly flagged this as a partisan takeover risk, not a neutral structural reform.

2. It shrinks your voice, not just theirs. Right now, every Hillsborough voter has a say in 4 of 7 commission races. Under this plan, you'd have a say in just 1 of 9 (or 11). That's a dramatic reduction in how much of county government any individual voter gets to weigh in on, at exactly the moment turnout and civic engagement matter most.

3. It trades countywide accountability for parochial dealmaking. USF political science professor J. Edwin Benton (who advised the county the last time this board size changed) warned that eliminating countywide seats removes the commissioners who "can afford to take a wider perspective and consider the entire county," and that an all-single-member board risks becoming "a game of competition between districts" rather than a body making countywide decisions.

4. The county's own review board already looked at this and said no. Hillsborough's Charter Review Board considered several options for adding commissioners.They ultimately recommended no changes at all. This referendum is an attempt to bypass that local process and to allow state control over local government.

5. It didn't need to eliminate at-large seats to add representation. If the actual goal were reducing constituents per commissioner as the county grows, we could have kept county-wide commissioners and simply added new single-member districts. The all-or-nothing design is intended to reduce minority representation.

What the Referendum Does

What's being decided: Whether to renew Hillsborough County Public Schools' existing half-penny (0.5%) sales surtax for another 10 years. This is an extension of the current rate, not a new tax and not a rate increase — voters first approved this surtax in 2018.

Proposed Changes:

• Legally restricted use: By law, the sales tax dollars can only go toward specific capital and infrastructure needs. It cannot be used for salaries or general operating costs. Approved uses include air conditioning/HVAC replacement, roof replacement, safety and security upgrades (cameras, vestibules, buzzer systems), classroom technology, athletic facilities, and new school construction to relieve overcrowding.

• Independent oversight: A Citizen Oversight Committee — independent citizens with no financial stake in the projects, plus a district representative — reviews spending monthly and reports publicly on progress. Committee leadership has included high-profile, cross-partisan figures: former Education Commissioner and USF President Betty Castor, Hillsborough Sheriff Chad Chronister, and former Republican Senate President Tom Lee.

• State-mandated audit: Florida law requires an independent performance audit of the surtax within 60 days before any renewal referendum, adding another layer of accountability ahead of this vote.

• Track record: Since the tax took effect in 2019, the district has spent more than $1.15 billion, completing more than 750 construction projects — including over 200 A/C replacements, dozens of roof replacements, new schools to relieve overcrowding, and tens of millions in safety/security and classroom technology upgrades. More than $680 million of that has gone to local and small businesses.

If it fails: This revenue funds work the state does not otherwise pay for. The state does not fund school buildings based on age or need. So as schools age, the need for repairs grows but state funding does not follow. Without renewal, the district would return to the pre-2018 situation of roughly $1 billion in deferred maintenance with no dedicated funding stream to address it.

VOTE YES BECAUSE:

1. It's a renewal, not a new tax or a tax hike. Voters already decided in 2018 that this was the right way to fund school facilities. This vote simply continues the same 0.5% rate for another decade — nothing about your tax rate changes if it passes.

2. It has a real, verifiable track record. This isn't a promise — it's a renewal based on eight years of results: over 750 completed projects, 200+ air conditioning replacements, dozens of roofs replaced, new schools built to relieve overcrowded classrooms, and tens of millions invested in student and staff safety. Voters can see exactly what their money bought.

3. The oversight is genuinely independent and cross-partisan. The Citizen Oversight Committee isn't a rubber stamp — it's chaired by respected, independent community figures across the political spectrum, meets monthly, and its job is specifically to catch misuse. That's a stronger accountability structure than most tax measures get, and it directly answers the "how do we know the money will be spent right" question.

4. The state isn't going to step in and fix this instead. Florida does not fund school facility maintenance based on building age or need. Without this local revenue stream, Hillsborough schools go back to a growing backlog of aging air conditioning, roofs, and safety systems, with no dedicated funding source to address it — deferred maintenance that gets more expensive to fix the longer it's delayed, not less.

5. A broad share of the burden comes from visitors, not just residents. Because it's a sales tax in a major tourist and visitor destination, a meaningful portion of this revenue is generated by out-of-county visitors spending money locally — not solely Hillsborough households.

6. It protects the classroom and safety improvements families already rely on. Letting this lapse doesn't just stop future projects — it puts continued maintenance of newly upgraded HVAC systems, security infrastructure, and technology at risk, undermining investments the community already made and is currently benefiting from.