- December 4, 2025
Dear Editor:
On Sept. 17, the Ormond Beach City Commission unanimously approved a 5.3% property tax increase. Opposing groups on both sides expressed unhappiness, those supporting a higher tax increase and those favoring a zero tax increase.
Commissioner Travis Sargent opened the final budget hearing with a proposal to adopt a zero tax rate increase, to preempt Florida DOGE from making arbitrary budget reductions. Taxpayer relief would also anticipate growing economic storm clouds in a city where many seniors own and maintain homes on fixed incomes.
Florida Sunshine Law precluded any advance warning to his surprised colleagues, so Commissioner Sargent presented a smorgasbord of budget-cutting items to consider. In a difficult eleventh hour public debate, they rejected most and accepted some, voting unanimous consent to a millage rate significantly lower than the one agreed to in the first budget hearing.
The original 10% proposed property tax rate increase ended up being reduced to 5%, a compromise where no one got everything they wanted. The city manager, city attorney, and our world-class chief financial officer guided the elected officials through the budgetary minefield.
For his initiative, Commissioner Sargent has been vilified. Ormond Beach Chamber Chairman Eric Palacios called him a “disgrace” for a last minute proposal in a hearing he said “should have been procedural.” But if the second hearing is supposed to rubber-stamp the first, then why have it? Other citizens called Sargent’s efforts “grandstanding” and “politics.”
Sargent knew he would be taking hits from all sides, risking political capital. But Marine Corps veterans are trained to make personal sacrifice for the common good.
All four commissioners performed responsibly under intense pressure. They arrived at the right number, balancing needed services with the required taxes. They honored their oaths, after a widely distributed anti-tax mailer publicly labeled them by name as “arrogant, clueless, out of touch pickpockets.” Commissioners Briley, Deaton, and Sargent grew up in Ormond Beach.
Deputy Mayor Tolland, a nurse, raised seven children here while volunteering countless hours to the community. Dedicated commissioners have faced unprecedented complex issues.
The budget process witnessed active citizen engagement. The system worked.
The approved tax rate is the lowest in Volusia County. Ormond Beach is a bargain paradise, two rivers, ocean, beach, the most beautiful homes on the planet. Responsive city governments have maintained the city’s historic, aesthetic, and environmental character over the decades in a unique community of people.
Jeff Boyle
Ormond Beach
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