Sarasota County School Board Sues Tax Collector For $2M: Reports

SARASOTA COUNTY, FL — The Sarasota County School Board is suing county Tax Collector Mike Moran, alleging that his office kept more than $2 million in taxpayer funds that were meant to support local students, according to multiple reports.

The school board, along with two county taxpayers, filed the lawsuit Friday in the Circuit Court of the 12th Judicial Circuit in Sarasota County, the Bradenton Herald said.

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The lawsuit centers on the board’s claims that the tax collector’s office kept more than $2 million in millage funding that voters believed was designated for schools, the Sarasota Herald-Tribune said.

"The gross and unilateral divestment and misappropriation of funds by the Tax Collector has real and detrimental effects on the ability of the School Board to adequately provide for its students and to employ resident staff and educators," the School Board said in the lawsuit.

The funds were taken by the office as a “commission” for collecting the ad valorem taxes, which Moran said in a letter to the board that his office was authorized to keep, reports said.

For more than two decades, this voter-approved tax has been used to cover pay for teachers and support staff, as well as equipment.

The board alleges in its lawsuit that voters never approved the office’s recent diversion of this “commission” away from schools.

“That’s not an insignificant amount when the taxpayers thought it was all going to the schools,” Superintendent Terry Connor told Suncoast Searchlight, adding that $2 million already diverted could pay the salaries and benefits of about 20 teachers.

Moran, who has been in office since January 2025, challenged the district in July, when he sent a letter to district leaders arguing that the county isn’t allowed to pay the collection fees on behalf of the district under state law, reports said.

Moran told the Herald-Tribune in an email that his office suggested "that the School Board wait until the Florida Attorney General issued its opinion on the matter which would save the taxpayers money, but apparently, they would rather spend money on attorneys than the children."