It's Your Money

Two weeks ago we alerted you to a proposal being made to modify how our Fire/Rescue operations are funded. At the time the plan was scheduled to be “work-shopped” within days by the Martin County Commission. We had heard of the concept being advocated: create a separate assessment (tax) for Fire protection based on an analysis of a property’s actual fire risk. However, we had no idea that a consultant firm had been hired to derive such a proposal or that the program was already scheduled to be advocated to the Commission by Fire/Rescue management and union. Our pleas to slow the process to make sure any such change would be well advertised and publicly debated before approval were answered by a postponement - due to a Commissioner’s illness. Since then we were invited to meet with the Fire/Rescue Chiefs, a union representative and the consultant involved for a briefing on the idea. While this briefing was long on concepts it was short on the specifics that will determine the viability of the consultant’s model. We look forward to the data from the July 20 th workshop that will present those specifics to the Commissioners.

What is being advocated is, quite simply, a method to tie the cost of Fire protection more closely to the actual risk/need of the property being protected rather than to its taxable value. Currently all County Fire/Rescue services are funded with a percentage of the ad valorem property taxes assessed annually by the County Commission. Municipalities within the County such as the City of Stuart use a similar system. As with many suggestions to improve government programs, the concept is a simple, common sense approach - and provides a measure of cover to the politicians that have to annually find the funds for an expensive service.

As a rule of thumb we like simple solutions, especially those that tie the cost of a service to those needing it. However, as usual, the devil is in the details and there are many of them in this scheme. The first complication is that to properly assess the risk someone has to look at every piece of property in the County, quantify their individual risk and calculate the appropriate “assessment”. Another major complication is that the Florida Courts have determined that governments cannot use the assessment method for funding EMS/Rescue services. Since Martin County has multi-tasked our Fire/EMS personnel and use ambulances as well as fire equipment for EMS response, the cost for these functions have to be “delicately” separated. The consultant has performed a three-year look-back that they believe will support a 60% of the total Fire/EMS (currently $38.77 million)budget, but this would have to be validated “every few years or when major changes are made.” With something like a 10 to 1 ratio of EMS to Fire responses, keeping this legally defensible will be totally dependent on continued calculations by, and the credibility of, the consultant. According to him, no county using a similar methodology has been sued over this issue. However, this is Martin County. Filing lawsuits, many which are less significant and have less merit than could be expected from this issue, are already a favorite pastime for some residents – and very expensive for our County to defend.

Since this assessment will drastically change the tax some property owners pay for fire service, such a risk allocation calculation will not be easy or without controversy. For example, a single family homesteaded property built in the 1990s pays a much lower property tax than an identical home owned by a part-time resident, or one built in the mid-2000s boom. Under this plan all three properties would pay exactly the same. Two of the three properties in this example would end up paying less, so the difference has to be made up elsewhere. Currently there are a large percentage of properties in Martin County listed as “agricultural”. These properties are subject to a much lower tax rate than those designated as commercial or residential. Agricultural land is also subject to what our Fire/Rescue service lists as the most expensive fire risk – brush fires – so the tax for fire protection on these properties would be replaced with a drastically increased assessment. Also, churches, hospitals, schools, disabled, veterans and other tax reduced/exempt properties would enjoy no legal respite from an assessment.

We look forward to the data from the rescheduled County workshop this week and will provide an update after we see the actual program and dollars involved. Currently we like the fairness of the concept, but it appears to us that the execution could be too hard/expensive to do for the possible gain. The change would involve creating a new bureaucracy, paying recurring consultant fees, opening up new legal liabilities and – probably the most important - easily be used to obfuscate the true cost of our excellent, capable, but already overpriced Fire/Rescue system.

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