Quick AnswerFlorida’s Amendment 3 (CS/HJR 1F) is on the November 3, 2026 ballot and needs 60% of the vote to pass. It would raise the homestead exemption against non-school property taxes to $150,000 in 2027 and $250,000 in 2028, cut the annual assessment cap on non-homestead property from 10% to 5%, and, for the first time, put limits in the Florida Constitution on what counties and cities may spend property tax revenue on. State economists put the eventual cost to local governments at roughly $12 billion a year. Code enforcement fines are not property taxes, and nothing in Amendment 3 limits them. If you are facing a code violation or lien, call The Code Clinic at (305) 396-1495 for a free review.
I defend property owners in code enforcement cases, which means I read a lot of city budgets. On October 5, 2026, CBS News Miami aired a story on how South Florida cities are preparing for Amendment 3. I appeared in it after going through several Broward city budgets. The segment focused on speed cameras. This post covers the code enforcement side.
The Code Clinic, PLLC is not taking a position for or against the amendment. Whether a bigger homestead exemption is good tax policy is for voters to decide. This post answers two narrower questions: what the amendment does, and why a property tax cut this large matters for code enforcement.
What CBS News Miami reported
The story, reported by Larry Seward, centered on Lauderdale Lakes. According to CBS News Miami, the city adopted a budget that increases revenue by nearly $1 million next year, and more than $685,000 of that comes from new speed zone cameras. City Manager Jonathan Evans told the station that Amendment 3 could cost the city $3 million next year and $5 million more in 2028. He said fine revenue would cover only a fraction of that, and that cutting public services is the only way to make up the difference. In Lauderhill, the city manager told CBS News Miami that if Amendment 3 passes, commissioners could consider running speed cameras outside school hours.
The station also showed language from two other Broward budgets. Fort Lauderdale’s budget says the city “anticipates the potential effects of property tax reform.” Wilton Manors’ budget message notes that “legislative changes at the state level have the potential to affect municipal revenues and operations.”
My part was the code enforcement side: cities writing fine revenue into their budgets before an inspector has found a violation. As I told CBS News Miami: “It is truly the tip of the iceberg… What you’re seeing is just above the water line, the meat and potatoes of it. And what’s hiding is what you can’t see. Cannot see the code inspector driving down the street with their head on the swivel, looking for anything and everything that they can find.”
What Amendment 3 does
Four parts of the amendment matter here.
A much larger homestead exemption, against non-school taxes only. The exemption that applies to non-school taxes rises to $150,000 on January 1, 2027 and $250,000 on January 1, 2028, with inflation adjustments starting in 2029. School taxes are not affected. Only the first $25,000 of a homestead’s value stays exempt from school taxes, as under current law. That means school districts are held harmless, and counties, cities, and special districts absorb the entire reduction.
A tighter cap on non-homestead assessments. The annual cap on assessment increases for non-homestead property, meaning rentals, commercial buildings, and second homes, drops from 10% to 5%.
A waiting period for new residents. People who become Florida residents on or after January 1, 2027 would start with an exemption of about $50,000. After four years with a Florida homestead exemption, they become eligible for the larger exemption on January 1 of the fifth year.
A constitutional limit on spending. Counties and cities could spend property tax revenue only on public safety, education, infrastructure such as roads and stormwater, natural resource and flood control projects, bonds and debt service, employee retirement benefits, and the operations and administration of county officers and municipalities, except spending the Legislature prohibits by general law. For the first time, the Florida Constitution would control what local property tax dollars may be used for.
The ballot language fight
Amendment 3 has already been to court. On August 4, 2026, Leon County Circuit Judge David Frank ruled that the original ballot title and summary were defective. The original title, “Save Our Homes From Excessive Property Taxes,” was in the court’s view closer to a political slogan than a neutral description. The summary’s claim that the amendment “benefits” taxpayers was held misleading, because whether it benefits them is the question voters are being asked to decide.
