Where Southern Riders Share Their Adventures!
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swampy
Moderator
Registered: 02/16/06
Posts: 4,142
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Reply with quote | #1 |
At the July 29, 2009 meeting of the Florida OHV Advisory Committee we received an accounting of the revenue, expenses and withdrawals for the OHV Trust Fund (within the Florida Division of Forestry) from its inception in Fiscal Year 2002-2003 until the end of Fiscal Year 2008-2009 (which ended June 30). The revenue deposited into the trust fund comes from titles issued for new and used off-highway motorcycles and ATVs. The title fee and trust fund were established by the T. Mark Schmidt Off-Highway Vehicle Safety and Recreation Act of 2002. The legislation was supported by the Florida Trail Riders and the Florida Motorcycle Dealers Association. In simple terms, OHV enthusiasts and dealers agreed to a tax (a title fee) if the money was put into a trust fund that was to be used to promote OHV safety and recreation in the state of Florida. From 2002 through 2007 the funds in the trust fund were used for that purpose.
However, in 2008 the Florida Legislature robbed (the politically-correct term is “swept”) $2 million dollars from the trust fund, and in 2009 compounded that robbery by stealing another $2.37 million dollars from the fund. In two years they stole $4.37 million of the $7.65 million deposited to the fund. They stole over 50% of our money. There is nothing left in the fund for OHV recreation.
You need to immediately contact your Florida senator and Florida representative to:
Inform them of your displeasure:
• With this breach of trust with the public. The legislation that created the tax and the trust fund was very specific that the money was to be used for OHV recreation. The exact language of the act can be found on the FTR website.
• Ask for copies of the legislative acts (probably an appropriations or budget bill) that authorized this off-highway robbery. If they claim it was not authorized by the legislature, then demand to know how the funds disappeared from the trust fund.
• Ask them to confirm if they voted in favor of this robbery.
• Demand that they restore this money to the trust fund.
If all FTR members do not apply pressure to the politicians this OHV money will be lost forever.
How do you identify and contact your legislators? Look on your voter identification card (you are registered to vote, aren’t you?). It lists your Florida Senate district number and your Florida House of Representatives district number.
If you know your senate district number, go to
http://www.flsenate.gov/Legislator/index.cfm?Mode=District%20Information&Subme
nu=2&Tab=legislators&CFID=123176567&CFTOKEN=67512265 and click on the appropriate number.
If you do not know the district number you can find it by entering your zip code number in the Find Your Legislators block in the left column of the webpage. If you know your house of representative district number, go to http://www.myfloridahouse.gov/Sections/ Representatives/representatives.aspx to get the contact information. If you do not know the district number you can go to http://www.myfloridahouse. gov/ and enter your zip code in the Find Your Representative block in the left column of the webpage.
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