What Florida’s Local Government Efficiency Task Force Is About
Bottom Line: The state’s Local Government Efficiency Task Force, created under a Florida law passed last year, will issue its first report to the state on June 1st. The Task Force’s report will evaluate the effectiveness and efficiency of local governments across the state issuing recommendations. Areas studied include the handling of business taxes, elections, liabilities, meetings, pensions and reporting. The Task Force is chaired by Manatee County Commissioner Carol Whitmore with oversight by Florida’s Office of Program Policy Analysis & Governmental Accountability. While we await the first report which is aimed at greater government accountability at the local level, we already have a preview. An eight-page draft of the report currently lists these summarized recommendations which include some biggies.
Elections: “The task force recommends that the Legislature standardize the statewide local election.”
Public meetings: The task force recommends lawmakers “amend Florida statutes as needed to reduce the number of municipal hearings” to be equivalent to those required by counties to address discrepancies in the number of required public hearings on proposed ordinances between counties and municipalities. “Recognizing past and current legislation related to notice for public meetings,” the report continues, “the task force recommends legislators engage with the media industry to examine options for updating the notice process to use modern technology platforms.” The report also calls for state lawmakers to “amend Florida statutes as needed to allow local governments to hold virtual meetings in emergencies or extraordinary circumstances.”
Local government reporting: The task force recommends changes in reporting requirements that conflict with municipal fiscal years, require local government reporting requirements be reviewed every 10 years and local government reports submitted to the state be centralized and made readily available for use by the public and other agencies. “As much as it is practical,” the report suggests “the Legislature take steps to consolidate duplicative required local government reports into single reports or existing reports and eliminate any reports utilizing information that has already been developed for other reports, such as that found in the Comprehensive Annual Financial Report (CAFR).”
Local government pension plans: “To address financial efficiency issues associated with operating local government pension plans, the task force encourages the Legislature to assemble a related task force … charged with examining issues related to migrating local government pension plans to the Florida Retirement System.”
Unfunded mandates: The report calls on lawmakers “to consider the funding impacts created for local governments by state legislation. For any state mandates that affect local government budgets, the state should partner with local governments to fund programs.”
Local business tax occupancy licenses: The task force recommends the Legislature “limit the amount charged for these licenses to no more than the cost of administering the license.”
There’s a lot to unpack here and there’s the question as to if they’ll be acted on. For now I’ll wait for the final recommendations before diving in. Standardized elections and pension system conversions are certain to be hotly debated. To be continued...
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