(The Center Square) – Floridians likely won’t experience all the tax cuts included under the One Big Beautiful Bill signed by President Trump last year.
A tax package that cleared the state House Ways and Means Committee includes approximately $251 million in tax cuts but decouples from certain components of the federal measure, including changes to corporate income tax codes.
Rep. Wyman Duggan, a Republican from Jacksonville who chairs the committee, said opting into the cuts would mean losing an estimated $3.1 billion in revenue.
“The long-range financial outlook is mixed at best and we at this point in the process do not want to engage in forgoing that kind of recurring revenue until we have a more clear sense of the scope of this year’s budget for example and some other considerations,” said Rep. According to Duggan, implementing all the tax cuts from the One Big Beautiful Bill would mean an estimated $3.1 billion in lost revenue for the state.
The tax package passed by the committee last week includes sales tax exemptions for certain propane tanks. It temporarily exempts firearm accessories, impact-resistant windows and doors, leases of tangible personal property owned by Space Florida, and it adopts a four-month sales tax holiday on certain outdoor supplies and adjusts the dates of the month-long annual back-to-school sales tax holiday.
The bill would also cap the increase on property tax assessments for certain mobile home parks, adjust notification timing for tax exemption denials and clarify homestead protection for certain people serving in the federal government outside the state, among other things.
The bill forgoes changes to the corporate income tax code that were in the One Big Beautiful Bill, creating “an administrative burden for businesses,” said French Brown, a lobbyist for the Florida Chamber of Commerce.
“It’s going to require them to keep separate Florida books and records from their federal books and records,” he told the committee on Thursday.
French said there were ways the legislature could tackle the issue to minimize the fiscal impact on Florida without placing additional burdens on businesses.
“The decoupling provision is the right thing for Florida. I empathize with concerns of administrative burdens,” said Rep. Anna Eskamani, D-Orlando. “The reality is that $3 billion is huge for us right now and we’re trying to operate a budget that is balanced, that is going to be strong in the base of upcoming potential storms and expressing our independence in that regard to really focus on fiscal responsibility I think is another reflection of who we are as a legislature.”
The tax package is scheduled to go before the full House for consideration later this week.
