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Tax or no tax?

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Hernando Today

Published: July 4, 2009

Tax or no tax?

I am a bit confused on the issue of who taxes whom in the Spring Hill Fire District. According to the bill the effective date of independence was June 11, 2009. The preamble containing the effective date has an interesting provision that I will quote so no one has to track it down. It states:

"Effective date: June 11, 2009, except that the provisions of section 6 that authorize the levy of ad valorem taxation shall take effect only upon express approval by a majority vote of those qualified electors of the Spring Hill Fire Rescue and Emergency Medical Services District, as required by Section 9 of Article VII of the State Constitution."

So here is the part that confuses me, the county says it will collect the tax at the rate set by the Spring Hill Fire commissioners, but according to the bill the commissioners don't have authorization to levy an ad valorem tax until the voters approve the rate cap.

If this is the case, even though there was a line item in the county budget for Spring Hill Fire, it is now an independent entity, not the dependent district in the county budget. So if the fire district doesn't have the authority to levy a tax, by what reason can the county set a rate for an independent district and collect the tax?

The reason cited in reply to Janey Baldwin was that it was part of a previous litigation that was settled relating to the Spring Hill Fire District. According to John Jouben, county attorney, the suit in Marion County prevented the county commissioners from interfering in the affairs of the dependent Spring Hill District, or so I was informed when I opposed the district budget in October 2008. I brought the matter to the attention of the fire commissioners and was informed by their attorney the suit was removed from the court docket due to inaction by one or both parties. It also should have been rendered moot by the granting of independence to the district.

I am in favor of letting the voters enact the 2.5 mil rate cap even if it is at a special election. This would settle the matter once and forever. Yes, it will cost the Spring Hill district money to have the election, but this is part of the price for independence. It would also remove any question mark about the legitimacy of the tax being collected and enable the district to move forward with a clean slate. Worst case would be that somewhere down the road a determination was made the tax without a vote was collected in error, and massive refunds would be in order. If that were to happen, the price of the special election would truly be "chump change."

Harry E. Chamberlain

Spring Hill

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