
Here in Alachua County, Florida the notice of proposed taxes is out and the county commissioners are now holding hearings which will determine the exact amounts which will be assessed. Once the assessments are received, you can pay early, by November 30th, and receive an early payment discount or pay up until April 1st of next year before your account is considered overdue.
Now nobody likes paying taxes, but they are just one of the things we are duty bound to do as citizens to cover those services which we take for granted, like police, fire and infrastructure. In our particular case here in North Florida, the major complaint of property owners has been the disrepair of the local road networks and recovering from past mistakes in judgment on that issue is a slow and cumbersome process. But in our particular case here in East Alachua, we are fortunate to have a new County Commissioner, Ken Cornell, who was elected just last year and has shown a great passion for trying to make corrective inroads.
Ken holds a Masters in Accounting, is a Certified Public Accountant, and as would be expected from his profession is detail oriented on budgets and all things financial. In his short time in office he has taken upon himself to delve deeply into spending patterns to find places where savings can be found and efficiency can be improved. I am pleased that he will be my guest tonight at 8pm on North Florida Writer Live.
We will discuss the state of the budget, the major financial issues that the county faces in the upcoming year and the impact of the planned Plum Creek development on county taxpayers. Whether you are from this area or not, if you are concerned with the way tax decisions are made and what their implication are for the average property owner, the discussion should be of value.
It should be an interesting topic and I hope you'll tune in. Here's the link:
tobtr.com/s/7889643
We'll also try to take a few call ins in the last segment of the show. The call in number is 646-668-8793. In the meantime, go have a great day.