Mental health district idea suspended

Put this on the list of COVID-19 casualties.

An initiative by Sarasota County commissioners to place a referendum on the November ballot to create a mental health district for the county has now been suspended.

County Administrator Jonathan Lewis told commissioners during their Wednesday meeting that the time for them to move forward with the idea would be coming at their next meeting on May 28.

Lewis brought up the matter, which was not on the published agenda, during his report to commissioners.

Commissioners have been discussing off and on during the past year the idea of creating a mental health special dependent district as allowed by Florida statutes. Commissioner Mike Moran first raised the possibility a year ago and been a strong proponent of the idea since then.

As a dependent district, funding for it would come from the county’s general fund which has property taxes paid by residents as its main revenue source.

When they lasted discussed the topic in early February, commissioners approved county staff proceeding with a survey of county residents through the rest of the month to determine interest in proceeding, and support for a possible tax increase to fund the district.

Commissioners were to discuss the survey results in March, but then the pandemic occurred and that didn’t happen.

“This is a real testy time to be raising taxes when we may be cutting services,” Commissioner Nancy Detert said. “This is an act of God moment that was totally unpredictable.”

Commissioner Alan Maio agreed.

“This may be the time to pause this for a year,” Maio said.

Commissioner Charles Hines, who has said in the past that there needed to be a public debate on the idea added that he didn’t believe there could be a vigorous public debate at the moment.

By consensus, commissioners agreed to suspend moving forward for now.

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