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Lake Worth Beach commissioners debate keeping millage rate as vice mayor presses rollback option
Summary
At the Aug. 11 budget workshop, commissioners discussed updated CRA revenue and whether to hold the citymillage at the current rolled rate or move to the rollback rate; Vice Mayor Mimi May said she will "go on record" for rollback while staff warned the final decision follows two public hearings.
The Lake Worth Beach commission spent a major portion of its Aug. 11 budget workshop discussing property‑tax options after staff reported updated projections for the community redevelopment area (CRA).
Candice Dale, senior budget analyst, told the commission that county figures raised the CRA projection to about $4.7 million, an increase of roughly $485,000 from the numbers used at the previous workshop. That update fed into a broader debate about whether to keep the citymillage at the current rolled rate or to adopt the lower rollback rate.
Vice Mayor Mimi May said she wanted to put her position on the record: "I did not agree to to keep it the same. I wanted to go to the rollback rate." May said her preference is to protect taxpayers now and revisit revenue choices after residents vote in the November election. Other commissioners pushed back, noting that the commissionhas statutory public‑hearing requirements for setting millage and that CIP and budget choices also affect the cityrevenue picture.
Finance staff and the interim city manager stressed the timing and mechanics: the city must publish a preliminary maximum millage and then conduct two public hearings before final adoption. Finance staff also showed that keeping the current rates would produce about $1 million more in property‑tax revenue compared with adopting rollback immediately, a point several commissioners said should frame the later public hearing.
The workshop did not produce a final vote on millage; commissioners and staff agreed to carry the discussion forward into the formal public‑hearing process required by state law.
