St. Johns County Freezes $100 Million in Projects as It Braces for Property Tax Vote

St. Johns County has put roughly $100 million in capital projects on hold and flagged $8.6 million in staffing costs for review as it prepares for a statewide property tax amendment that county officials say could eventually cut local revenue nearly in half. Every homeowner in the county will decide the measure's fate at the polls on November 3, 2026.

Proposed Amendment 3 would raise the homestead exemption used to calculate county, city, and other non-school property taxes to $150,000 starting in 2027 and to $250,000 in 2028, with annual inflation adjustments after that. It would also cut the assessment cap on non-homestead properties from 10% to 5% and require five years of Florida residency before a homeowner qualifies for the bigger exemption. The amendment needs 60% voter approval statewide to pass.

For homeowners, the appeal is straightforward: a bigger exemption means a smaller tax bill. For the county government that collects those taxes, the math runs the other way.

What the county says it stands to lose

Using projections from Florida's Office of Economic and Demographic Research, the county estimates it would lose $68.3 million, or 16% of its FY2027 property tax base, in the first full year the amendment applies. The losses grow every year after that as the exemption climbs and inflation adjustments compound.

Those figures are measured against an estimated $426 million FY2027 property tax base, the largest single funding source for county services. By the county's own breakdown, 31% of that money funds the Sheriff's Office and jail operations, and 27% funds Fire Rescue and emergency communications. Roads and transportation take another 13%, with parks, libraries, county buildings and general government splitting most of the rest.

Projects already paused

County Administrator Joy Andrews started a countywide review in May, months before the amendment was even placed on the ballot, examining 380 services across 18 departments, more than 1,100 existing fees and several proposed new ones. That review fed directly into the FY2027 Recommended Budget.

The Capital Improvement Project Oversight Committee, working with Andrews since June, sorted every planned capital project into one of three buckets: continue, pause, or defer. The committee weighed factors including life-safety requirements, outside grant funding, how far along a project already is, and the cost of stopping and restarting work later. That process produced the roughly $100 million now on hold.

Daniel Whitcraft, who chairs the oversight committee, said in a county announcement that pausing a project does not mean canceling it. The county says design work or limited site work may continue on paused projects so they can stop at the least disruptive and least costly point, with phasing, redesign or alternative funding considered later depending on how the vote turns out.

On staffing, the county identified $8.6 million in positions for reassessment after the election: $4 million tied to currently vacant positions, $2 million in FY2027 positions that were not recommended for funding, and $2.6 million in positions that were recommended but paused.

Reserves set aside either way

The FY2027 Recommended Budget already sets aside $31.2 million in emergency response reserves to help the county respond to hurricanes and other disasters, on top of that a separate $30 million in general fund reserves designated specifically as "financial resiliency" money tied to Amendment 3. County officials are also studying alternative revenue tools, including a possible municipal service benefit unit, which would let the county levy assessments on properties in a defined area to pay for things like fire protection or stormwater work without relying on property taxes.

The county has built a dedicated page at sjcfl.us/amendment-3 laying out the exemption changes, the revenue projections and how property tax dollars are currently spent. County officials say the page is meant to inform, not persuade: the county takes no position for or against the amendment and describes its job as preparing for either outcome.

What happens next depends on voters. If the amendment fails, the paused projects and staffing questions largely go away. If it passes, the county says the real budget decisions, which projects get revived, which stay frozen, and how big a role new assessments play, will play out over the following several budget cycles, starting with the money that shows up on tax bills mailed in November 2027.

Find more coverage of county budget decisions on our government and politics page, and follow ongoing developments in our news section. Visit the St. Johns Community Website for more local coverage, follow us on Facebook, and join the conversation about what this means for your tax bill in our Community Forum.

Header photo: Michael Rivera / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)