Lawmakers’ ballot questions are relatively tame, but lame
The Legislature loves to hack away at the ability of Florida voters to put proposed constitutional amendments on the ballot. But they also love to send their own amendments to the ballot — it’s a good way to look busy (and beneficial) while ducking responsibility for potentially bad decisions.
Voters are wise to lawmakers’ tricks. In 2022, all three legislative proposals fell short. Voters will see four more on the November 2024 ballot, only one of which has a valid claim of popular support. In fact, the first — Amendment 1, approved by lawmakers in 2023 — would fly in the face of voters’ express wishes in many charter counties by changing all county school board elections from nonpartisan to partisan. Voters have certainly had their fill of hyper-partisan meddling in Florida’s public schools.
Amendment 2, another product of the 2023 session, would unnecessarily enshrine a right to hunt and fish in the constitution, elevating it over far more important rights and mandating hunting as the “preferred means” of controlling wildlife populations.
This year, lawmakers put two more constitutional amendments on the November 2024 ballot that are a trifle more nuanced, but still poor public policy. One (which doesn’t yet have a ballot number) is a clear no. It would repeal a section of the Florida Constitution that guarantees matching campaign money to statewide candidates who abide by spending limits.
Critics ridicule this as “welfare for politicians,” but repealing it would close one more door to everyone except the two main political parties’ anointed candidates, who are already awash in money from their parties and deep-pocketed donors. Voters have already decided this question. In 2010, they defeated an attempt to repeal public financing.
Another proposed amendment would increase Florida’s $25,000 homestead exemption every year, based on inflation as reported in the Consumer Price Index.
Increasing the homestead exemption sounds like a good deal. But this proposal hits at a point where inflation is low. According to the very metric the Legislature used, inflation rose 0.5% in the last month of 2023, the latest period available.
If lawmakers really wanted to do something about the housing crisis, they could start by tackling ballooning property insurance costs. But the insurance industry has real clout in Tallahassee, and homeowners do not.
The second problem with this homestead exemption increase is that it would cut tax revenues to local governments. A legislative staff analysis estimates the increased homestead exemption would result in a net loss to local governments of $23 million in fiscal year 2025-26 and $173 million in 2030-31.
Faced with that loss of property tax revenue, local governments may have to raise property taxes. Still, this one needs more study. We’ll offer our editorial advice on these questions later.
Voters shouldn’t confuse these legislatively proposed amendments with two citizen-backed amendments on abortion rights and recreational marijuana. Both issues gathered enough petitions to reach the ballot, but the fate of both questions rests with an ideologically conservative Supreme Court. We’ve yet to recommend yes or no votes on those, though we believe voters have the right to decide those issues for themselves.
Could have been worse
Neither of the 2024 proposals are as onerous as, say, injecting rancorous partisanship into school board races. Nor are they as bad as some other proposed amendments that the Legislature wisely didn’t pass.
Had Republican Rep. Rick Roth of West Palm Beach prevailed, he would have asked voters to make it much harder to pass amendments (HJR 335) by raising the threshold for passage from 60% to 67%. Apparently, Roth doesn’t endorse “power to the people.”
State Agriculture Commissioner Wilton Simpson wanted personal property on agricultural land to be tax exempt, which required voter approval (HJR 1251). As an agribusiness multimillionaire himself, Simpson would have been a beneficiary, but the Legislature didn’t approve it.
The Florida Senate’s leading political provocateur, Sen. Blaise Ingoglia, R-Spring Hill, proposed banning slave reparations (SJR 582), which has not been contemplated in Florida, but outlawing it was sure to excite the wing of the Republican Party that enthusiastically flies the Confederate flag. That died too.
As with so much else this session, these proposed constitutional amendments aren’t great, but they could have been a lot worse.
The Orlando Sentinel Editorial Board includes Editor-in-Chief Julie Anderson, Opinion Editor Krys Fluker and Viewpoints Editor Jay Reddick. The Sun Sentinel Editorial Board consists of Editorial Page Editor Steve Bousquet, Deputy Editorial Page Editor Dan Sweeney, editorial writer Martin Dyckman and Anderson. Send letters to insight@orlandosentinel.com.