School tax referendum poorly designed, but worth supporting

Thoughts for a fall day with an election approaching.

... Please don't throw knives at me, but I am losing my patience with the Manatee school district and how this referendum tax, which is on the Nov. 5 ballot, is formed and divided.

I want to make it clear that I will vote in favor of the referendum one last time because I want to see our children have the resources to be competitive in the future.

That being said, when I can vote for a District 5 school board member in 2026 (you might remember that Richard Tatem lost in his bid for representative seat in the primary and vacates his seat Nov. 5), I will only support a candidate who falls in line with Cindy Spray, the District 2 school board member.

Spray is on record as saying the district should consider asking taxpayers for a .75 mill instead of a full mill in the referendum because its rake from rising home values has been driven up considerably. One milll has gone from $37 million in the 2018-19 school year to an anticipated $75 million in 2024-25.

That's not even considering the district's general fund has swollen as well. The budget is projected at $1,590,763,809 for the 2024-25 fiscal year.

So what happens when you pump more money into anyone's budget? Yes, it gets spent.

Spray is preaching financial accountability, and if nothing else, at least broaches the subject and prompts discussion. Besides talking about referendum strategy, she also talks about being good stewards of the public's money in the general budget.

She is a lone wolf in that regard.

If you look at the allocations from the 1 mill we tax ourselves, you will see that 71% of it goes toward salaries, whether that means teachers, administrators, bus drivers or support personnel. Are these the extras that we should be voting to support?

WFLA posted a story in July about the Hillsborough County School board suing to try to force a property tax increase being placed on the November ballot.

The media outlet quoted Gov. Ron DeSantis as saying, "Why are you trying to raise property taxes in the midst of some of the worst inflation we’ve seen in the modern history of this country?”

Fortunately, we live in an area where the residents don't mind going above and beyond in supporting schools. But I might not be the only taxpayer getting annoyed by being responsible for giving district employees a decent salary.

Get the salaries covered in the budget, and move the programs and tools that need to be cut because of it into the referendum tax.

... It will be interesting to see if the Cinderella story of Carol Ann Felts continues. Felts, who had not been competitive in previous commission elections in 2020 and 2022 but wanted to use the platform to stimulate talk about topics such as urban sprawl, found herself as the beneficiary of the perfect storm in the 2024 District 1 Commission primary.

Felts beat big-spending Steve Metallo, who was backed by the political machine headed by advisor Anthony Pedicini. The voters made it known they wanted to get rid of Pedicini-backed candidates, so Felts was left standing after all was said and done in the primary.

The general election holds a different kind of challenge for Felts. She is facing Jennifer Hamey, who has no political affiliation, and Democrat Glen Pearson. Hamey is an attorney, who has the expertise to handle all the obstacles of a rookie commissioner. In a Republican heavy district, it is doubtful Pearson can make a successful run.

The end result likely will be determined by the "R" next to Felts name. None of the candidates raised more than $27,000 in campaign contributions so I doubt the voters in general will have enough information to make a head-to-head comparison. The "R" is going to hold power on Election Day.

... While voters were stirred up going into the primary, the general election, as often happens in a Republican-dominated region, tends to be somewhat of a foregone conclusion. The Felts-Hamey matchup would tend to be one of the only races that holds suspense.

It would figure that Republic George Kruse, who has steadily captured public trust in becoming Manatee's most popular commissioner, will crush Sari Lindroos-Valimaki, who is a Democrat, for the District 7 seat. Likewise, Robert McCann upset Ray Turner in the District 5 primary and he figures to carry that momentum to a victory over Joseph Di Bartolomeo, who has no party affiliation and who is a true grassroots candidate.

Di Bartolomeo's biggest challenge is that McCann benefitted from the Pedicini blowback to score an upset over Ray Turner in the primary. That victory took all the emotion out of the race, and now it might just be a matter of money spent (McCann has raised five times as much as Di Bartolomeo) and that "R."

... There is an interesting race for the District 1 school board seat between Heather Felton and Mark Stanoch. Felton earned 6,100 votes in the primary to 4,960 for Stanoch (neither had more than 50% of the vote in the primary and therefore advanced to a runoff) but Stanoch has spent more money in campaigning and might have closed the gap.

... My final thought is that I can't wait to get past Nov. 5 so my email and my phone will stop being filled with political ads. I do think about voting for the candidates who sent me the least ads.