FLCapitalTea

12/03/2025

✨Tallahassee ALERT launches campaign to advocate for all our neighbors in our community

✨They aren’t opposed to FSU health but they want to ensure care for all our neighbors in the years to come.

✨They are asking for

-Protection of the FAMU programs and clinical opportunities
-Safeguards for indignant and underserved neighbors
-Ensure independent valuation and genuine community and FAMU representation in governance of the hospital
-Follow basic standards of ethical, transparent, and responsible decision making

✨All these concerns we have heard echoed across the community.

🫶Keep the conversation going. We are better and healthier together

12/02/2025

📑Report to Bondholders, April 18, 2024

“The Series 2024 Bonds were issued to finance the initial construction of a new police station, various road improvements, and improvements to City-owned facilities.” Page 20 (document in comments)

📑 Principal: $65,110,000 Interest: $67,519,250 Total: $132,629,250

📑 An agenda item (8.12) for the city commission meeting was approved with a principal not to exceed $100,000,000.

📑 This bond is supposed to cover the police station and the Southside Transit Center among other projects… but we’ve already taken out a bond with over a 100% interest added for the police station. And in a WTXL news article from March 2024 states the Transit Center dollars were secured (see comments for article)

📑The transit center received money from Blueprint as well as other funding sources… so why do we need a Bond for it?

🫶Keep the conversation going. We are better together

12/02/2025

🍎This week the school board is traveling to a convention despite a travel freeze that was placed on the district back in August.

🍎They voted on this travel at their last meeting but emails sent to us by a neighbor reveal that they planned and paid for this convention only a month after the travel freeze.

🫶Keep the conversation going, we are better together

12/01/2025

✨We wrote out the process so far for the IDEA funding public records request through Leon County Schools

See comments for full website post on our experience obtaining one aspect of the district’s finances

✨A few weeks ago we decided to pursue voluntary mediation, we have heard back from deputy assistant superintendent Dr. Michelle Gayle.

✨She explained that the funds are deposited into the general account and while coded, they are not directly distributed to any schools.

✨We explained that while federal and state laws allow the funds to be combined in general, there is clear guidance that the funds are traceable, auditable, and compliant with federal restrictions and cost principles.

✨Dr. Gayle’s response that “there are no records identifying specific school receiving a specific amount” is problematic; while they dont recieve direct transfers, they must maintain documentation of how the funds are allocated by site and student. To say "no such records exist" conflicts with federal requirements for student-specific service documentation, maintenance of effort, and time/effort reporting for federally funded personnel.

✨Federal source: 34 C.F.R. §300.202-300.206 on IDEA funding

🫶Stay engaged, remain involved, and keep the conversation going.

https://floridacapitaltea.com/idea-funding-a-serious-matter-met-with-unserious-answers/

In July, we requested the IDEA funding information from Leon County Schools, almost 4 months later and we still haven't received answers

12/01/2025

🎁 Save the date, the only city commission meeting of the season will be held on December 10, 2025

🎁The city has suggested that the item for Tallahassee Memorial Hospital sale will be coming back at this meeting.

🎁We haven’t heard anyone speak against a partnership with FSU. However, there is concern around a sale.

🎁FSU and TMH already have a partnership, so many neighbors are wondering why they must purchase the hospital to continue that partnership.

🎁There is also suggestion from neighbors that FAMU and TSC are provided voices at the decision table. Currently there has been discussion but currently the MOU with the city reflects none for FAMU or TSC.

🎁When laying a foundation for a house, you calculate the costs prior to beginning the build. The same is applied to major decisions such as this.

-What will the community voice once the hospital is sold?
-How will this affect public trust in our local government if it is sold quickly, more slowly?
-What is the best and most accurate cost of the hospital (obtaining an official appraisal)?
-How will indignant care be considered and continued after current leadership is gone?
-Who will current employees benefits be under?
-How do physicians feel about a sale?

🫶We are better and louder together, keep the conversation going. Curiosity in this sale results in more knowledge and a better informed decision.

11/30/2025

POST 2

🪙 We started a post series researching the reasons neighbors have stated they are for or against consolidation of our two governments.

🪙 The most common two reasons we saw or heard in favor of a government merger was reducing duplicative services and thereby reducing costs.

🪙Hardy states in a journal titled “The Pros and Cons of Consolidated Government” (see comment “Hardy, 2019” for source) that there are multiple studies showing mixed results for a reduction in costs. He continues in stating that “efficiency can only be realized in certain cases…what this probably means is that in order for efficiencies to occur, the ‘system’ must be actively and very well managed.” Later in the same article, Hardy asserts that while consolidation is an option for reducing or eliminating duplication of services he also proposed that the best method for this can be through other methods like interlocal agreements.

🪙The Citizens Research Council of Michigan (Michigan, 2020 in comments), highlighted an interesting pattern. They remark how consolidation in 1982 and 2000 were successful however the recent governmntal mergers have not been successful. They concluded that consolidation of services was more desirable over consolidation of governments for this reason.

🪙Other noteworthy information we discovered was a journal from Laura L. Payne, PhD (Payne, n.d). She used Jacksonville, Florida and Louisville, Kentucky as examples of mergers with no measurable increase in efficiency (maximizing the output of public services) but did improve financial status (budget).

🪙 However, a final study we will mention today (Hall, 2017), concluded that the economic success varies depending on the time examined and how economic progress is measured. They state that economic development is not guaranteed.

