Cops

Property Taxes Again

Governor DeSantis is pushing to have a ballot initiative on Florida’s 2026 ballot. The initiative would be to eliminate property taxes.

Those who oppose this claim that counties, school boards, and other government entities rely on this to provide essential services. That’s a load of crap. On average, counties only rely upon property taxes for 18% of their expenditures. Of course, if you ask the counties, they play a bit of a shell game with the facts:

“If you want to get it from sales tax, well, it’s really going to disproportionately hurt lower income,” Kroll said.

Each year Kroll’s offices collect more than $700 million from property taxes, he said.

“The majority of it goes to the school board that that’s about $248 million,” Kroll said.

The remaining revenue goes to the Seminole County Board of Commissioners and Kroll said they use most of that money to fund the budgets for the Seminole County Sheriff’s Office and Fire Rescue.

  • It isn’t going to disproportionately affect lower income. See, lower income will buy less stuff, so they will pay less in taxes. If a person spends ten times as much, they will pay 10 times more in taxes. That’s how proportionality works. What they really mean is that the poor are now paying nothing, while those who aren’t poor are paying for bullshit that isn’t necessary. There are so many carve outs and exemptions, that nearly half of the people in my small town pay NOTHING in property taxes. More on that in a minute.
  • Don’t look now, but $248 million isn’t most of $700 million
  • The Seminole county school board has an annual budget of just over $1 billion. Only 1 in 3 households in Florida has a school aged child, yet we are each paying thousands to send those kids to school, even though education is a giant failure. It’s a huge drain of resources.

Seminole County’s proposed 2025 budget is $1.2 billion, which includes a potential property tax increase for 2025. That amount also doesn’t include the money that goes to the school board, because that is a different budget. In fact, they are increasing the milage rates for property taxes by 10% over 2024 levels, as well as increasing the county gas tax from 6 cents to 11 cents per gallon, and increasing taxes on electric, cable, and telephone.

With property values climbing, there is no need to raise taxes, but they do like them some tax and spend. Government officials always like to blame the services that are popular for tax increases, even though there is plenty of room to cut other, unneeded services. People don’t want to see the fire department cut, so they fund things like free needles for drug addicted transgender unwed mothers, then cry poor when there is no money left for the fire department.

Let’s take a look at the Seminole County Sheriff’s budget: There is plenty of waste here. The SWAT team has 20 members, and spends $4.5 million a year on it. That is a lot of money. Perhaps there is some room for cuts there. The sheriff’s office is paid $4.4 million per year to provide school resource officers to Seminole county schools, but actually providing those officers costs the Sheriff’s office $9.9 million per year. The cheaper way to go is to have the schools participate in the Guardian program, allowing teachers who volunteer to go through the training to be armed at school. Most counties in Florida who are part of the Guardian program accept the grant money, but then pay cops to fill the roles while not allowing teachers to participate. It’s a HUGE waste of money to have cops there when so many teachers would do it for free. Then they are spending all of that cash, only to find out that school resource officers aren’t required to do a damned thing if, God forbid, there actually IS a shooting at their school.

I pay over $6,000 a year in property taxes. 28 percent of that goes to the county, another 33 percent to the town, 31 percent to the school board, and the remainder to police, fire, EMS, hospital, and the water authority.

Overall, the loss of property tax revenue would mean that government agencies would need to get rid of some luxury items and perhaps learn to stop wasting money. If I could vote more than once to get rid of property taxes, I would.

By Divemedic, ago

Protecting and Serving the Shit Out of You

A woman called police. When they arrived, she claimed that a man kicked in her door, beat her, and fled into the woods on foot. She named him, said he was her boyfriend who had just broken up with her, and was upset over the breakup. The police got a warrant for his arrest for domestic violence.

The only problem? He was a married paraplegic and had been confined to a wheelchair for the past 25 years. Instead of actually conducting a further investigation, the cops arrested him and told him that if he could bring proof that he was actually paralyzed to his trial, he could then prove his innocence. They arrested him and accused him of faking his medical condition to get out of going to jail. Watch for yourself:

The cops inform him 13 minutes into the video that he needs to get a lawyer so he can establish his innocence. Since when has that ever been the law? The cop even admits “She says you kicked down her door, but it doesn’t look like you can kick down anything.” So why are you still arresting him, you fucking idiot? This officer also admits that he spent nine months investigating this. How good is he at investigating when he didn’t even know that the guy he swore a felony arrest warrant for has been confined to a wheelchair for nearly three decades? He even says it’s been in his driving record that he requires a wheelchair and has a handicapped permit.

To make matters worse, the woman had an arrest record for lying in previous cases. This cop, his sergeant, and his lieutenant are all incompetent.

This is one area where Trump and I disagree. Cops don’t need more immunity, they need less. Qualified immunity needs to go away, and cops should be forced to carry malpractice insurance like other professions. I have a one million dollar policy that only costs me $150 a year, but then again, I am not an incompetent idiot who doesn’t know how to think for myself. They can get a policy, too.

