Learning to Tame the Beast

It's hundreds of pages long. It's made up primarily of numbers and mathematics. It contains words like capital expenses and bond referendums....It's a budget and it's indecipherable, or so I thought until Hillsborough County Tax Collector Preston Trigg taught me how to better understand one of these monsters.

First he explained how all government agents have budgets and that all of them are public record in the state of Florida. Some of these budgets contain facts and even demographic information. Most also contain an executive summary-a quick rundown of the contents of the budget. These budgets, according to Trigg, are the key to uncovering corrupt behavior, because the root of most corruption is money.

Budgets are usually done every fiscal year which, in most cases, starts October 1st and ends on September 30th. They are also made up of two main parts: revenue and expenses.

Revenue is the money that is coming into a business or agency. For government agencies, this usually includes things such as taxes, federal grants and money left over from the previous fiscal year. It also includes things like fees paid from traffic tickets and other violations. Bond referendums are also apart of the revenue section of the budget. These are essentially loans to the government from citizens that are eventually paid back with interest. Trigg says to be aware of large jumps in revenue such as property taxes and water bills. If these jumps are seen, it is the duty of the reporter to make the public aware of the increases. Every normal citizen will want to know if their taxes go up. Many people won't be very happy knowing that they have to pay higher taxes, unless these new taxes can be justified. That's where the expenses portion of the budget comes in.

Expenses is the money going out or being spent by the business or agency. There are typically three areas of expenses on a budget. These include personnel, capital and operating costs. Most budgets show whether the expenses have increased or decreased and by what percentage. Line items for every individual expense are also available in most budgets. Personnel expenses are those that deal with paying people like salaries and health benefits. Capital expenses involve one time purchases of $1,000 or more like a vehicle or a new building. Operating costs are expenses that involve normal monthly bills like utilities and travel. Major increases in the areas of personnel and capital should be looked at carefully. For example, an 18% increase in salaries would be an incredible jump and should usually only be justified by the hiring of more employees. However, some agencies may be trying to give themselves pay raises at the taxpayers' expense. Also, capital purchases like a new private jet for an agency's president is a bit excessive and should be reported.

But Trigg wasn't done with his lesson yet. He also taught me the complex mileage property tax system. All homes are taxed according to what they are appraised at. One mil is equal to one tax dollar for every one thousand dollars a home is worth (1mil=$1 of tax/$1000 of worth on home, 10 mils=$10/$1000, etc.) Many counties set the mil for property tax however, the homestead exemption, which lowers the value of a home for tax purposes by $50,000, has caused these property taxes to decrease dramatically. For example, a home originally worth $100,000 would pay $1,000 in a 10 mil system. With the exemption, that same home would only be taxed for $500 in a 10 mil system. This has hurt county budgets tremendously, according to Trigg.

Overall, budgets are an incredibly useful tool that should be relied on heavily for reporting. These budgets help better inform the public on where their tax money is going and it also helps to expose those who misuse the public's hard earned money.