🪙These posts are very brief summaries of extensive writing and research. The information we mentioned here was observed across multiple articles, studies, and analyses which is why we included it here. We encourage all our neighbors to research more if they are led, and share what they find in the comments below.

✨We are better and more knowledgeable together. Keep the conversation going. Next post on consolidation: expanded services and less representation

11/30/2025

✨Keep the conversation going. We are better together and our actions have far reaching impacts 🫶

https://www.tallahassee.com/story/opinion/2025/11/30/fsu-pressuring-tmh-to-sell-isnt-the-neighborly-thing-to-do-opinion/87473217007/?utm_campaign=trueanthem&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook&fbclid=IwZnRzaAOZJi1leHRuA2FlbQIxMQBzcnRjBmFwcF9pZAo2NjI4NTY4Mzc5AAEeoIHUipkRSe6sW6whfDObQTAYn4fROLtmuJOQn3s-GVJs9b9ty2IFTKqK0hA_aem_i1KlbIctRaU8W4R7k7VUCQ

To FSU it may just be a business deal, but it is so much more to our community. It is our health and livelihood.

11/29/2025

✨With all the discussion about government consolidation, we want to know more about the reasons neighbors are proposing for or against consolidation.

✨The reasons we have seen listed in favor are a reduction in costs, less duplicative services, expanded services, fewer officials, and improved harmony.

✨The concerns around consolidation are feelings of less representation, less “peer accountability,” and a threat to home-rule.

✨While all these reasons for or against are educated reasons we haven’t seen the reasons backed by studies. While this is acceptable in the initial phases, we would like to take the conversation deeper and look into studies and articles written on consolidation for a better understanding of the facts.

✨This will be a multi-part series exploring the reasons and reading the journals, articles, or studies.

✨We plan to publish all the information into a longer website post once it has all been compiled.

🫶We are better and more knowledgeable together, keep the conversation going.

11/26/2025

✨This is a compensation study that was reviewed at the 11/17/25 Leon County Schools meeting.

✨It does not include our educators but the results are in: Most employees love working with our public schools but they are not being paid competitively.

✨This study supports their feelings that many of them don’t have movement out of the lower 25% of the pay ranges-despite employment of 54 years with the district.

✨While the pay range starting for exempt (executives) is lower than comparable places, most executives are being paid much closer to comparables (comparables included public sector organizations not limited to public schools).

✨ This skews the data to show that “starting executives are making less than comparable” however upon looking at more data, few are actually starting out at the minimum.

✨We assume this is not intentional but is a result of human error in not adjusting the pay ranges appropriately.

🫶Keep the conversation going. We are better together

11/24/2025

✨The City commission is moving fast on the sale of Tallahassee Memorial and Capital City golf course.

✨Peep the comments for a longer post on the appraisals of Capital City golf course.

✨All our neighbors can agree that a partnership with FSU is beneficial, productive, and in the best interest of the community.

✨We’ve heard more neighbors asking why it has to be sold to have that partnership?

🫶We are better together, keep the conversation going

11/24/2025

✨During conversations around this graphic last week a neighbor, a neighbor mentioned the average pay in Tallahassee. Here are the numbers they provided:

Average annual salary: ~$62,616
Average hourly wage: ~$30
25th percentile: ~$45,478 annually ($22 per hour)
75th percentile: ~$79,755 annually ($38 per hour)

Source: Zip Recruiter

✨We also saw where the majority of neighbor pay range between 25th and 75th percentile.

✨The US Bureau of Labor Statistics (May 2024) shows that the average US neighbor receives about $32.66 an hour while the average Tallahassee neighbor only receives about $27.99 an hour.

✨For Tallahassee only 8.3% of the population is in management and the average income for management here is $51.91 an hour (US management is $68.15)

👀When we requested the recent salaries, the city originally sent us all their hourly rates. Here’s how they compare the the hourly national and local rates:

-Reese Goad hourly $146.46
-Karen Jumonville $132.35
-Christian Doolin $120.32
-Wayne Tedder $122.93
-Abena Ojetayo $120.32
-Thomas Whitley $100.00
-Rob McGarrah $119.02

🫶Keep the conversation going. We are better together

11/23/2025

🔥ISO ratings are assigned to fire departments by the insurance services office (ISO). This assesses the departments ability protect the community.

🔥The majority of this assessment is the department. This includes size, staffing levels, training, response times, and proximity of fire stations

🔥Then the next largest assessment is water supply, then emergency communications and community risk reduction.

🔥If you recall our fire fighters were in negotiations during the last fire assessment rate and were asking for more pay which would increase staffing

🔥One of the last ISO scores was low due to staffing (https://www.wctv.tv/2024/09/03/tallahassee-fire-department-rating-could-correlate-insurance-costs-community/).

🔥The city didn’t count the cost of personnel expansion or competitive pay, they aren’t paying competitively enough to fill the new stations and so they delayed building which has increased the cost.

🔥Station 17 was projected to be completed in 2023. This was years before the city declared they no longer wanted to honored the interlocal agreement. They still plan to build it even if the interlocal relationship isn’t repaired.

🔥This is because that area will service incorporated neighbors living there most and it has been known to need a station for at least a decade.

🔥The impact of the City’s actions is unfairly affecting everyone.

🫶We are better together, keep the conversation going