Q&A of the Day – Florida DOGE Local Accountability for Wasteful Spending
Each day I feature a listener question sent by one of these methods.
Email: brianmudd@iheartmedia.com
Social: @brianmuddradio
iHeartRadio: Use the Talkback feature – the microphone button on our station page in the iHeart app.
Today’s entry: Submitted via Talkback: Brian, I'm listening to you talk about the tax increase, and I wanna say good morning to Brian, good morning to Joel. How do we put the genie back in the bottle? Like, what steps can we take as citizens of Palm Beach County to revert the taxes back to how they were, and end this crazy spending.
Bottom Line: Today’s note is in response to my recent breakdown of Palm Beach’s Florida DOGE report which among other things found the following...
- 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% (Adjusting for inflation and population growth the total spending increase without growing the size of government would have been 13.4%).
- Property tax revenue: Property tax collections nearly doubled, from roughly $790 million to about 1.43 billion. The report frames this as fueling unchecked expansion, with property taxes covering a larger share of services.
Also, among the noteworthy takeaways was that the county's increase in spending to address homelessness actually encouraged additional homelessness within the county and the icing on the cake is that taxpayer funds have been used for (now illegal) DEI initiatives like the “Responsible for Racism” training for employees in addition to the “Living While Black” program. The culmination of Palm Beach County’s tendency to spend recklessly led to Florida’s DOGE team identifying the county as having had the most wasteful spending take place. This would be notable in a state with 67 counties regardless of other factors; however, is rather remarkable when you consider that the county is only the 4th largest, and the state includes a county like Broward.
Perhaps just as remarkable has been the reception by local officials. For example, commissioner Maria Sachs referred to report as “almost complimentary”, as she suggested that it wasn’t nearly as extensive as what she had been expecting. Similar sentiment was expressed by Palm Beach County Administrator Joe Abruzzo who said: I was expecting not a 98-page report on all the areas of the state with only about a page and a quarter in written recommendations for Palm Beach County, or compliments, but a full 100-plus page report just on Palm Beach County. This type of sentiment really does lead to one wondering what it is that perhaps they’re indicating that the county got away during the investigation.
Predictably, allies in Democrat Party politics – like the South Florida Sun Sentinel have also weighed in with stories like this...Headline: Florida DOGE report has local officials asking: Where’s the waste? I find all of this offensive on multiple levels, but most of all it’s about the big picture.
Is it outrageous that residents of Palm Beach County have been taxed out of their homes over the past decade to help subsidize homelessness in the county? Yes, and there’s a great deal of unfortunate irony. Is it offensive that residents have continued to struggle with affordability while the county spent years indoctrinating its employees with DEI training? No doubt. But to the offenders themselves, the public officials who clearly haven’t prioritized affordability and haven’t been good stewards of taxpayer money seemingly think it’s all ok as long as the overall numbers weren’t larger than the $344 million in specific waste and abuse that was identified.
Do you think misuse of $344 million of taxpayer funds by a local government isn’t a big deal? That it isn’t much abuse? That it’s almost complimentary...? Which btw, given the way this has been covered by the local media, which hasn’t been to press back on the local officials suggesting this isn’t a big deal but rather to echo the local politicians' perspectives – lets you know whose side they’re really on. But the bigger issue for me isn’t the hard dollar amount of abuse that was identified but rather the big picture.
The size of Palm Beach County’s government grew by 77% in just a decade on a fully population and inflation adjusted basis. In that context I don’t care what they spent the money on and whether a report found it to be wasteful or an abuse. The bottom line is that 77% of that spending was abuse of local taxpayers. There can be and is no justification for that kind of growth in the size of a well-established government in excess of the population of its citizens. And this takes us to the question posed today. What can we do?
The most direct answer is to identify county commissioners who will pledge to reduce the spending and size of the county’s government and to vote for them. But this year that’s not the only answer and in the short term it isn’t even the best answer. The answer to fully support Governor DeSantis’ proposal for an end to homesteaded property taxes. You should let your state house representative and state senator know that a full repeal of homesteaded property taxes is the only proposed amendment you want to see passed by the legislature. You should also let them know that if they’re unwilling to support it that you’ll be compelled to find a candidate in the next primary cycle who will.
We have a historic opportunity to end homesteaded property taxes this year. We should absolutely take it. The best way to end abuse of our money by local governments is to never give it to them in the first place. Local governments scream at the suggestion of this – but it’s not because it can’t be done. It’s because they’re clearly comfortable with continuing to tax your home spending the money and endlessly growing the size of government. They’re also more than willing to take your home from you if you can’t pay for it too.