These South Florida projects are in the state budget, but what will DeSantis veto?
When Florida lawmakers officially received the copy of the state budget Wednesday afternoon, it outlined vast swaths of $91.1 billion the state is expected to spend, from education and healthcare to the environment and dozens of other agencies.
But the budget, as it is every year, is also studded with scores of local requests from lawmakers for projects back home. Among them are the sewers, roads, senior centers and museums that gird local governments’ wish lists regularly. They reach into hundreds of millions of dollars that now await not just lawmakers’ votes to pass the bill but also what will be the first run of Gov. Ron DeSantis’ veto pen.
On the line in South Florida are scores of projects, like more than $8 million for the SEED School of Miami, which does not charge for its low-income students to attend, to $850,000 set aside for a new senior center building in Miami Springs.
Much of it is infrastructure and construction: The Underline, the 10-mile outdoor linear park that is planned to extend from downtown Miami to Dadeland under the tracks of the Metrorail, got $1.5 million in this year’s budget though it had requested $7.5 million. New ADA-accessible walkways, greenways and facilities for a business park in Miami Lakes, home to House Speaker José Oliva, got $853,000.
There are also millions of dollars in water and drainage projects, from $1.5 million for stormwater and tidal flooding projects in Miami to $30,000 to protect against canal erosion in Miami Gardens and $300,000 for a well in Homestead to offset water needs.
Local social services make an appearance in the appropriations, including $250,000 for a senior meals program in Hialeah, and more than $400,000 for a Sweetwater senior center. Despite some initial budget negotiations that threatened to cut its funding, the Little Havana Activities and Nutrition Centers of Dade County got $334,770.
Even promotional efforts for the Miami International Agriculture, Horse and Cattle Show get $98,850 in this year’s budget, though requests to help fund those efforts have been vetoed by the governor twice for the past two years.
These projects are also only some of the several hundred projects that lawmakers proposed, many of which never made it into the budget at all. Legislative leaders who must eventually come to agreement on the document have broad sway over what is included.
Tens of millions for local projects in northern Florida received particular attention in this year’s budget, including more than $8 million alone for Bay County, which was hit with the brunt of the storm.
Last year, it was projects in the Florida Keys, which were battered by Hurricane Irma, that received millions in recovery funds.
Lawmakers are expected to vote on the budget on Saturday, to satisfy a 72-hour “cooling period” that must be observed after the budget is officially published.
Assuming that happens as now scheduled, the budget will then go to DeSantis, who has the power to veto individual line items if he desires.
DeSantis’ predecessor, now-U.S. Sen. Rick Scott, notably used his power to line-item veto more spending than any other governor in the state’s history. This year’s budget will be the first test of how much DeSantis might lean on his own power to check the Legislature’s spending.
South Florida projects
▪ SEED School of Miami, $8,760,331
▪ Underline Multi-Use Trail/Mobility Corridor, $1,500,000
▪ Miami Biscayne Bay Tidal Valves and Stormwater Improvements, $1,500,000
▪ Miami-Dade Adults with Disabilities Program, $1,125,200
▪ Florida Keys Aqueduct Authority Stock Island Reverse Osmosis Facility, $1,000,000
▪ Aircraft Service Center — Opa-locka Airport, $1,000,000
▪ Mount Sinai Medical Center Road Improvements, $1,000,000
▪ West Miami Potable Water System, $985,210
▪ Miami Lakes Business Park SE Resilient Transportation Infrastructure Project, $853,000
▪ City of Miami Springs Senior Center — New Building, $850,000
▪ Broward County Public Schools Adults with Disabilities, $800,000
▪ Monroe County Mobile Vessel Pumpout Program, $750,000
▪ Miami-Dade County Operation Blue and Brown, $500,000
▪ Sunny Isles Beach Pedestrian Park Bridge, $425,000
▪ City of Sweetwater Elderly Activities Center (Mildred & Claude Pepper Senior Center), $418,242
▪ Miami Shores Village-Wide Traffic Calming, $410,500
▪ Virginia Gardens — 38th Street Stormwater/ADA Improvement, $380,000
▪ Virginia Gardens — 64th Avenue Stormwater/ADA Improvement, $380,000
▪ Little Havana Activities and Nutrition Centers of Dade County, $334,770
▪ Homestead — Well Number 7, $300,000
▪ Bal Harbour Village Stormwater System Improvements, $300,000
▪ Downtown Miami Pedestrian Bridge — Phase 1, $300,000
▪ City of Hialeah Gardens — Elder Meals Program, $292,000
▪ City of Opa-locka Crime Prevention Technologies, $255,200
▪ Aventura Curbing of Swale Flooding Country Club Drive, $252,106
▪ City of Hialeah Elder Meals Program, $250,000
▪ Bay Harbor Islands Sewer Lateral Lining Project, $250,000
▪ North Bay Village — Sidewalk and ADA Improvements, $229,950
▪ North Bay Village Stormwater Pump Station, $200,000
▪ Doral Stormwater Improvements NW 114th Ave./50th St., $200,000
▪ North Miami Beach Snake Creek Canal Park, $200,000
▪ Cutler Bay — Drainage Improvement Cutler Ridge Section 3, $200,000
▪ Miami Beach Senior Center — Jewish Community Services of South Florida Inc., $158,367
▪ North Miami Arch Creek North/South Drainage Improvements Basin D, $150,000
▪ Coconut Creek Wastewater Conveyance System Improvements, $150,000
▪ Surfside Biscaya Island Water Main Crossing Relocation, $124,000
▪ Coral Gables Stormwater System Improvements, $100,000
▪ Monroe Association for ReMARCable Citizens, $100,000
▪ Miami International Agriculture, Horse and Cattle Show, $98,850
▪ North Miami Beach Police Athletic League STEM/Robotics Leadership Academy, $75,000
▪ City of West Miami Community Center, $69,071
▪ Holocaust Memorial Miami Beach, $66,501
▪ WPBT-TV, Miami — Repair Disintegrating HVAC Condensing Units, $51,000
▪ North Miami Foundation for Senior Citizen Services Inc., $50,000
▪ Miami Gardens NW 203rd Street Outfall Retro-fit Project, $50,000
▪ WMNF-FM, Miami — Replace Security System and Lighting, $43,814
▪ Miami Gardens Canal Erosion Protection Project, $30,000
▪ WDNA-FM, Miami — Repair Damaged Exciter on Transmitter, $5,400
This story was originally published May 2, 2019 at 12:29 PM.