ORANGE COUNTY, Fla. — Orange County leaders held their first of two public meetings to discuss its $8.3 billion budget for the next fiscal year.
The proposed budget includes about $200 million in cuts.
This is as state officials like Governor Ron DeSantis and CFO Blaise Ingoglia have criticized Orange County’s spending.
Last month, Ingoglia said Orange County has been on a “spending spree” with expenses up roughly $600 million and tax collections up by 52 percent over the last five years. This is as the population has grown by roughly 10 percent, the state said in a press release.
Demings responded to the state’s criticism in the meeting on Thursday night.
“We have been able to maintain our countywide tax rate that currently is the 11th lowest in the state of Florida,” Demings said.
Demings says new growth is supposed to pay for itself, but then, he says, the county must take account its tourists when it budgets for county services.
“The 75.3 million visitors effectively doubles our weekly population and adds over 206,000 people daily that we have to provide services to,” Demings said.
It’s why commissioners along with members of the public spoke Thursday, saying legislators need to allow the county to use tourist development tax dollars for county services like transportation.
“We haven’t figured out a way to tax those people that don’t live here to help. Provide funding for the gaps in our budget,” said District 5 Commissioner Kelly Semrad.
“So those are individuals that are using our roads, flushing our toilets. They put their waste in our landfill. But we don’t get to use tourist development tax dollars for any of those needs,” said District 1 Commissioner Kelly Semrad.
But still, commissioners note they’ve proposed cutting the budget by roughly $200 million, making the overall budget $8.3 billion.
As it has been historically, the largest chunks of the budget go towards public safety, transportation and affordable housing.
Commissioners proposed increasing the budgets for homelessness resources by roughly $10 million. Demings says part of the increase is because of the new state rules.
Some of the cuts are from pandemic-era funding like American Rescue Plan and CARES Act expiring, county officials say.
Semrad noted that the county could not fulfil all the budget requests for public safety with Sheriff’s Office and Fire. She says public works will also take a hit by tens of millions of dollars.
“In District 5, we have real concerns, that the community programs that help make us have a higher quality of life like having complete streets walkable sidewalks, bicycle communities will not be able to find those safety mechanisms,” Semrad said.
The next public hearing is Thursday, September 18 at 5 p.m. at the County Administration Building.on
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