On Sept. 4, Pinellas County Commissioners repeatedly cited property taxes in their 5-2 preliminary vote to strip funding from Creative Pinellas, the county’s designated arts agency.
The vote left artists and arts leaders stunned—and this week, Creative Pinellas laid off four staffers.
One of the biggest mysteries surrounding this month’s vote was why the commissioners spoke of property taxes when the overwhelming majority of people in the room came to talk about art. The reason for this disconnect remains unclear, but a letter from The Florida Department of Government Efficiency suggests one possible explanation.
On July 28 Florida DOGE sent Pinellas County Commission Chairman Scott a letter, that cited increased annual property tax collections as reason for performing an audit of Pinellas County’s spending on Aug. 7-8.
Gov. Ron DeSantis and the legislature have been obsessed with property taxes in the runup to next year’s session.
Although the Florida DOGE letter doesn’t specifically ask about arts and culture programs, it does request a list of all procurements and contracts in excess of $10,000, which would place Creative Pinellas under scrutiny.
As previously reported, Creative Pinellas uses about $1.05 million to support and promote the arts in the county. Pinellas’ tourism bed tax—collected when visitors book hotel rooms—provides $861,000.
Last week after a Sept. 11 meeting between the Tourist Development Council (TDC) and Pinellas County Commission, Commissioner Scott told Creative Loafing Tampa Bay that the county is still waiting on the results of its Florida DOGE audit.
Scott shut down discussions of the local arts agency at the meeting’s beginning, saying: “There’s two things at the very end here, during closing comments, that I want to update everybody on. One is our call this morning with the U.S. Army Corp, and the other is Creative Pinellas, which you all have been inundated with email about. It’s not on today’s agenda, and we’re not going to talk about that. I’ve got just a quick wrap-up statement on that.”
In his wrapup statement, Scott reiterated why he pushed to defund Creative Pinellas, citing property taxes as one of the reasons.
“The use of funds by Creative Pinellas has been misaligned with allowable uses of TDT dollars and the priorities for the majority of this county commission,” Scott claimed. “The programs are often a duplication of Visit St. Pete Clearwater’s efforts, and the inability to provide results-oriented metrics that equate to heads in beds. And then finally, the need to provide our residents with some tax relief…”
Scott claimed to CL that 53% of Tourist Development Tax dollars went to payroll, 9% on grants to artists, and around $200,000 on programs like summer camp that are not directly designed for tourists.
But financial records from Creative Pinellas CEO Margaret Murray tell a different story.
In 2025, the organization received funding from multiple sources beyond the Bed Tax, County General Fund and Transportation Fund including:
• $196,500 from grants
• $120,000 from public art
• $85,000 in contributions and donations
• $60,000 from art sales
• $30,000 from Foundation for a Healthy St. Pete
• $32,000 from the Florida License Plate Fund
• $14,000 from rentals and services
Creative Pinellas also drew $210,000 from reserves.
Because it serves both Pinellas County residents and its visitors, salaries are allocated by percentage, Murray noted. Tourist Development Tax dollars only cover staff work on tourism-facing initiatives. Programs geared toward Pinellas County residents—such as summer camp—are funded through the county’s general fund or other revenue streams. While the county allocated general fund dollars in 2025, no such funding is budgeted for 2026.
In an statement to CL, Murray said that after taking over in 2024, she went to work refocusing and reshaping Creative Pinellas’ usage of TDT funds to fit within allowed use. Last February, she even worked with Visit St. Pete-Clearwater, and the tourism agency’s President & CEO Brian Lowack, to help with FY26 budget planning.
“Lowack and I both had many conversations about how arts funding should benefit tourists, and as a result, I put our Arts Coast Magazine on hiatus as we worked to develop a magazine specifically curated towards cultural tourism,” Murray added. The Making Waves grant program was also created. “When I presented both of these programs (Making Waves and VACAY) to VSPC, Brian Lowack said that this is exactly what VSPC wanted to see from us. In June, I presented Making Waves to the TDC and everyone seemed very excited about launching it.”
Murray said that the TDC also never gave Creative Pinellas a directive to prove “heads in beds.”
“It isn’t a requirement per our agreement. But I closely followed their Visitor Profile reports and saw that Pinewood Park and/or the Florida Botanical Gardens (which we’re a part of ) often ranked in the top 12 visitor attractions,” she said.
Did Pinellas County residents ask for decreased property taxes? One person at the Sept. 4 vote did talk about millage rates.
What is clear is that more than 50 people urged the county to continue funding Creative Pinellas at the Sept. 4 budget hearing. Hundreds more wrote to Pinellas County Commissioners asking that Creative Pinellas remain the county’s designated arts agency. Those requests—along with the loud cheers and boos coming from the overflow room that night—did not sway the vote to defund.
Pinellas County Commissioners, it appears, have no intention of reintroducing Creative Pinellas back into the FY 26 budget. In addition to layoffs, Creative Pinellas has also canceled September and October programming. The organization will also skip today’s budget meeting.
“The county has moved on, and we are marching forward as well and ask that you do the same,” a Sept. 17 social media post said “We are so grateful for the incredible show of support and advocacy we’ve already experienced over the past few weeks. But now, let’s use our time and our collective power wisely and productively to look ahead and help us build something new.”
New documents do suggest that Visit St. Pete-Clearwater might work with Creative Pinellas on new competitive arts tourism grants.
Over the past few weeks, Murray has repeatedly stated her interest in continuing to work with Visit St. Pete-Clearwater, and there may be something new brewing on that front.
In a Sept. 12 email from Brian Lowack to Pinellas County Commissioners and Tourist Development Council members, Visit St. Pete-Clearwater’s President & CEO proposed working in coordination with the St. Pete Arts Alliance, Clearwater Arts Alliance and Creative Pinellas to create a new competitive arts tourism grant program.
“Working directly with the county’s three local arts agencies will provide unique and qualified expertise to ensure the program capitalizes on the county’s rich arts and cultural offerings, while creating a transparent program that produces measurable results and return on investment,” Lowack wrote.
According to the email, Visit St. Pete-Clearwater will engage the three arts alliances and begin program development once they have approval from the Board of County Commissioners.
A separate email from Lowack to Chairman Scott, sent on Sept. 3 ahead of the 5-2 defund vote, says that VSPC supports the arts through advertising, marketing and PR campaigns both in the U.S. and abroad. The letter adds that VSPC is investing $2.68 million into events that it claims will attract 1.65 million attendees.
With the future of Creative Pinellas’ Gallery still uncertain, Pinellas Commissioner Kathleen Peters’ comment at the Sept. 4 budget hearing lingers: “They definitely can’t say we’re taking away arts.”
That’s true—no one can (accurately) say that Pinellas County is taking away the arts.
But here’s what they can say.
They can say that hundreds of people asked Pinellas County Commissioners to continue funding Creative Pinellas, and they declined to do so.
They can say that Pinellas County used to have a designated art agency, but now they don’t.
They can say that Creative Pinellas worked hard to make Pinellas County a beautiful place to live, and the county rewarded them by taking away their funding.
They can say that Creative Pinellas presented Visit St. Pete Clearwater with two different arts granting programs, one of which was already underway, when the county chose to pull their funding.
They can say that four people at Creative Pinellas lost their job this week because of the county’s decision to defund Creative Pinellas.
And they can wonder if it’s all because of a letter FL-DOGE sent to Chairman Scott referencing property taxes.
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This article appears in Sept. 18-24, 2025.