The judge also found that the summary left out a material fact: the amendment would put the Legislature’s authority over local property tax spending into the Constitution for the first time. Attorney General James Uthmeier released rewritten language on August 14, 2026. The new title is “Increased Homestead Exemption; Lower Cap on Increases in Non-Homestead Property Assessments.” The amendment remains on the November 3 ballot.
The number: roughly $12 billion a year
State economists at Florida’s Revenue Estimating Conference project that the amendment would eventually reduce local property tax collections by roughly $12 billion a year once fully in effect.
A revenue cut that size has to be absorbed somewhere. A local government facing a revenue cut has a short list of choices: cut services, raise the tax rate on property that is still taxable, which shifts more of the burden onto non-homestead property such as rentals and businesses, or find money somewhere other than the property tax.
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Why this lands on code enforcement
A code enforcement fine is not a tax. Fines imposed under Chapter 162, Florida Statutes are penalties for violating a local ordinance. They are not property tax revenue, they are not subject to millage caps, they do not need a vote of the public, and nothing in Amendment 3 limits them or controls how the money is spent. The amendment would put a constitutional fence around property tax dollars and leave fine revenue completely outside it.
Now look at the limits in the statute. Under §162.09, a first violation can carry a fine of up to $250 a day, and a repeat violation up to $500 a day. A county or city with 50,000 or more residents can raise those limits by ordinance, with a vote of a majority plus one of its governing body, to $1,000 a day for a first violation, $5,000 a day for a repeat violation, and up to $15,000 for a violation that is irreparable or irreversible. The first two limits are per day; the $15,000 is per violation. Daily fines keep running until the property comes into compliance, and once the order is recorded, the fine becomes a lien. Under §162.10, that lien can last up to 20 years, and longer if the city files suit on it within that time.
None of this means any city has decided to replace property taxes with code fines. It is a point about incentives. When one source of money gets capped and another does not, the one without a cap gets more attention.
What the cities’ own budgets say
City budgets are public records, and they have a line for fines.
Wilton Manors. The city’s code enforcement fines line was $849,587 in FY2023-24. The FY2024-25 actual came in at $1,440,518, roughly a 70% jump, in a city of about 11,500 people. The FY2025-26 budget was set at $750,000. Through the first eight months of that year, the city had collected $392,265, a pace of about $588,000 for the year. The FY2026-27 proposed budget recommends $1,000,000, about 70% above that pace. The city’s standard fine is $250 a day, plus a per-case administrative fee, and it opens roughly 2,000 to 2,500 cases a year. The budget message says the budget “does not rely solely on property taxes to fund City operations” and lists growth in fines and forfeitures among the revenues that maintain services. It does not mention Amendment 3 by name.
Fort Lauderdale. The FY2027 budget message, under the heading “Preparing for the Future,” says the budget strengthens fiscal stability as the City prepares for FY 2028 and anticipates the potential effects of property tax reform. It does not name Amendment 3. The FY2027 proposed budget also included $380,846 in ongoing funding to expand nighttime code enforcement from four nights a week to six.
The counterexample. Fort Lauderdale’s General Fund revenue line for violations of local ordinances is projected down: $773,000 proposed for FY2027 against $781,846 adopted for FY2026. A city adding enforcement while projecting slightly less ordinance fine revenue does not fit a simple revenue-grab story, and it belongs in any fair account of this.
What the statewide data shows, and what it doesn’t
Florida’s Office of Economic and Demographic Research publishes each city’s Annual Financial Report data, including account code 354, “Fines, Local Ordinance Violations.” It is the closest thing to an apples-to-apples measure of ordinance fine revenue across Florida cities. It also has two traps, and it is easy to fall into both.
Trap one: red light cameras. Account 354 includes red light camera fines along with ordinance fines. Opa-locka’s raw FY2024 figure of $2.83 million, or $171 per resident, would lead the state, but most of it is camera revenue. The city’s FY2025 budget books about $2.67 million in camera fines against roughly $630,000 in ordinance and code fines, or about $38 per resident. The headline number is about four and a half times the code-related figure.
