Manatee County homeowners could be seeing an increase in their taxes this year.
- Manatee school board's one mil tax referendum to affect homeowners
- Referendum to help close teacher pay gap between counties
A special election is being held at the end of the month. If passed, the one mill tax referendum would raise $33 million a year for years.
The bulk of the money will go to teachers to close the pay gap between other counties. However, not everyone is on board -- saying Manatee already has the money.
It's no secret that Manatee County is struggling to keep teachers in the classrooms. Right now there is a $9,000 pay gap between teachers in Manatee and Sarasota Counties.
"They've passed a one mil referendum four times -- so for 16 years they've had close to 53 additional million dollars to use for improving their teachers' salaries," Manatee County Superintendent Dr. Diana Greene said.
That is why Greene is pushing for a one mill referendum to pass on March 20. The additional $33 million of revenue will come from homeowners -- about $17 a month.
However, Garin Hoover said the cost is not necessary.
"Let's keep teachers and bus drivers at a high priority, let's take care of them -- but we don't need to go to tax payers for more money especially when so much is being wasted right now," Hoover said.
Greene said the school board did end the school year with a surplus, but that money is to be looked at as emergency funds.
"Such as adding law enforcement officers to all of our schools. We were able to go to that fund to support that effort," Greene said.
Hoover said he wants the school district to take a look at those excess funds and figure out if there are ways to stay competitive without raising homeowners' taxes.
The district said it's already done that and this referendum is the only way.
Pinellas County has a similar half mill tax increase for schools already in place.