To those who would say “Well, there was an arrest warrant, they have to follow it,” that is bullshit. I get written orders from doctors all of the time that I refuse to follow because they are stupid. Just last night, I had a doctor order me to conduct a pregnancy test on an 84 year old woman, and a second doctor wanted me to give a medication to someone when it was right there in the chart that they are allergic to that medication. I can use my brain and refuse to carry out an order that doesn’t make sense. So can cops.

It’s why they make us go to school and have a license. They expect you to not be a complete dumbass.

This story and others like it is why I won’t cry any time a cop gets killed.

By Divemedic, ago

Useless

Check out these young adults in Minneapolis trying to bait cops into chasing them:

When questioned about it, the police chief had this to say:

“If a vehicle is simply stolen, there’s no force, violence or gun involved, police are not allowed to chase stolen cars. Period,” said O’Hara, “The police department’s policy does not allow for a vehicle pursuit simply because the car is stolen. The car would have to have been taken by force, some sort of violence, there would have to be a gun involved or some other serious crime. If an individual is trying to just bait the officer into a pursuit, it’s not going to get safer once this, once the cop starts chasing them… The cops did their job. They had zero discretion in that case,” he continued. “It is just not worth the risk of endangering everyone’s lives, especially if, at the end result, even if no one’s hurt, we arrest a couple juveniles, we bring them downtown, and they’re immediately released. It is completely senseless.”

In the meantime, local residents and business owners voice complaint after complaint that the police do nothing. If the cops aren’t going to even try to catch criminals, there is no reason to have cops. This is a case for an immediate 50% cut to the police budget, to correspond with a matching tax cut for the residents of the city.

In the meantime, remove the plates from your car and simply refuse to pull over for any and all traffic stops. They can’t chase you. Period.

By Divemedic, ago

It’s a street in a strange world

Maybe it’s the third world. Two border patrol agents have been caught taking thousands of dollars in bribes to allow people to enter the country through the nation’s busiest port of entry without showing documents. Both men were paid thousands for each vehicle they waved through.

While Almonte was in custody, investigators allegedly seized nearly $70,000 in cash they believe his romantic partner was trying to move to Tijuana. Prosecutors wrote in a court filing that Almonte is potentially facing additional charges for money laundering and obstruction of justice..There have been five US Customs and Border Protection officers assigned to the San Diego area to face similar corruption charges in the last two years.

Keep telling me how we need to defend Federal workforce jobs.

By Divemedic, ago

Liars

I read this story about a former firefighter in the Keys who has been accused of making bombs. The cops found him with what they called an unregistered short barreled rifle. I don’t trust cops to know a machine gun from a shoestring, so there is that. Maybe it was a pistol AR with a brace. Because they could see part of the rifle in his backseat, they arrested him for open carry. So much for the incidental exposure part of the law, eh?

They used the short barreled rifle as an example of a threat to the public to get a red flag order, which they they used to get a search warrant for his house. Inside, they found “dozens of firearms” and more than 10,000 rounds of ammunition. They also claim to have found bombmaking materials.

This sort of breathless fearmongering sets off my bullshit detector. We all know the ATF lies to make headlines. Read about this Navy guy who got 20 years for possessing unregistered NFA items when the ATF was able to replace the firing mechanism for some replica devices with the firing mechanism from real devices, which enabled them to fire them.

Now ask yourself if someone could take all of the items in your house and spin a tale of you being a danger to society. Do you have lamp timers? Pipe? Gunpowder? Fertilizer? Constructive possession, in the eyes of the ATF.

By Divemedic, ago

Cyberstalking Cops

From wirecutter, we see that a man saw cops doing donuts in a local parking lot and posted video to the Internet. The local police union has begun posting videos and pictures of the man, along with his identifying information. I was going to comment over there, but my thoughts became too wordy for a comment.

The cops get caught by a citizen doing something that they would ticket others for, and a citizen posts video of it. The cops get in trouble, and a social media war ensues. Here is the issue. You, as a public servant, are driving around in a highly visible vehicle that has a huge billboard painted on it. We had things like this happen to the fire department when I worked there. You know that you are being watched, you can expect to be in the spotlight, and you act accordingly.

At most, the officer involved would get a talking to about “don’t do that again.” That wasn’t what happened here. The police union decided to up the ante by posting in a public forum what amounts to public threats against the citizen who did the reporting. At best, the actions of the union are poor optics, discouraging citizens from reporting crimes for fear of retaliation. At worst, the posts of the man are thinly veiled attempts at intimidating a witness to police’s illegal acts, which makes this witness tampering, a serious crime in itself. Go with cyberstalking or even witness tampering

Cyberstalking is a crime in Texas. Texas law includes provisions that prohibit stalking and harassment through electronic communication. Including email, social media, instant messaging, and other forms of digital communication. Cyberstalking is defined as the use of electronic means to repeatedly harass, alarm, or annoy another person.

Under Texas law, cyberstalking cases can be charged as either a misdemeanor or a felony. Depending on the specific circumstances of the offense. The penalties for cyberstalking in Texas can include fines, imprisonment. As well as a restraining order to prohibit the offender from contacting the victim.

