Michelle Lincoln, Mayor Pro Tem for Monroe County, joined Good Morning Keys on KeysTalk 96.9/102.5FM this morning to talk about what’s been going on in the county.
How have the meetings been going in Tallahassee?
Lincoln said, “I think they went very well. I think that everyone up here is just feeling the crunch of the three special sessions that were held prior to committee weeks that the governor held, and then that the legislators held to get the immigration bill set, and I think that put everyone behind on their committee meetings and all of the bills that they wanted to file. So I think everyone’s just scrambling here and trying to read all the bills and see what the implications are going to be, and get them through all the committee weeks that the legislators have to go through, but with that said, I thought our meetings were very positive with all the people we met with last week. For sure we’re pushing our Florida Keys Stewardship Act funding from environmental restoration, which is the bill that we typically can receive up to $20 million in appropriations for water quality projects and the $5 million that we asked for for the set aside from the Florida Forever funding that we use to acquire land to set aside, both sensitive land and also the land that we buy to protect us from taking cases. So the good news is that is in the governor’s budget. So because he’s made it a priority of his and because some of the legislators have heard and seen us before that’s not an easy sell, but at least they’re aware that it’s going to be an ask of ours, and we definitely ask for that. The big the big bill that we have that both our House Rep Jim Mooney and our Senator Ana Maria Rodriguez, is sponsoring for us is our ROGO asking for the hurricane evacuation clearance time, but also attached to that bill, which is why we really need the legislators to get it in alignment with each other is it also has the exemption for Habitat for Humanity, exempting them from the requirement to purchase a construction performance bond for new, affordable constructed houses that’s on county owned land, county owned long term lease properties. So that’s on there to help Habitat for Humanity get some tax relief. Also on that bill, we also have our ask to grant an ad valorem property tax relief for residential properties that voluntarily provide workforce housing in a long term rental situation. So we really do want the House side and the Senate side to get their bills to align with each other, because the language in both of their bills must be the same in order for it to get passed through. So, obviously, while we’re here, we’re working with both sides of the Capitol, the Senate and the House side, to try to get them into some consensus. There’s another bill that also has language on the 26 hour evacuation, but it doesn’t have any of the safeguards we need in place. So while we’re here, we’re also working with staff on, is there any way we can get those safeguard language of single parcel, the majority of these ROGO units being for that new category of workforce, housing market rate units, and the spreading of these units over a time frame that allows for our infrastructure to catch up. So working on that.”
The Small County Coalition is also meeting.
Lincoln said, “The 39 counties that make up our Small County Coalition are here with meetings with other departments, and also the Florida Association of Counties Day was yesterday, so a lot of the commissioners from around the state are here. We had carve out meetings with Secretary Alex Kelly from Florida Commerce, with the head of the Florida Department of Transportation, with Children and Families, and also, we got to meet with our new attorney general. So those meetings were sprinkled yesterday in between us meeting with other legislators here at the Capitol. So it’s just been a whirlwind. I’m up here this week with our county attorney, our Director of Community Affairs, our administrator, and our Mayor Jim and county commissioner Holly Raschein. So we’ve been working hard the last few days, and we’re going to finish up this afternoon and get back into the Florida Keys.”
Are there any common concerns that other counties are experiencing?
Lincoln said, “One of the biggest priorities of the Florida Association of Counties, is to protect us from pre exemptions that the legislators put on us. In fact, this year alone, there’s 51 bills that have language in it that preempts a county and or a municipality from doing their job. So that’s probably the largest frustration that we have, is that this body in Tallahassee who so far removed from us in local government, where we’re dealing with potholes and infrastructure and then the level of service that we are required to provide for our residents, we’re the boots on the ground, we’re the people that get stopped at the grocery store, and our residents ask us the questions and yet, sometimes it’s frustrating when the legislators get together in Tallahassee and they think they know what’s better for us than what we do, and we’re so up here this year, really trying to protect the voice of our residents, who sometimes vote for one thing and then Tallahassee overrides them.”
Is there still talk about doing away with property tax?
Lincoln said, “The talk is still going around. We’re just preparing for what that would look like and how then are we going to fund the levels of service that our residents want, including first responders and libraries, parks and beaches. The governor did release a letter two days ago requesting every county to provide documentation on how we spend our money, so our budget is open and available, so we’ll be sending him our budget and how it is that we prioritize our spending. So again, we’re just up here doing what we can, and we have a county commission meeting on Tuesday this coming week. So usually we have them on Wednesday, but we have them on Tuesday, so I’m sure we’ll be diving deeper into what the governor has requested from us. I think we are actually looking forward to showing how the money that we spend has a public purpose, and it is spending money that is necessary to spend for the level of service that we do provide for not only our residents, but for our 5 million visitors every year. So we have to keep that in front of why we spend what we spend.”