Last Tuesday night was a tremendous victory in the fight for the Concerned Taxpayer’s of Duval County. This was the most attended council that I can EVER remember seeing. The vote was deadlocked 9 – 9 as amendments for sensible budget cuts (things that Taxpayers should not spend one penny on) were ignored. They went on until 3 am last night and “recessed” until 11:00 am today. Although the City Council ultimately voted to raise your taxes today, they deliberated more than any other budget hearing in history.

Despite some unusual tomfoolery of “power failures”, you stayed so that you could be heard.

Thanks to all the First Coast Tea Party, The Republican Liberty Caucus, Libertarian Party of Duval County, Concerned Taxpayers of Duval County, Ferret Tax Protesters, small business owners and working families who came out to fight. This would not have been possible without each and every one of you!

Again, this was a huge victory for us. We fought last year, the year before that, the year before that, etc. It has become increasingly difficult for the tomfoolery to continue. More and more people come out and scrutinize how our hard earned money is being wasted on special interests for corporate, social and cultural welfare. The City has no business picking winners and losers in any of these areas. .

In the past, the righteous anger of the people over continued tax increases to fund special interests on the right and the left has been quickly forgotten. However, this year is different. WE WILL HOLD THEM ACCOUNTABLE IN THE SPRING ELECTIONS.

We have targeted the Habitual Tax Offenders for “unelection” in the spring with our operation Recidivism. The final details and logistics are being worked out now.

We have focused on those who are up for re-election in the spring and are not term limited. The list is being finalized now based on past voting records and other research we have been conducting to root out special interest ties and influence.

Also, we have in mind to target Habitual Tax Offenders who are term limited for City Council when they run for other political offices. WE WILL NOT FORGET.

Now, more than ever, all the groups that fight waste and corruption must continue to work for this common goal. It is perilous to let the special interests divide our common goal of fighting for the Taxpayer.

Please stay tuned for more information at:

www.teamtaxpayer.com

Best regards,

Victor L. Wihelm Jr
President Concerned Taxpayers Duval County

• Unemployment in Duval County and Florida is at a record high level! (Florida Times Union 3/26/2010)
• Floridians’ personal income has taken a hit and is now near the bottom of the nation! (Jacksonville Business Journal 3/25/2010)
• Unemployment continues to rise! (Jacksonville Business Journal 7/16/2010)
• Now, Mayor John Peyton wants to convince City Council to increase his three new taxes and the property tax rate again!
• Our garbage tax has already been doubled!
• No more tax hikes!

In 2007, Peyton broke his promise not to raise taxes “on his watch” with the creation of three new taxes.

In 2008, Peyton and the City Council expanded spending with the new Jacksonville Journey entitlement program.

In 2009, Peyton broke his promise again with increased property taxes in the middle of the worst economy in decades.

Taxes and government spending in Jacksonville are at an all time high. The Jacksonville economy simply can not afford another tax increase by Peyton and the City Council.

It’s time to end the Jacksonville Journey, Jacksonville Children’s Commission, and Jacksonville Economic Development Commission and let the taxpayers decide for themselves in which charities and economic development they wish to participate.

Contact your council members by phone or e-mail.

Remember to show up in force on September 28, 2010 for the Team Taxpayer Tailgate Party!  For more information, go to the Concerned Taxpayers meetup site.

Here is a budget proposed by the Concerned Taxpayers of Duval County.  You can read more about this budget in the article in the Jacksonville Liberty Journal (page 1 and 6) that further explains the rationale used to develop it.  We need real spending cuts, not tax rate increases!

The City’s Budget vs. What We Can Afford

City Council Town Hall Meeting – Districts 7, 9 and 10
Tuesday, March 30, 2010 6:00 p.m. – 8:00 p.m.
FSCJ Downtown Campus – 401 W. State Street, Jacksonville Florida

City Council Town Hall Meeting – Districts 12 and 14
Thursday, April 08, 2010  6:00 p.m. – 8:00 p.m.
FSCJ Kent Campus, 3939 Roosevelt Boulevard, Jacksonville Florida

City Council Town Hall Meeting – Districts 8 and 11
Thursday, April 22, 2010  6:00 p.m. – 8:00 p.m.
FSCJ North Campus, 4501 Capper Road, Jacksonville Florida

City Council Town Hall Meeting – Districts 1, 2, 3 and 13
Thursday, May 06, 2010 6:00 p.m. – 8:00 p.m.
FSCJ South Campus, 11901 Beach Boulevard, Jacksonville Florida

The up side of putting the fees on the property tax bill is cost savings.  The cost savings projected by the Central Operations department is about $737,000 per year. In a tough budget year, that is not exactly chump change.  Billing customers is a major expense for businesses which explains why so many businesses like e-mailed billing notices and automatic debits which reduce this cost.