A reasonable person would consider the statements made by the police through their union to be a threat. Here are some of the posts that they made, each of them included videos, photos, and links to the guy who posted the video of the cops:

Never post anything on the internet you don’t want to see on the news… or the internet.

If you are going to ghost ride your car, like Hamon Brown, make sure the doors aren’t locked when you climb on top.

Remember Hamon Brown? The hater that went on the news to run his mouth about police cars in the snow (in a parking lot)? #DontBeAHater #ComingDine #GotEeem

Tag local auto glass repair companies. We’re looking for someone who can help Hamon Brown get his broken windshield repaired. He didn’t get any Crime Stoppers money for s̷n̷i̷t̷c̷h̷i̷n̷g̷ tattling, so we need a good sponsor that can hook him up.

The police union also posted screen shots of the man’s criminal record.

Comments made by police officers to those posts include statements like:

  • I bet there is no weed smell coming from Hamon Brown’s vehicle
  • Throw stones at cops, expect cops to look at your glass house

In my book, that makes the police union (in this instance) a criminal conspiracy. To threaten a member of the public who reported criminal behavior, simply because it was a member of your organization, is no better than the mafia or the South American drug gangs. I hope this man gets a lawyer, and I hope he sues the police union, who by the way do NOT have qualified immunity. The loss in this lawsuit WILL come out of the police officer’s pockets.

By Divemedic, ago

Karma is Beautiful, But Sometimes Slow

In 2009, I posted about an Oklahoma cop who pulled over an ambulance that had a cardiac patient in the back because the cop believed that the driver of the ambulance had flipped him the bird. The paramedic in charge of the crew told the trooper that they had a patient in the back, asked the trooper to follow them to the hospital and told him they could handle the situation there. It was at this point that the trooper let his oversized ego take over, and instead of doing the sensible thing that would have best served the public that both the cop and paramedic are sworn to serve, decided to arrest and choke out the paramedic.

The reason why the cops were so hell bent on arresting this medic? The trooper was on the way to a call because another cop had been in an accident that was his fault. The trooper was rushing to the scene so he could do a blood draw on the driver that had been hit, hoping that it could be proven that the driver was drunk and thereby make it his fault, and not the cop’s. It seems that the police have some real corruption issues here.

In reviewing the case, the local prosecutor agreed that the cop was in the wrong and had likely committed an unlawful assault against the paramedic, but also stated that pursuing charges would not be in the best interest of the law and decided to give the cop a free pass. All he wound up receiving for punishment was a five day suspension.

I bring this case up because I really missed the ball on the conclusion of this case. Here is how the rest of the story went down.

The paramedic filed a lawsuit in the case, and the cops (as always) hid behind qualified immunity and wanted the case dismissed. While all of this was going on, the paramedic was arrested again by a small town Oklahoma cop as the medic was on the way to the courthouse to testify against another cop in an unrelated case.

The court refused to dismiss the medic’s lawsuit, setting the case for trial, and the cop appealed that ruling. The appeals court sided with the paramedic and the case moved forward. The paramedic wound up getting half a million dollars.

The trooper wound up being investigated again, this time for sexual allegations involving photos with accusations that the photos were of minors.

This is where karma finally decided to show up. The trooper had a heart attack in 2018 and needed an ambulance to take him to the hospital. He was sent to a rehab facility for treatment, where he had a second heart attack, got a second ambulance ride, and finally died. I am not above celebrating the death of someone who deserves it, and it seems that his death was the only way that he was ever going to pay for being a dictatorial asshole, so I am going to gloat over this one. The only way this could have turned out better is for the paramedic who he roughed up to be the one who took him to the hospital.

I will treat people to the best of my ability, no matter how badly they have treated me, because I swore an oath to do so, and my word is my bond. However, I never swore that I wouldn’t be happy that someone got what was coming to them. Karma, after all, is a bitch.

By Divemedic, ago

Pardons Don’t Mean Shit

President Donald Trump ordered that the defendants from January 6 be pardoned. As the chief executive, the power to issue pardons is absolute. That doesn’t mean shit to the leftist enforcers. Although Olivia Pollock and Joseph Hutchinson III have been pardoned for their actions on January 6, the Feds still would not drop the counts of failure to appear in court from 2023. Why didn’t they appear in court?

After reading stories about the abuse suffered at the hands of police that are detaining J6 defendants for trial, knowing how cops will abuse and torture prisoners, and how they are transferring them to Supermax prisons, many J6 defendants began simply skipping out on their trials and sentencing hearings:

So Pollock and Hutchinson did what many would have done- they simply removed their ankle monitors and skipped town. Because of that, the Feds decided that Trump’s pardon didn’t excuse them from criminal charges.

The good news is that a Federal judge ordered that the charges be dismissed. The Federal employees are refusing to obey orders. This is being replayed all over the government- there are employees and former military members who still are loyal to the commies that are trying to overthrow our government. They need to be rooted out- every last one of them.

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By Divemedic, ago