Submitted by David A. Hallman
Nassau County Attorney
July 25, 2014 9:20 a.m.
Nassau County Attorney
It has become evident to me, as someone who works in local government, that there is much confusion about where property tax dollars go, i.e., how those dollars are spent. To that end, and with the help of our budget staff, I have prepared two simple charts. These charts, based upon the 2013-14 Nassau County budget, track the property tax dollar for a Nassau County resident, who lives outside a city or town. (If you live in a municipality, you pay an additional property tax to it, for the services of that entity.)
Because Nassau County has a non-charter form of government, each officer (Clerk, Sheriff, Tax Collector, Property Appraiser, Supervisor of Election, School District) is an independent entity, with its own budget. This first chart shows who gets what portion of your property tax dollar:
The second chart, below, shows how the County Commission spends its 23 cents of the overall dollar:
  |
Fire-Rescue service |
| |
Maintenance of Roads, Bridges and Facilities |
| |
Libraries, Animal Control, Growth Management, Cooperative Extension, Code Enforcement, Emergency Management, Contributions to Not-for-profits and other agencies (Volunteer Fire Departments, Council on Aging, Boys & Girls Club, Starting Point Behavioral Health, Health Department, Economic Development, Barnabas, ARK of Nassau, Micah’s Place, Episcopal Children’s Services, Soil & Water Conservation), administrative functions (human resources, risk management, purchasing, manager, legal, IT, public safety communications, rescue billing, and budgeting) and Commissioners. |
| |
State Mandates (Medicaid, Juvenile Justice, Legal Aid, Medical Examiner, Indigent Health Care, State Forestry) |
It is my sincere hope that this information is helpful to citizens. If you have any questions about anything here, please do not hesitate to contact me, or our Budget Office at (904) 548-4590 or (904) 491-7370.
David A. Hallman
Nassau County Attorney
A big thank you to David A. Hallman and the county budget staff for this great illustration ( and reminder) of how property taxes are allocated. As an employee of the Nassau County School District, I am again humbly reminded that we serve the fine citizens of this county.
It would serve us well to ensure that this type of information is included in our high school civics curriculum. After all they will soon be the community leaders of tomorrow!
Carl J. Carlson
It would be helpful to see a similar breakdown for the County Constitutional Offices.
It looks like a little visual stretching happened to slightly accentuate school board portion. Not cool.
How much dose Sheriff Leeper get . The Sheriff’s Office waste more money than any other agency . I would like to know how much The Sheriff’s Office is costing us .
Carl and Eric, thank you for your comments. Kim, I noticed that too. It must have happened in the graphics in the process of emailing it. I promise you it wasn’t intentional.
I want to make sure I am reading this right but fire rescue only gets 8percent of the total budget?
The municipal service tax/fee levied by the County for unincorporated areas is conspicuously missing. This fee is where the Sheriff’s Office and the County Fire Department is supposed to get ALL of its funding.
Ben, Fire-Rescue service represents eight cents of the overall property tax dollar. This means that it is 35 % of the county commission’s property tax expenditure.
How much does the Sheriff’s Office spend every year ? Is a secret ?
The George – the Sheriff’s budget is part of the 21 cents that goes to the Constitutional Offices in the chart above. Call me at the County’s budget office on Monday 904-491-7370 and I will give you the breakdown for each Constitutional office including the Sheriff.
George, the Sheriff’s Office budget is part of the 21 cent piece of the first chart (dollar bill). I apologize that I don’t know the precise dollar amount, but if you call the county budget office on Monday, they’ll be happy to provide that for you.
Jim – the municipal service taxing unit (MSTU) is included in the chart above – some of the MSTU revenue is included in the 23 cents allocated to the County Commission departments/expenses (such as the Fire Department) and the rest of the MSTU revenue is included in the 21 cents that goes to the Constitutional Offices (such as the Sheriff’s office). Please contact me at the budget office if you’d like more details or would like to discuss. 904-491-7370
For those who may not know, Shanea Jones is the Nassau County Budget Director, and Assistant County Manager. Thank you Mrs. Jones, for helping out with these questions.
Just to keep a healthy debate the fire rescue department gets 35 percent of 23%.. I am fairly certain that is a very low percentage compared to other counties. Does the fire rescue budget reflect the money they recoup for rescue transports?
Ben – yes, this article only shows how your property tax dollar is allocated so any revenue collected by a department to offset the cost of its operation (such as rescue transport fees) has been backed out. The more funding a department can generate from other sources (grants, user fees, state revenue sharing, etc), the less property tax that is required to support its operations. For example, the County has a Building Department who issues permits, etc. and a water/sewer company called Nassau Amelia Utilities. Neither of these departments are included in the article because both departments generate enough revenue to be self supporting. Therefore, 0% of your property tax dollar is allocated to either of these departments. Hopefully this answers your question.
I want to thank everyone who commented or asked questions. At this point, staff and I ask that any further questions be directed to the numbers at the end of my letter, above. Again, thank you.
David,
Excellent article. Very well done and shows the citizens (who live outside of the city limits and off Amelia Island) how their tax dollars are spent!
Being that this is the “Fernandina Observer”, I bet the citizens who do live in the City of Fernandina Beach would be very surprised to see a break down of their dollar in the same way. It would add in both the city’s portion of property taxes as well as the Amelia Island Mosquito Control Board.
I now live outside of the city limits and my bill is exactly as you depicted it. But for those living within city limits, this chart will be dramatically different!
Thank you so much for providing this valuable information to the citizens.
John M. Drew
I’ve heard we have some of the most highly paid police officers in the nation. What is their cost and where does it come from?