Board members agree to wait on resolution of Circuit Court litigation between Tax Collector’s Office and School Board to decide how to deal with commissions in future years
The Sarasota County commissioners voted unanimously on May 19 to adopt a resolution that county administrative staff and representatives of the Office of the County Attorney had drawn up to reflect the board’s May 5 vote to pay Sarasota County Tax Collector Mike Moran’s office for commissions Moran is charging for the handling of the revenue from a special 1-mill tax for the Sarasota County School Board.
On May 5, at the suggestion of Commissioner Tom Knight, the board members voted 3-2 to rescind action they took unanimously on Aug. 19, 2025 that called for the School Board to pay the $589,556 that County Administrator Jonathan Lewis had included in the county’s budget for the 2026 fiscal year budget, which began on Oct. 1, 2025.
During that last workshop before they formally adopted the FY 2026 budget, the commissioners talked of the need to trim the county’s spending in coming fiscal years. They stressed their concerns about the potential that the Florida Legislature will place a referendum on the November General Election ballot that will allow citizens to vote for the elimination of specific property taxes. Property tax revenue is the major source of funding for local government operations.
During remarks to the commissioners on May 19, as they met again in Venice, County Administrator Lewis explained that the resolution regarding the Tax Collector’s Office commissions that was included in their agenda packet that day “was an attempt to find the easiest way to execute on the board’s [May 5] direction. … We found a way to make it happen [in a formal way],” he continued, having the resolution drafted “by the end of the day [May 15], and [having informed] the tax collector and the School Board on [May 18].”
Lewis noted that he had worked on it with County Attorney Joshua Moye and Chief Deputy County Attorney Karl Senkow “over the weekend.”
Lewis did point out that the commissioners on May 5 did not discuss how long they wanted the county to keep paying the commissions. Thus, he said, he and the attorneys included a sunset date of June 30, 2030, which is when the latest iteration of the voter-approved special tax is due to expire.
Lewis indicated that he expected the commissioners on May 19 to discuss the term before voting to adopt the resolution.
Knight responded that he had read the resolution, agreeing with Lewis that it was “pretty much” a mirror of the language of Knight’s May 5 motion, aside from the sunset issue.
Nonetheless, Knight noted, “Certainly, we’re not indemnified from the current civil litigation going on.”
He was referring to the complaint that the School Board filed against Tax Collector Moran, in Moran’s official capacity, on April 24, in the 12th Judicial Circuit Court in Sarasota. An exhibit filed with the complaint —which was included in a letter that Moran sent in July 2025 to Sarasota County Schools Superintendent Terry Connor and County Administrator Lewis — shows that the School Board revenue collected in 2024 totaled $103,962,920. The 2% commission Moran charged for handling the funds added up to $2,079,258.
The complaint contends that Moran violated public trust by having his office take a commission for collecting the revenue derived from the special tax that voters have approved by margins of more than 80% during the past two referenda.
Could the County Commission ‘shift gears’ on future payments of the commissions?
During the May 19 discussion, Knight did ask County Attorney Moye whether approval of the resolution that staff had drafted “is really necessary?” Would it be better to let the presiding judge make a ruling on the commissions paid to the Tax Collector’s Office, Knight then inquired.
As he had on May 5, Moye explained that, since Knight raised the proposal of rescinding the August 2025 vote while Knight was making his routine report to his board colleagues on May 5, the public had had no notice of the fact that the matter would be considered by the commissioners. As a result, members of the public had no opportunity to express their views about the issue, Moye added.
Thus, Moye said, adoption of the resolution on May 19 “kind of formalizes that vote the board made at the last meeting.”
Then Knight asked Moye whether the board would be able to “shift gears” with the county budget if it chose to do so after the judge rules in the case.
Knight acknowledged that if the commissioners ended up paying the commissions over the coming years, that would be “kind of a shock and awe impact” to the county budget.
Moye directed Knight to read Paragraph 7 in the proposed resolution. That says, “The Board retains discretion to periodically review the payment provided hereunder and the continued effect of this Resolution.” Therefore, Moye noted, the commissioners could bring up the resolution at a future meeting, to readdress the handling of the payments.
Then Commissioner Teresa Mast told her colleagues, “I just want to be sure we’re asking all the right questions. We are not involved in the current lawsuit,” she reminded them.
Mast also talked about the demands on the county budget. “I don’t want to see us pay something that we should not be paying.”
“Hopefully, the courts will resolve this issue … There is a friction there,” Mast said, between the School Board and Tax Collector Moran.
At the very least, she continued, she believes the commissioners should review the proposed county payment of the commissions on an annual basis until the litigation has been resolved. Saying the county should continue the payments until 2030 is not “fiscally prudent,” she added.
Following her remarks, Commissioner Mark Smith said, “I was under the impression that this resolution would basically allow us to do the bookkeeping.”
“The goal of the resolution was to effectuate what the board told us to do at the last meeting,” County Administrator Lewis responded. Some people had suggested that the county “just cut a check to the School Board,” Lewis pointed out. “That would require a budget amendment” and other staff and board action, he indicated.
“The only way I could accomplish the board’s goal quickly,” Lewis continued, “was to ask the tax collector to use what he holds back from our distribution … and refund the School District …”
Lewis was alluding to funds that the Tax Collector’s Office traditionally has returned on an annual basis to the county. The money represents what would be called “profit” in the business world, as former decades-long Tax Collector Barbara Ford-Coates often reminded the commissioners. The money is Tax Collector’s Office revenue left over after all of that office’s fiscal year expenses have been paid.
Although the Tax Collector’s Office brings in revenue from its services, the county includes a line item each year in its General Fund budget showing the amount of money the Tax Collector’s Office is expected to spend. The Florida Department of Revenue approves the Tax Collector’s Office budget, Moran has stressed to the commissioners and county staff; the commissioners have no control over it.
Through the resolution, Lewis added, “We gave [Moran] a mechanism to refund that money to the School District and hold more of our money.”
Commissioner Knight pointed out, “The law is nebulous,” referencing Moran’s assertion that state law calls for “the Tax Collector’s Office to retain a commission for the collection of ad valorem taxes,” as Moran noted in his July 2025 letter to Schools Superintendent Connor and Lewis.
Paragraph 3 of the resolution that staff had prepared for the commissioners’ May 19 meeting says, “The [commission] acknowledges that the amount of the commission that is ultimately retained by the Tax Collector for the Voted School Board Operating Millage is dependent on the amount of tax that is collected from such millage and the lawful costs of the Tax Collector’s operations.”
“I think that, for public trust, everybody just wants to see how the public’s money is being spent,” Knight said.
Commissioner Joe Neunder noted the timing of the discussion that day, as this is graduation week in the Sarasota County School District. “The resolution allows us to have some clarity,” he added. In the future, the commissioners again can discuss how to take the most appropriate action, Neunder said..
His focus, Neunder stressed, is on the students and teachers in the School District.
Chair Ron Cutsinger told his colleagues, “I do think the … litigation has to play out. That will settle the matter. And then based on what that outcome is, we make our decision,” he added, in regard to future payments of the commission.
Commissioner Mast asked County Attorney Moye whether the county could be reimbursed for covering the commissions, depending on how the lawsuit is resolved.
Moye told her that the resolution was an effort “to go back before last August,” when the commissioners voted not to pay the commissions.
The court ruling could prompt a review of their May 19 vote, if the resolution were approved, he indicated.
Mast ended up making the motion to adopt the resolution with a modification of Paragraph 8 that calls for the commission to revisit the vote that day after the lawsuit has been settled.
Commissioner Knight seconded the motion, and it ended up passing unanimously.