Key West The Newspaper

It appears that the Florida Keys Mosquito Control Board is in the process of regaining it’s sanity

In its most recent meeting they ditched the Big Coppit Skeeter Taj Mahal.  The vote was 3-2.  Only two very old line commissioners voted for the Taj Mahal.  Commissioners Shaw and Smith.  Shaw is not seeking reelection.  Smith is!  Remember that he wanted to raise your skeeter taxes by 45%,  that’s what it would have cost to build the Taj Mahal that he and Shaw wanted.  Commissioner Craney-Gage had an epiphany moment and changed her vote…effectively killing the massive waste of money.

The new plan will replace the expensive and unneeded structure and will replace it with a utilitarian portable unit. Its not a perfect solution, the admin staff should be moved to Marathon, but sometimes compromise is necessary to move forward.

Ditching the Taj Mahal will save millions.  It will dramatically decrease the taxes that were necessary to pay for the House and Gardens Taj.  Before the the death of the Taj, your taxes would have increased by 45%.  Now the new taxes will increase by about 22%.  Fully half of that increase is because of the extraordinary expense of chemical and man power necessitated by the Zika threat.