BILL SUMMARY DETAILS

HB 1053 (Overdorf), SB 1874 (Burgess) and SB 102 (Burgess) will have the effect of limiting or prohibiting various civil actions and class action matters by local governments including recent class actions involving opioids, PFAS and predatory lending. The bills authorize the attorney general to unilaterally declare circumstances involving economic loss or harm to governmental entities in five or more counties as a “matter of great governmental concern.” Upon such a declaration, the attorney general would have sole authority to file a civil action on behalf of the affected governmental entities. The bills authorize the attorney general to intervene in any pending civil proceeding in federal or state court (including pending appeals) and dismiss, consolidate, settle or take any action he or she believes to be in the public interest. A declaration by the attorney general that a matter is of great governmental concern will operate to abate or stay any pending civil action unless and until the attorney general takes an action in the proceeding. The bills require governmental entities that are parties to any action that has been declared a matter of great governmental interest to notify the attorney general of the existence of the action and provide that any settlement or resolution of a proceeding by a governmental entity after the attorney general’s declaration and without the attorney general’s consent is void. The declaration of a matter of great governmental concern is not “final agency action” subject to review under the Administrative Procedure Act. The bills provide a process by which governmental entities may apply to a court to recover attorney fees and costs incurred prior to the attorney general’s declaration, but they fail to identify a source of funding, responsible party or conditions for obtaining such recovery. (O’Hara)

HB 1393 (Davis) and SB 1808 (Powell) revise the indication criteria for an “abandoned residential property” to make the process for abating nuisance properties easier and less costly to local governments. The bills revise the process for a local government to notify a mortgagee or mortgage servicer of a nuisance residential property and directs them to abate the nuisance until ownership of the property has been transferred through the foreclosure process. If the local government steps in to abate the nuisance property, the bills allow the local government to recover the costs of abatement by placing a lien on the property, which may not be foreclosed. The bills specify that the local government may request reimbursement for the cost of abatement from the mortgagee or mortgage servicer, which must be paid within 20 days. (Taggart)

CS/HB 1103 (Maggard) and SB 1624 (Albritton) require certain independent special districts that levy a non-ad valorem special assessment to contract with an independent entity to conduct performance audits. These bills also require the Office of Program Policy Analysis and Government Accountability to conduct performance audits of certain classifications of independent special districts and report the performance audits by a specified date. (Cruz)

HB 487 (Duggan) and SB 1274 (Perry) revise acreage thresholds for adopting comprehensive plan amendments using a small-scale development amendment. (Cruz)

CS/HB 337 (DiCeglie) and SB 750 (Gruters) are comprehensive impact fee bills. Of concern to cities, the bills would cap impact fee increases to no more than 3% annually. The bills would allow a local government to collect an impact fee only if it has a planned or funded capital improvement within the applicable impact fee assessment district at the time the fee is collected. Lastly, the bills require the submittal of an affidavit by local governments that collect impact fees attesting that all impact fees were collected and expended by the local government in compliance with the bills. CS/HB 337 was amended in committee to provide the cap on impact fees may not be more than 25% of the current rate and for the increase to be phased in. (Cruz)

CS/HB 403 (Giallombardo) and CS/SB 266 (Perry) passed in their respective committees. The bills provide that local governments may not enact or enforce any ordinance, regulation or policy or take any action to license or otherwise regulate a home-based business in a manner that is different from other businesses in a local government’s jurisdiction. The bills authorize business owners to challenge local government actions and authorize the prevailing party to recover specified attorney fees and costs. CS/SB 266 was amended to provide that a home-based business may not create noise, vibration, heat, smoke, dust, glare, fumes, odors or electrical or electronic interference detectable by neighbors. The amended bill would also allow local regulation of a home-based business for things such as parking, hours of operation, signage, exterior structures and the use of hazardous materials. (Cruz)

SB 1274 (Perry) and HB 487 (Duggan) authorize landowners with development orders existing before the incorporation of a municipality to elect to abandon the order granted by the county and instead obtain a new order granted by the newly incorporated city in accordance with their comprehensive plan. The bills also revises the required acreage thresholds under which a small-scale development amendment may be adopted from 10 acres to 50 acres. (Cruz)

CS/CS/SB 496 (Perry) and CS/CS/CS/HB 59 (McClain) are comprehensive growth management bills. The legislation requires local governments to create and include a private property rights element in their comprehensive plans. The bill requires the consent of certain property owners is not required for development agreement changes under certain circumstances. Under certain circumstances the legislation authorizes developers to exchange approved land uses, subject to demonstrating that the exchange will not increase impacts to public facilities. The bills require the Department of Transportation to afford a right of first refusal to previous property owners under specified circumstances. The bills were amended to provide that in certain situations a city or county will have additional time to amend their comprehensive plan to comply with the requirements of the legislation. As amended, a city or county can now wait until the next time they amend their comprehensive plan or until their seven-year review of their comprehensive plan is due to comply with the new private property element. (Cruz)