Trap two: enterprise funds. Cities that run parking operations book parking tickets in an enterprise fund under the same account code. Take out camera cities and enterprise-fund parking revenue and the picture changes. Fort Lauderdale drops from about $34 per resident to under $14, a figure that counts all of the city’s governmental funds and so is broader than any single budget line. West Palm Beach drops from about $42 to about $21.
After that filtering, using governmental funds only and setting aside Golden Beach, a town of under 1,000 people where small numbers swing the result, Surfside leads at roughly $79 per resident. Wilton Manors follows at about $74, then Lake Worth Beach at about $53, Palm Beach at about $53, and Lantana at about $45. The statewide median for cities of more than 5,000 people without camera programs is about $3.20 per resident. Ten of the top twelve cities on this measure are in Miami-Dade, Broward, or Palm Beach County.
One more caveat. Depending on the city, account 354 can also include parking, noise, or animal citations that are not code enforcement in the sense property owners mean. These figures describe ordinance fine revenue broadly. They are a strong signal and a reason to ask questions, not a finding of wrongdoing by any city.
What this means if you own property in Florida
Whatever happens on November 3, a few things are already true. At least one large South Florida city has proposed ongoing money to expand code enforcement. The fine limits in larger cities and counties are far above the $250 a day most owners assume applies. And because fines run every day, the time between a case being opened and an owner responding is the biggest driver of what the case ends up costing.
None of this is cause for alarm, but it is a reason to respond to the first notice, not the third. An early notice is usually the cheapest point to resolve a violation. The same violation 18 months later, at $250 a day, can be a six-figure fine that, once recorded, sits on the property as a lien. If you own property you do not live in, make sure the city has a mailing address that actually reaches you. It costs nothing to check.
Frequently asked questions
What is Florida’s Amendment 3?
A proposed constitutional amendment (CS/HJR 1F) on the November 3, 2026 ballot. It would raise the homestead exemption against non-school taxes to $150,000 in 2027 and $250,000 in 2028, reduce the annual assessment cap on non-homestead property from 10% to 5%, delay the larger exemption for new residents, and limit in the Constitution what local governments may spend property tax revenue on. It needs 60% of the vote to pass.
Would Amendment 3 limit code enforcement fines?
No. Code enforcement fines are penalties imposed under Chapter 162, Florida Statutes for ordinance violations. They are not property taxes. Amendment 3 deals with property taxes and how property tax revenue is spent. It puts no cap on fines, no restriction on recording liens, and no limit on how fine revenue is spent.
Did a court remove Amendment 3 from the ballot?
No. On August 4, 2026, a circuit judge found the ballot title and summary defective and ordered a rewrite, which the Attorney General released on August 14. The amendment remains on the November 3 ballot under the title “Increased Homestead Exemption; Lower Cap on Increases in Non-Homestead Property Assessments.”
Are Florida cities raising code fines because of Amendment 3?
No city has said so in a budget document, and I would not claim it. What the public records show is that at least one South Florida city is budgeting far more code fine revenue for FY2027 than its current-year pace, that budget messages in Fort Lauderdale and Wilton Manors refer to property tax reform and state legislative changes in general terms, and that fine revenue sits entirely outside the limits Amendment 3 would impose. The documents are public, and readers can draw their own conclusions.
What should I do if I already have a code violation or lien?
Deal with it now, before more fines accrue. Most Florida cities and counties have a lien reduction or mitigation process, and the factors boards weigh, such as how serious the violation was, what the owner did to fix it, and any prior violations, tend to favor owners who act quickly. More in How to Reduce Code Enforcement Fines.
Facing a code violation, a running fine, or a recorded lien anywhere in Florida? Call The Code Clinic at (305) 396-1495. Attorney Ari Pregen will tell you where you stand and what your options are. Flat fee. No hourly billing. No surprises.
This article discusses a pending ballot measure and public budget documents. It is general information about Florida law, not legal advice about your situation, and it does not advocate for or against any ballot measure. Budget figures are from cities’ FY2027 proposed budgets and Florida Office of Economic and Demographic Research data. Ballot information is current as of October 6, 2026.