Fort Myers set a not-to-exceed property tax rate of 7.3112 mills on August 3, and that ceiling is the number Lee County TRIM notices will carry this month

Fort Myers City Council voted 5 to 2 on August 3 to set the city's not-to-exceed property tax rate at 7.3112 mills for the 2026-27 fiscal year, up from the 6.5 mills it has levied for the past year. Evan Williams reported the vote for Gulfshore Business.

The figure is a ceiling, not a rate. Under Florida's truth in millage process a city advertises a maximum, mails it to every property owner, and then adopts a final rate at public hearings in September. That final rate may be lower. It may not be higher.

Lee County mails the notices carrying the advertised figure this month. Tax bills follow in November.

One mill is a dollar for every thousand dollars of taxable value, so the difference between the old rate and the new ceiling is $81.12 per $100,000. On a taxable value of $100,000 the ceiling produces $731.12 in city taxes against $650 last year.

Council could have held the rate at 6.5 mills, or adopted the rolled-back rate of 6.6465 mills, which is the rate calculated to raise the same money from the existing roll as last year raised. Either choice would have left a gap against a budget carrying rising costs, flat projected revenue and a new police headquarters. Members said they wanted room to work before September rather than a decision on the size of the increase, and Mayor Kevin Anderson put it in five words to the chamber. "This is just a flexibility move at the moment," he said, according to Gulfshore Business.

If the city does adopt a higher rate in September it would be the first increase in a decade. Financial Services Director Christine Tenney told the meeting that Fort Myers raised rates sharply after the recession that began in 2007, cut wages, eliminated fire department posts and restricted police hiring, and has spent the ten years since bringing the rate back down. This year's potential increase, she said, would be less than half the size of that one.

Two council members voted against the ceiling, Terolyn Watson and Fred Burson. The margin was the point as much as the outcome. This site reported on July 30 that 7.3112 mills is not a figure the city chose but the exact statutory ceiling reachable on a two-thirds vote, being 110 percent of the 6.6465-mill majority-vote maximum. Five votes out of seven clears two thirds. Four would not have.

Burson's objection was about what the notice does rather than what the budget needs. He argued that a higher number printed on TRIM notices arriving weeks before the November election would push Fort Myers homeowners toward Amendment 3, the state constitutional measure that would raise the homestead exemption on non-school levies to $150,000 in 2027 and $250,000 in 2028. "They'll all go to the polls hellbent on voting for it," he said, per the same account, adding that he considers tax increases a drag on growth.

The rest of the bill moved less. Council set a not-to-exceed 10 percent increase in the fire assessment fee, taking it from $218 to $239.80, down from a 30 percent increase that had been under consideration. Solid waste and stormwater fees would stay the same or fall.

Separately, members agreed on August 3 to move forward with a $45 million bond issue, part of the $75 million in general obligation bonds Fort Myers voters approved in 2024 for parks and recreation improvements.

This item does not link the city's own resolution. Fort Myers publishes its agendas, resolutions and budget documents on its municipal site, and the host serving them did not answer any request made for this item, so the account above rests on the credited report rather than on the record itself.

The fiscal year begins October 1. The rate is fixed at public hearings in September, and that is the only stage at which it can still come down.