HB 421 (Tuck) and SB 1876 (Albritton) amend the Bert J. Harris, Jr., Private Property Rights Protection Act shortening the review period governments have in responding to claims from 150 to 90 days. The bills create the presumption that certain Bert Harris settlement offers are in the public interest. The bills create a process by which a property owner can notify a government entity that they believe a new law or regulation imposes a limitation on their property. The government entity would have 45 days to respond in writing describing what limitations are imposed on the property by the new law or regulation. At this point, the Bert Harris claim would be ripe for filing without the property owner being denied an application for development if filed within one year after receiving the response from the government entity. The bills give the property owner the option to forgo a jury trial and instead have a bench trial. Lastly, the legislation amends the attorney fee provisions of the Bert Harris Act by making them more favorable to the property owner. (Cruz)

CS/HB 1139 (Smith) and CS/SB 1520 (Boyd) provide that a utility easement is an interest in real property and subject to certain actions unless otherwise provided in the instrument creating the easement. These bills revise rights that are not affected or extinguished by marketable record titles and require persons with certain interests in land that may be extinguished by this act to file a specified notice to preserve their interests. (Cruz)

HB 255 (Geller) and SB 1338 (Torres, Jr.) – Legislation by Initiative

HB 6021 (Eskamani) and SB 1020 (Torres) – Rent Control Measures

HB 499 (Benjamin) and SB 576 (Jones) –  Prohibited Landlord Practices

SB 1068 (Taddeo) and SB 567 (Bartleman) – Local Housing Assistance Plans

HB 1543 (Koster) and SB 1150 (Harrell) – Low-income Home Accessibility Program

HB 1469 (Smith) and SB 2002 (Taddeo) –  Florida Commercial Rent Stabilization Fund

HB 13 (Killebrew) and SB 510 (Hooper) specify that funds deposited in the State Housing Trust Fund and the Local Government Housing Trust Fund may not be transferred or used for any other purpose. (Taggart)

HB 81 (Casello) and SB 224 (Berman) – Sales and Use Tax Exemption

SB 302 (Taddeo) and HB 637 (Tant)  – Small Business Saturday Sales Tax Holiday

SB 598 (Perry) – Back-to-school Sales Tax Holiday

HJR 85 (Rizzo) and SJR 156 (Diaz) – Joint Resolution: Homestead Assessment Limitation for School Levies

HB 87 (Rizzo) and SJR 158 (Diaz) – Homestead Assessment Limitation for School Levies

HB 597 (Woodson) and SB 1256 (Polsky) – Homestead Exemption for Seniors 65 and Older

SB 734 (Gruters) – Sales Tax Holiday for Disaster Preparedness Supplies 

HB 749 (Mooney) – Small County Discretionary Sales Surtaxes

HB 1125 (Fischer) and SB 1390 (Gruters) – Capital Investment Tax Credit

HB 1209 (Fetterhoff) and SB 1408 (Burgess) – Department of Financial Services

HB 1429 (Avila) – Tourist and Convention Development Taxes

HB 6047 (Altman) and SB 842 (Baxley) – Aircraft Sales and Lease Tax

SB 58 (Rodriquez) – Hospitals’ Community Benefit Reporting

SB 806 (Book) – Tax Exemption for Diapers and Incontinence Products

SB 986 (Hutson) – Tax Exemption for Disabled Veterans

HB 1519 (Duggan) –  Homestead Exemptions

SB 2008 (Diaz) – Tourist and Convention Development Taxes

SB 1254 (Bean) and HB 1519 (Duggan) – Ad Valorem Assessments

CS/SB 506 (Garcia) and CS/HB 195 (Persons-Mulicka) require new reporting requirements for nongovernmental entities that receive a least 50 percent of their revenue from a governmental entity or expend at least $750,000 of government funds in any fiscal year. The bill provides that, before receiving funds from a governmental entity, a nongovernmental entity that received state funds in the previous year must submit to the governmental entity an attestation verifying that the nongovernmental entity has submitted the required report. Beginning January 15, 2022, a governmental entity may not expend, transfer or distribute funds to a nongovernmental entity until the nongovernmental entity has complied with the reporting and posting requirements. (Hughes)

SB 516 (Rodriguez) and HB 927 (Tuck) specific the methodology for the assessment of the structures and equipment used in aquaculture. The bills allow the property owner to request removal of its agriculture classification if the tax assessed based on such methodology exceeds the tax assessed based on the value of the structures and equipment. (Hughes)

HB 1241 (Stevenson) makes various updates to the statutes administering numerous taxes. Of note, the bill requires, rather than authorizes, tax collectors to accept late payments of prepaid property taxes through July 31 and deletes a late payment penalty. (Hughes)

HB 1037 (Roth) and SB 1210 (Baxley) authorize property owners of assessed property who have not filed personal property tax returns to qualify for tax exemption without filing an initial return. (Hughes)

CS/CS/SB 50 (Gruters) and HB 15 (Clemons) require retailers with no physical presence in Florida to collect Florida’s sales tax on sales of taxable items delivered to purchasers in Florida if the retailer makes a substantial number of sales into Florida or provides for the taxation of sales facilitated through a marketplace provider. The bills also delete a provision that exempts an out-of-state dealer that makes retail sales into Florida from collecting and remitting any local option surtax. (Hughes)

SB 132 (Hutson) allows the rental of a portion of a dwelling, claimed to be a homestead for tax purposes, while the dwelling is physically occupied by the owner does not constitute the abandonment of the dwelling as a homestead. (Hughes)