State legislators, legends in their own minds when it comes to delivering great government, seem determined to pre-empt local elected officials and declare local government profligate.

St. Petersburg Mayor Rick Baker (left) talks with Senate President Ken Pruitt about property taxes during an April visit to the Capitol. "In June the people here (in Tallahassee) will be celebrating," Baker said, "and in August when local governments are doing their budgets, people will be screaming." [AP Photo / Phil Coale]

A special session starting June 12 is designed to fulfill Republican campaign themes about rolling back property taxes and imposing caps on local taxes for the future. "Save Our Homes," a tax cap originally created to help people stay in their fast-appreciating homes, may be extended to people who don't want to stay in their fast-appreciating homes. School boards, those paragons of effective spending, are exempted from the tax reductions under almost everyone's proposal; in fact, the $72-billion state budget for next year increases the amount of tax school boards are required to impose.

Why, one might wonder, if local citizens are so outraged about their local taxes, did they re-elect so many local officials last year and why did they bypass those officials and appealing instead to the state Legislature?

Maybe this "tax revolt" is the last hurrah of the Jeb Bush Republicans looking for one more statewide anti-tax crusade. Maybe legislators are loving all this tax-cut rhetoric without having to cut spending. And maybe it was the inevitable consequence when some residents pay higher taxes while the folks next door do not.

"In June the people here (in Tallahassee) will be celebrating, and in August when local governments are doing their budgets, people will be screaming,"
St. Petersburg Mayor Rick Baker said in April as he took a lunch break during a lobbying trip.

Instead of letting local politics work this out and making local politicians deal directly with any uprising over local property taxes, the state politicians are stepping in with one big scythe, whacking at tax rates across the whole state at once.

"It is an indication of a failure in the political system," acknowledges Republican Sen. Don Gaetz, who nevertheless is a strong advocate of the mandated property tax cuts (and who owns millions of dollars in real estate). Gaetz chafed at mandates from the state when he was Okaloosa County's school superintendent. He declared, in an interview last winter, that as many government decisions as possible should be made by local officials, "people you can reach out and grab by the neck" ["Golden Gaetz," February, FloridaTrend.com].

The property tax issue "should be handled face to face between local taxing authorities and local taxpayers," he said in late April as the Legislature entered its final days. "We're doing the business that local governments should have done" because "thousands and thousands of Florida citizens are looking past local officials."

But that is a reason not to act, rather than to act. The biggest single risk to the sustainability of the republic is not $50 a month in property taxes but the decline in clear accountability of elected officials. Every level of government is involved in everything. The U.S. Congress is funding local swimming pools. The same local governments complaining about property tax cuts are getting millions in state grants for water and sewer projects, parks, arts centers, stadiums, roads and more.

They're like post-adolescents who want independence but won't move out of the parents' house. State legislators need to let them grow up and face the consequences of their decisions. Let them eat steak. More parks? Enough cops? Too many bureaucrats? That's for local voters to decide.

Gaetz is right, though, that local government performance is deficient. A lot of local governments simply haven't won the trust of their citizens when it comes to cost-effective local government. Here in Leon County, the generally Democratic taxpayers rejected a sales tax increase for healthcare proposed by an ever-squabbling county commission with a vague plan for spending the money. Commissions and councils spend hours on administration, then give citizens three minutes to speak. You get there on clogged local streets and muddle through incomprehensible agenda handouts.

Return on investment

Taxes cannot be cut enough to satisfy people who think their government is doing a lousy job. The challenge for political leaders is to so impress the public with the effectiveness of government that they are happy to invest more with you. Why is Toyota poised to become the biggest car seller in America? It's not because Toyotas are cheaper.

Gaetz ran for the school board in 1994 advocating what he calls "the biggest tax increase this county's ever seen," but on two conditions. First, it would be imposed by a referendum, and second, there would be "a contract with the community, signed by every school board member" on how it would be used. Okaloosa built new classrooms to replace trailers and came in nearly 10% under budget. When Gaetz finished six years as superintendent in 2006, Okaloosa's schools were the highest rated in the state, and the teachers were among the highest paid.

That was a local government that delivered for the taxpayers.

The same day Gaetz commented on the "failure in the political system," Senate Democratic leader Steve Geller of Hallandale Beach was declaring, "I don't think local governments have been doing a good enough job of projecting where the cuts are coming from." He cited one poll in which people guessed where governments were spending money. Respondents guessed administration was 30% to 40%, but it's really 5% to 10%. On police and fire, they guessed one-fourth, but it's actually more like two-thirds.

Also that day, Mayor Baker, a Republican attentive to data on his government's performance, penned a column for his local newspaper in which he noted that St. Petersburg had reduced millage rates in 14 of the past 17 years.

"Despite improving services at all levels, and ushering in a historic renaissance, we have budgeted 57 fewer employees than we had six years ago when our team took office," he wrote. He said 95% of the spending increase in the past six years was in five categories: Fuel, property insurance for city structures, medical insurance for employees, higher pension costs because of lower projected investment returns, and local police.

But that dull-edged argument is not the same as convincing citizens they're getting great value for their money. Maybe Baker's constituents immediately grasped their supposed good fortune, or maybe they didn't. But that really is the point. The Legislature has no business here. The issue is between local officials and their constituents.

The Legislature's property-tax "reform" of 2007 is likely to prove as unsatisfying as its insurance "reform" from the January special session. Someday we'll be back to noting that our roads and sewers and other infrastructure continue to fall behind our population growth rates, that we remain near the bottom on the quality of our K-12 schools and lack a first-rate public or private university, that we have failed to manage sprawl and urban design.

We might even wonder if mediocre government is costing us valuable time and money as residents and businesses, in everything from commuting and delivery costs to the availability of good jobs and a skilled workforce.

If there's a taxpayer rebellion out there, it's not about the last few dollars on a property tax bill but about the idea that government at all levels is mired in myopia and self-satisfaction while our economic prospects and quality of life deteriorate. Tinkering with the allocation of the burdens and benefits of government doesn't change much except to further obscure the accountability of government to the citizens it is supposed to serve.