Insights · Proof of work
Florida's 67 counties, by the numbers.
An independent analysis of every Florida county's budget, built from public records: where the money comes from, where it goes, what it costs per resident, and how each county compares to its peers. A demonstration of what careful financial analysis can surface, written in a neutral voice.
Last updated —. Duval County files with the City of Jacksonville and is not yet included.
See all counties compared on one page →The statewide figure
in property tax revenue above the population-and-inflation baseline, Florida's counties, FY2020–FY2024. That is the sum, over five years, of each year's property tax revenue minus what it would have been had FY2019 revenue grown only with each county's own population and prices (CPI-U South).
Figures are actual revenues as each county reported them to the State of Florida (64 counties report property tax in every year shown; Duval files with the City of Jacksonville). The baseline describes the arithmetic, not what any county could or should have done; this is an analysis of public records, not an audit, and it makes no recommendation.
What this is, and is not
An exercise in analysis and transparency. This study takes no position on county spending, on property tax policy or on Amendment 3; it puts the public record in one place so that local officials and the voters who choose them can decide with all of the information in front of them.
Feature
The Brevard Example
Eighteen budgets under a voter-approved cap on property tax revenue: how the limit came to be, what the county's own figures show, the three times the commission set it aside and the reasons it gave, and what people in Brevard say about it.
Read the feature →The state figure
in state agency spending excluding construction above the population-and-inflation baseline, Florida's state government, FY2020–FY2026. That is the sum, over seven years, of each year's spending minus what it would have been had FY2019 spending grown only with Florida's population and prices (CPI-U South). Federal money — pandemic relief, Medicaid matching funds, disaster aid — is inside that figure and is separated out in the tiles, because the state did not raise it.
Figures are amounts spent as recorded on Transparency Florida, the Governor's budget-and-spending site, for the 31 agencies compared (Administered Funds, the statewide holding line, has its own page and is left out). “Spending excluding construction” is the amount spent in every appropriation category except fixed capital outlay (construction and land, appropriated in one year, spent over several and recorded against the year appropriated) and transfers to a state trust fund or the General Revenue Fund (dollars that appear again as spending when drawn from the receiving fund). The baseline describes the arithmetic, not what any agency could or should have done; this is an analysis of public records, not an examination of any agency's books, and it makes no recommendation.
Second study
Florida's state agencies, by the numbers
The same question asked of state government: how did each of 32 agencies' actual spending move from FY2019 to FY2026 against Florida's population growth and inflation — with federal money, construction money and the pandemic years separated out. One page per agency, one comparison page, and the method in full.
See the agencies compared →Loading the county list…
Methodology
How each county is analyzed.
Every page follows the same structure so counties can be compared fairly. Figures are the actual revenues and expenditures each county reported to the State of Florida in its Annual Financial Report, compiled by the Legislature's Office of Economic and Demographic Research, covering FY2015 through the county's latest filing. Every figure is measured against the same baseline: the county's own population growth and inflation since FY2019. Per-resident figures divide by that year's population. Peer counties are the four closest in population.
The analysis describes what the records show. It does not make policy recommendations.
- Snapshot
- Revenue, property tax revenue, spending per resident, and the population-and-inflation baseline
- Revenue
- Mix by source, the FY2015–latest trend, and property tax against the baseline and against federal grants
- Spending
- By function (public safety, general government, transportation, physical environment, and more), with capital and debt service shown separately
- Revenues over expenditures
- Each year's revenues against expenditures, the closest the state filing gets to reserves
- Debt service
- Debt-service outlays, debt service per resident, and the years borrowing was reported
- Peers
- The four closest counties by population, on the same year and measures
- Observations and questions
- What the numbers support, and the questions they raise for county officials to answer
- Sources
- Links to every document used
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