County Budget and Millage — Indian River County, Florida

The Indian River County budget proposed for fiscal year 2025-26 totaled $598,860,844, according to the latest audited annual report from the Clerk of the Circuit Court and Comptroller at 1801 27th Street, Vero Beach.

That figure comes from the management discussion in the county's Annual Comprehensive Financial Report for the year ended September 30, 2025. The Comptroller Division describes the fiscal 2025-26 proposal as a decrease of $72,067,399, or 10.7%, from the fiscal 2025 budget, but an increase of $74,140,969, or 14.1%, over the beginning fiscal 2025 budget of $524,719,875. The two comparisons differ because the fiscal 2025 budget grew during the year: adding the decrease back gives $598,860,844 + $72,067,399 = $670,928,243 as the fiscal 2025 budget used for the first comparison.

Reserves grew in the same year. The fund analysis reports a combined governmental fund balance of $390.6, up $30.8 from $359.8, with the report stating that all amounts are expressed in millions of dollars. The General Fund alone rose $9.1 million, which the Comptroller Division attributes to a 10.1% increase in the county tax roll. The two largest restricted amounts are the Optional Sales Tax Fund at $113.7 million, a principal funding source for the five-year Capital Improvement Program, and the Impact Fees Fund at $40.8 million.

This page reports the latest audited year and the fiscal 2025-26 proposal described in it, not the fiscal 2026-27 budget, which the Board of County Commissioners takes up at its September hearings.

In fiscal 2025 the Board of County Commissioners levied 4.6981 mills of direct county tax, a 3.5475-mill general fund rate plus a 1.1506-mill municipal service rate, and 2.3531 mills for the Emergency Services District.

The Property Tax Rates schedule labels each line, and the 2020 to 2025 columns show the direct county rate at 4.6981 in all six years from 2020 to 2025 while taxable value climbed. Each line pays for something different. The general fund carries countywide operations and most of the money for the constitutional officers. The municipal service rate is the second county direct levy and has its own line on the Tax Collector's list of taxing authorities. Florida Statutes 200.071 caps ordinary county millage at 10 mills except for voted levies and lets a county levy up to 10 more mills inside a municipal service taxing unit, a kind of unit that Florida Statutes 125.01 allows for any part or all of the unincorporated area.

The Emergency Services District levy feeds the Emergency Services District Fund, which also collects ambulance charges, and new fire stations are funded partly by Emergency Services District revenues, as the capital section below shows. According to note 1 of the ACFR, the district was created pursuant to County Ordinance 90-25, the Board of County Commissioners is its governing body, and the Board also sets the millage rate for the EMS. The land acquisition bond line reappeared in 2025 at 0.0639 mills after four years at zero, and the fiscal 2025-26 proposal lowered the Land Acquisition Bond 2024 rate by 0.0029 to 0.0610 while leaving the other county taxing funds unchanged.

City rates sit beside the county levy. In fiscal 2025 Schedule 7 lists Fellsmere at 5.0000 mills, Sebastian at 3.1955, Vero Beach at 2.7680, Indian River Shores at 1.3349 and Orchid at 0.7000. The School District of Indian River County and the other special districts are left out of the county's financial statements because, as the transmittal letter puts it, those entities are independent from the County.

The Board of County Commissioners adopts the county budget and millage each September at public hearings held under Florida Statutes 200.065, after the County Administrator presents a tentative budget by July 15.

The calendar starts with the elected officers. The transmittal letter says the Clerk, the Sheriff and the Supervisor of Elections submit proposed operating budgets to the Board prior to May 1, the Property Appraiser submits a budget to the Florida Department of Revenue prior to June 1st, and the Tax Collector follows prior to August 1st. Under note 2 of the ACFR, the Department of Revenue has the final authority on the Tax Collector and Property Appraiser budgets, while the Office of Management and Budget compiles the proposed budgets of the constitutional officers, Board departments and outside agencies. On or before July 15, the County Administrator and the budget director deliver a tentative budget, and the Board reviews it fund by fund in workshops.

State law then sets the clock. Under Florida Statutes 200.065, each taxing authority tells the property appraiser its proposed millage rate, its rolled-back rate and the date, time and place of its hearing within 35 days of certification of value. The hearing on the tentative budget must fall within 80 days of certification, but not earlier than 65 days after certification. A newspaper advertisement follows within 15 days, and the final hearing takes place 2 to 5 days after it is first published. At the end of the last hearing the Board adopts the budgets by resolution at the fund level.

For questions about the county rates themselves, the Indian River County Tax Collector lists one number, (772) 226-1214, for the Board of County Commissioners and for each of its millage lines: General Fund, Municipal Service, Land Acquisition Bond and Emergency Services District-EMS.

The Clerk of the Circuit Court and Comptroller keeps the county books and prepares the annual report, and an outside firm, James Moore and Co., PL, audited the year ended September 30, 2025.

The Clerk of the Circuit Court and Comptroller describes the comptroller role this way: the Clerk acts as the County Treasurer, Auditor, and Finance Officer, providing a check and balance on the County's budget, revenue, and expenditures. The same office serves as Clerk to the Board of County Commissioners and custodian of its records. The financial report itself was prepared by the Clerk's Comptroller Division, which takes questions at 1801 27th Street, Vero Beach.

An annual audit is required by law. The transmittal letter cites Section 218.39, Florida Statutes, and reports that James Moore and Co. issued an unmodified opinion on the county statements for fiscal 2025. The table of contents shows separate auditors' reports for the Board of County Commissioners and the Clerk, and its next page adds the Property Appraiser, the Sheriff, the Supervisor of Elections and the Tax Collector.

Collection results are part of the audited record. The levies and collections schedule shows a fiscal 2025 county levy of $181,187,502 and current collections of $174,416,303, or 96.26%, with another $52,102 in delinquent collections. The same schedule restates the payment rules the Tax Collector applies countywide: discounts of 4% in November, 3% in December, 2% in January and 1% in February, delinquency on April 1, and tax certificates sold on or prior to June 1.

For fiscal 2025-26 the county kept its proposed millage rates flat apart from the land bond, while raising most Solid Waste Disposal District rates 15% and Indian River County Utilities rates 12%.

The Sheriff's Office budget increase is the one the report puts in dollars: $6,861,517, or 8.6% over fiscal 2025 funding. Waste charges rose for everyone billed by the Solid Waste Disposal District, with the residential waste generation unit going from $108.75 to $125.06, and unincorporated households took on a new universal collection assessment of $181.70 per household after the county started Universal Garbage Collection. Utility rates were scheduled to rise 12% on October 1, 2025 under a rate study the Board adopted on August 28, 2024.

The capital program carries three fire rescue stations, 7, 15 and 16, at $21.3 million, paid for with impact fees, Emergency Services District revenues and the Local Option Sales Tax, with Stations 15 and 16 meant for the north county area after rapid growth. The list of completed projects includes the North Sebastian Water and Sewer Project Phase 2, finished for $6.5 million and connecting about 200 homes near the St. Sebastian River and the Indian River Lagoon, and the $39.4 million widening of 66th Avenue from 49th Street to 69th Street.

Taxable value kept rising over the same years. It went from $26.6 billion in 2024 to $29.3 billion in 2025, per the transmittal letter, and Schedule 6, built on Indian River County Property Appraiser values, puts the fiscal 2025 total at $29,285,468,693, up from $13,402,059,461 in fiscal 2016.

Last verified: October 12, 2026, on the Indian River County Clerk of the Circuit Court and Comptroller website, from its fiscal 2025 annual report.