Florida’s DOGE: Palm Beach County Is the Most Wasteful County
The recently released Florida DOGE Report titled the "Report on Local Government Spending," is a 99-page breakout by Florida's Department of Government Efficiency. This initiative, established by Governor Ron DeSantis, aims to identify waste, inefficiency, and excessive spending in local governments, with a focus on promoting fiscal discipline, transparency, and respect for taxpayers. The report analyzed 13 jurisdictions, finding over $1.86 billion in what it describes as "excessive wasteful spending". It emphasizes that local spending has surged due to rising property tax revenues from increasing property values, while criticizing a lack of budgetary restraint compared to state-level discipline. No outright fraud was identified, but the report accuses many entities of inefficiency, particularly in areas like salaries, social programs, and DEI initiatives. Right at the top of the list is PBC...
Palm Beach County is singled out as leading the state in alleged wasteful spending, with the report estimating $344 million in excessive or inefficient expenditures—the highest of the 18 studied governments.
Key Palm Beach County findings included:
- General fund growth: The county's general fund surged nearly 90% since 2016 (from approximately $1.25 billion to over $2.37 billion), while population grew only about 10%. This mismatch is attributed to the "absence of budgetary discipline."
- Property tax revenue: Property tax collections nearly doubled, from roughly $790 million to $1.4–1.43 billion. The report frames this as fueling unchecked expansion, with property taxes covering a larger share of services (massive local government expansion)
Specific flagged spending:
- Health services: A $12.8 million increase
- Paratransit services: Growth from $50 million to $138 million (176% increase in three years)
- Salaries and overtime: 37% rise, outpacing the period's 26% inflation rate
- Homelessness programs: More than $16 million spent since FY 2020-21, yet the homeless population rose from 1,500 to over 2,000 during that time. The report suggests such funding may have incentivized rather than reduced homelessness.
- DEI and related initiatives: $151,000 spent on DEI training since 2019 including topics like employees being "responsible for racism" or "Living While Black". Costs for some trainings were reported as "unknown." It also highlights over $1.1 million allocated to the Office of Resilience in FY 2024-25, prioritizing "Social Equity." Additionally, past grants from the MacArthur Foundation’s Safety & Justice Challenge led to prisoner releases to address "racial inequities,". The county ended its involvement in October 2025.
Though Florida’s DOGE found what it termed wasteful and inappropriate spending everywhere it looked, Palm Beach County's scale of flagged spending and rapid budget growth were unprecedented. The report helps make the case for Governor DeSantis’ claim that it’s entirely possible to eliminate homesteaded property taxes while effectively operating local governments.
As my prior analysis has illustrated, on an inflation adjusted basis Palm Beach County could operate the same as it did in 2019 without homesteaded property taxes. That as much as anything illustrates the growth of government locally.