On the other hand, the down side is that the fees become more entrenched as they become easier to collect.  Many of us were not happy with the fees mainly because they rolled back the property tax relief provided to us by the Florida Legislature in 2007 and which we taxpayers approved in 2008.  Personally and I speak only for myself and not for Concerned Taxpayers, I have no problems with the fees in and of themselves and I actually like the idea of diversifying the city’s revenue base.

However, my problem with the fees is that the political establishment in Jacksonville was not willing to give up its obsession with spending other people’s money even when the Jacksonville taxpayer was clearly being overtaxed.  Sometimes, the money is spent on indispensable services like police and fire suppression.  Other times, it is spent on government charity and corporate welfare which I believe the taxpayer should not be forced to fund.  Until Jacksonville city government restricts its responsibilities to the core functions of government (police, fire suppression, parks, etc) and not whatever pet project some City Council member or Mayor fancies at the moment, I will reject any tax increase that makes hard earned taxpayer money available to politicians to play with.  That is especially true in hard times when a failure to pay the fees could lead to the loss of your home.

I accept that some of the salary increase may have been due to new bachelors degrees which led to promotions or something similar to this.  Clearly, this could be a legitimate recognition of the improved skill set brought about through higher education. However, 586 employees out of 8,116 – about 7 percent of the city workforce – received raises of 10 percent or more. Clearly, this has to be explained before we taxpayers will accept a 12 percent tax increase

The following City Council members voted to lower your taxes by keeping the millage rate as it currently is, specifically 8.48 mills.

Bill Bishop, Richard Clark, John Crescimbeni, Daniel Davis, Johnny Gaffney, Art Graham, Ray Holt, Glorious Johnson, Denise Lee, Clay Yarborough

The following City Council members voted to raise your taxes by 12 percent as proposed by Mayor Peyton.

Reggie Brown, Michael Corrigan, Ronnie Fussell, Kevin Hyde, Warren Jones, Stephen Joost, Don Redman, Art Shad, Jack Webb

What makes the budget process insane is that in a scant two weeks after the budget was unveiled, the City Council must decide what the initial millage rate will be for the city budget. Yes, that is two weeks to study the budget and determine if a millage rate increase is needed or whether more cuts in the budget are possible. Of course, the millage rate can be set lower later once budgets cuts have been identified. But once the genie is let out of the bottle by giving the mayor his millage rate increase, reducing it could be harder to do this once the mayor gets the momentum moving in his direction.

However, if we do not want the millage rate increase and we do not want the mayor’s three fees, we have to identify what to cut in the budget. The worst thing that we can do is to cut say 10 percent from everything in the budget. Not everything is equal in the budget. Public safety and roads are a far higher priority than the Jacksonville Economic Development Commission and the Cultural Council. Prioritizing city spending is crucial as we must cut from the budget those expenditures that are superfluous to its city’s central mission of providing essential services utilized by the vast majority of the public that cannot be provided by the private sector.

Of course, that sounds great in theory. However, the reason that so many things find their way into the budget is that there are often influential interest groups fighting for every one of these government programs. While the individual cost to the taxpayer for any one of those budget items may not be that much, it is means a lot more to the non profit groups or government agencies that receive city funding. So the incentives for the taxpayer to balk at paying for this or that are not as high as the incentives for the interest groups to fight for the taxpayer funding of their pet project. Taxpayers begin to rebel when enough of these government programs accumulate over time and the resulting taxes reach a breaking point that usually leads to a tax revolt.

As depressing as that sounds, it is imperative that we do not give up the fight. In the next few months, Concerned Taxpayers will be reviewing the city budget and identifying where the budget can be cut. When this review is complete, then we will present our results to the City Council and the news media as an alternative to the mayor’s budget.