On Thursday night the City of Cape Coral City Council approved a 2026 budget of $1.437 Billion. That’s up from a 2025 budget of $1.058 Billion.
The increased revenue will not come from a higher millage rate on residents (the council approved the rollback rate). It will come from other revenue generating lines in the budget such as the Fire Service Assessment and Public Safety. So yes, you’ll be paying more but just not through your millage rate assessment.
Before the budget was approved, the Council adopted a 2026 millage rate of 5.1471 per $1,000 of assessed property valuation. That’s the rollback rate, meaning taxpayers will pay exactly what they paid in 2025 on their ad valorem line.
The tentative millage rate was set at 5.2188, however, Councilman Keith Long made a motion to adopt the lower rate which was approved 7-1. Councilman Derrick Donnell voted against the rollback rate. He wanted to see the millage rate increase by a point.
The dollar amount difference between the tentative millage rate (5.2188) and rollback rate (5.1471) was approximately $2.2 million. The City Manager will now go back to the budget and find a way to cut that amount out of the approved $1.4 billion approved budget.