County, school district sales taxes pass in Marion County

File photo: The Marion County Commission meets as hundreds of people fill the Marion County Commission auditorium to oppose the Jumbolair expansion during the Marion County Commission meeting in Ocala, Fla. on Tuesday, Feb. 20, 2204. The Jumbolair expansion proposal was withdrawn before the meeting started. 200 people signed up to speak against the expansion. [Bruce Ackerman/Ocala Gazette] 2024.

Marion County Penny Sales Tax Renewal:

Marion County voters have voted yes on renewing the penny sales tax, extending it for 20 years to fund infrastructure and public safety.

The measure passed with 62.37% 

Extension of existing sales surtax for public safety and transportation infrastructure:

In order to fund improving roads, reducing traffic congestion, building new fire stations, reducing 911 response times, improving animal control, law enforcement, and other public safety and transportation infrastructure in Marion County and its municipalities as allowed by law, shall Marion County extend the existing one percent sales surtax for a period of twenty years?

The county’s penny sales tax was first approved in 2016 and increased Marion County’s sales tax from 6% to 7%, then renewed in 2020 for another four-year period. Now, the county asked for voters to approve the tax for the next 20 years.

The penny sales tax is projected to generate about $65 million a year, 70% of which will go toward road and infrastructure projects and the other 30% toward public safety needs.

The county engineer put forward a list of 27 road projects to be funded by the penny sales tax over the next 20 years and would cost upward of $1.4 billion—$1.1 billion of which needs funding. That shortfall could be filled by the penny sales tax revenue.

School Half-Cent Sales Tax:

Marion County voters have voted yes on the school district’s half-cent sales tax referendum, which will be used to fund school facility construction and capital projects.

Due to the county’s population growth, School district staff has recommended five new schools and nine new wings to existing schools be constructed over the next 15 years The cost for this new construction, in addition to necessary maintenance and renovations to other schools, is estimated to be about $1.8 billion, $1 billion of needs funding.

The school half-cent sales tax has been a revenue generator for the district in the past, from January 2005 through December 2009. Levying the tax generated over $111 million in revenue and helped to fund the construction of four schools: Horizon Academy at Marion Oaks, Legacy Elementary School, Liberty Middle School and Marion Oaks Elementary School, according to MCPS.

School Capital Outlay Sales Surtax to Improve Safety and the Learning Environment:

To retain high-quality teachers, reduce classroom overcrowding, and improve safety and security by expanding, constructing, and improving school facilities, with collected revenues shared according to Florida law with eligible public charter schools based on their proportion of total school district enrollment, with oversight by an independent volunteer committee, shall the school district of Marion County levy a one-half cent sales surtax for ten years to fund such activities for Marion County schools?

The Ocala Metro Chamber & Economic Partnership was tasked with advertising and polling for both the county penny sales tax and the school half-cent sales tax, as the governmental bodies cannot lobby for their own propositions.

“CEPI (our political committee) has invested heavily in the promotion and marketing of the ½ cent sales tax for our schools. We have run two different sets of ½ cent commercials across a targeted array of media for the last month. Along with the TV (broadcast, YouTube, Roku, etc.) ads, we have been running online retargeting ads. This is in addition to the texting campaign to vote by mail voters and then early voters. We have easily invested more than $100,000 just on the marketing in the most recent weeks. This does not include polling, marketing research, focus groups, etc. or earlier investments and marketing,” according to the CEP.

CEP president and CEO Kevin Sheilley told the “Gazette” in July that the polling response toward the renewal of the county’s sales tax had been “positive,” in two surveys it had conducted. The first survey had 600 participants and the second had 400 participants.

Sheilley estimated that the CEP had raised about $200,000 for the promotion of the county sales tax at that point. The CEPI is chaired by Doug Cone, and composed of Carolyn Roberts, Navroz Saju, Harvey Vandeven, and Chris Langley.

Sheilley said in July that about 55 to 65% of those surveyed approved of the school half-cent sales tax, and 65 to 75% approved of the county’s renewal of its penny sales tax.