Brevard County Final Budget Hearing: How Florida's TRIM Law Scripts the Vote

Microphone in a dim hearing room, text: They have to say it out loud, listing three steps of a final budget hearing

September 22, 2026

As Brevard County's Republican State Committeeman, I'll be watching tonight's final budget hearing. Here is the part almost nobody knows: the board does not get to just vote. Florida law hands it a script.

Under the TRIM statute, section 200.065 of the Florida Statutes, a final budget hearing runs in a fixed order, and the order is the accountability.

  1. Say it out loud. Before anything is adopted, the millage rate has to be publicly announced, along with the percentage by which it exceeds the rolled-back rate. Rolled-back is the rate that would raise the same property tax dollars as last year from the same properties. If the proposed rate is above it, the board has to say out loud, in the room, by how much. It cannot be buried in a packet.
  2. Public comment. The public is heard before the vote, not after.
  3. Two votes. The millage rate comes first, then the budget. They are separate motions, and a commissioner can be recorded differently on each.

That sequence exists because somebody decided a property tax decision should cost an elected commissioner a moment of public speech before it costs you money.

Here's what's on the table tonight. The tentative budget passed 4–1 on September 8, with Commissioner Rob Feltner the lone no. It declares a critical need in order to exceed Brevard's voter-approved charter cap on property tax revenue growth, roughly $17.7 million above what the cap alone would have allowed. The charter requires four of five commissioners to do that. The overall proposed budget, about $2.4 billion, is roughly $162 million smaller than this year's.

Both of those things are true at once, and you are allowed to weigh them yourself. That is the point of making them say it out loud.

If you go, public comment comes before the votes. If you don't, the minutes and the video are public records, and you can check that the script was followed.

Originally posted on Facebook

Political advertisement paid for and approved by Josiah Gattle for Brevard Republican State Committeeman.

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