As Palm Beach County voters consider Amendment 3 on property taxes, many are thinking about the impact for homeowners, residential and commercial renters, business owners, and the essential day-to-day services provided by our cities and county. We must keep our children’s future on the critical list of things at risk.
Where will my family get help with child care and afterschool programs so I can keep working? Will my child’s favorite summer camp still open next year? Who can help me know if my toddler is learning and growing on par with other children? How will I find a tutor for my middle-schooler, a mentor for my teenager?
For 40 years, Children’s Services Council of Palm Beach County (CSC) has used a share of county taxpayers’ dollars to respond
effectively to these family concerns. Working together with the county, cities and a range of non-profits, foundations and faith-based organizations, the council helped build the robust network of programs and providers that today serves all families and children.
The council’s work began when you, the county voters, established it in 1986. The tax dollars that it invests today in primary prevention and early intervention help diminish or eliminate more costly remedial services that may be needed later in a child’s life.
If Amendment 3 is approved, property tax revenue will drop sharply and rapidly. But the need for family services and those costs will not disappear. Approval could push the county, cities, the Children's Services Council and other tax-supported entities, such as the Health Care District, to reduce family services or shift the costs elsewhere.
That could mean new or higher fees, with fewer children participating in fewer programs. In just two years, projections show Amendment 3 would eliminate an estimated $200 million to $300 million annually from the county’s budget and about $26 million from the Children's Services Council’s budget. Every city’s budget would face similar cutbacks.
Ultimately, your elected and appointed officials for the county, cities, the council and other boards will face difficult votes on how to adjust services, staffing and costs. So what’s at risk? Looking just at the council, for example, here’s what a 15% cut could look like for Palm Beach County families and their children ― your children, our children.
The cut could mean more than 21,000 children could lose access to child care, afterschool programs and summer camps. Nearly 6,000 youth could lose access to caring mentors, or about 1,400 young children learning to ride bikes could go without helmets, and children with special needs could lose access to essential, often expensive medical equipment.
Or, it could mean about 11,500 children and families won't developmental screenings and referrals to therapeutic services they need. Roughly 4,300 pregnant women and new moms could lose at-home support, nutritional education, breastfeeding counseling or postpartum services, and children with autism, who face a significantly higher risk of drowning, and their families could be without water safety lessons.
Approval of Amendment 3 could mean cuts to mental health care, youth sports, health and wellness activities, child-abuse prevention programs, literacy programs that prepare children for kindergarten, weekend and summer food programs that help families eat healthy meals, and access to books, child videos, story times and safe internet access at more than two dozen city and county libraries. Passage also could affect scores of programs that support teens through early career development and youth clubs that build teen confidence, self-esteem and goal setting.
Because Children Services Council services are efficiently integrated with those provided by cities and the county’s Youth Services and Community Services Departments, many more families will struggle to raise their children to be productive members of our future workforce if the amendment is approved.
Palm Beach County voters created Children’s Services Council because they recognized that children and families need help from all of us to grow up healthy, safe and strong. That’s one reason this is a special place to live and raise a family. This November, children and families need your active support. Vote No on Amendment 3.
Verdenia Baker is the former Palm Beach County Administrator. Tammy Fields is the retired deputy county administrator and the founding director of the county’s Youth Services Department; and Dr. Seth Bernstein is a child advocate and retired executive vice president at United Way of Palm Beach County.
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This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: Reject Amendment 3 — for the children | Opinion
