In Your Corner

As reports are spread about the probability of County tax and fee increases and possible imposition of a nearly 6% surcharge on our electric bills, we are receiving more and more input from local taxpayers. One of the questions we are often asked is “where did all our tax money go during the years of booming economy and skyrocketing home values”. Well, one of our new Commissioners has been asking the same question and got some very informative official data from County Staff. Reprinted below are excerpts from that data, which is given as a percentage comparison of the change in numerous categories of County budgets and employee count during the eight-year period FY 01- FY 09.

Many of these categories, especially the County budget and total number of full time employees (FTE), actually peaked over two years ago. Therefore, the change from FY 01 to FY 07 would have been much more dramatic since the FY 09 numbers reflect the two years of budget/employee cuts already instituted. However, we are presenting this information as is because it is validated, relevant to the discussion and still goes a along way toward answering the question.

Be sure and note that the County’s population only increased approximately 18% during the period and the County even took on additional debt during a time of rapid increases in normal revenues.

CATAGORY % change FY 01-09

In the considered opinion of our Board of Directors, Martin County was a great place to live in 2001. While there were many improvements in the levels of service provided to County residents over the next 5 years, there were far larger increases in what those services cost. In fact, as we predicted during those years, the increases became unsustainable and we are now suffering the consequences.

We believe our readers can derive their own conclusions without further comment from us. We also look forward to presenting the same type of comprehensive data from our School District in the near future.