The City of Lauderhill has begun work on $65 million dollars worth of voter-approved general obligation bond projects. The plan aims to revitalize the city’s parks, roadways and public safety.
However, should Florida’s proposed Amendment 3 pass in November, the city could struggle to keep up with the new improvements, officials have warned.
Amendment 3 would increase homestead exemptions, having a dramatic effect on the tax revenue of cities like Lauderhill.
In March of this year Lauderhill voters approved three ballot initiatives with more than 70% support. The program, dubbed RISE Lauderhill, will complete the slated projects over the next five years. To finance the program, the city took on debt that will be repaid over the next 30 years with a set-aside portion of ad valorem tax revenue. Amendment 3 does not impact the city’s ability to finance these projects, but between debt payments and loss of property tax revenue, it could hamper the city’s ability to service them.
“It may impact the maintenance of those projects or how many hours those facilities are actually open, or if the pools are open year-round versus just certain months, or if all of the pools are open versus we're having rotating pools — one a month per community. Those are the types of impacts that we'll see,” said city manager Kennie Hobbs.
Data from the Broward County Property Appraiser's office lays out the impacts on municipal cities and savings for homeowners under Florida’s proposed Amendment 3.
If passed, Amendment 3 would increase the homestead exemption from $50,000 to $150,000 in 2027. In 2028, the exemption climbs to $250,000. After that, the state legislature would create a schedule to eventually eliminate property taxes. The property appraiser applied those increased exemptions to 2025’s tax roll to calculate their impact.
For Lauderhill residents in 2027, those who own homesteaded properties worth more than $150,000 would save an average of roughly $1,000. The city would lose 16.1% of its tax roll. That jumps to 24% in 2028, while resident savings would climb to around $1,500.
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Lauderhill had been planning these projects long before the state legislature met in June to approve the ballot measure and created a department to oversee these projects. The new Construction and Capital Projects Department is led by Marc Celetti. He says the bond ensures projects get done more quickly than through traditional municipal funding methods.
“If we had to spread out this over 10 years, then [taxpayers] will be paying for a long time to get something that they may not be able to use,” he said. “This is infrastructure. This is brick and mortar stuff that's gonna be taking place. It's not people, it's not vehicles, it's roads, it's walls, it's park buildings. “It's tangible. You'll touch this stuff. You'll use it.”
Because of the large investment, the city has taken extra steps to ensure each project is completely transparent for its residents. The bond projects have their own website, where people can track not just the progress of the projects, but also get a live update of how every dollar is spent along the way.
Hobbs says the city is also holding frequent meetings with stakeholders about the projects that impact them. He says this not only helps build trust in the community, but can also help complete projects more efficiently.
“ Historically, by the time we come out and have renderings and have construction drawings and we start the actual construction, [residents] are like, ‘Wait a minute. That's not what we thought it was gonna be.’ So we take care of all that on the front end,” he said.
The city is also using the projects as a way to connect local businesses. They’ve hosted two matchmaking events with local small businesses that allows design and construction firms to meet smaller firms and recruit them to their teams for large bond projects.
“ Smaller businesses may not have the capacity to take on an entire project, but they may have the capacity to do the electrical work or the plumbing work or some of the cleaning work within there,” Hobbs said.
Hobbes said the events have been “very successful” and he looks forward to hosting more soon.
