30 Florida counties sue, saying consumers at risk in expansion of a home loan program

As Florida’s insurance crisis makes hurricane hardening more important than ever, consumer advocates have pressed to reign in a popular — but controversial — loan program that allows homeowners to pay for new roofs or impact windows through their property tax bills.

Some counties and tax collectors across the state have pushed for clearer disclosures for a program that has generated hundreds of complaints from people who say they were misled on costs or didn’t understand that the loan amounts to a long-term tax lien on their home.

Now, one agency that bankrolls PACE construction projects is pushing back — arguing that individual counties have no legal right to force it to follow additional rules or even decide where it can operate.

The fight has led to a high-stakes lawsuit that includes nearly half the counties in the state, several of which have blasted the continued operations of a single quasi-governmental agency in Northeast Florida as “an immediate danger to the health, safety or welfare” of residents. Tax collectors from Alachua County to Palm Beach have complained in emails and court records that the Florida PACE Funding Agency’s statewide expansion is “running roughshod” over local government rights. For now, Broward and Miami-Dade, are staying out of it, but the outcome has big implication for two counties that lead the state in PACE contracts.

The case in Tallahassee shapes up as a major legal test for the few but hardwon consumer protections already in place across the state, including new ones in Miami-Dade County, and, perhaps, the future of Florida’s PACE program. That stands for property assessed clean energy, a nod to what has been touted as “green” program.

And it could also impact nearly 13,000 property owners across Florida who’ve recently signed