Today the Senate released SB 2500, the General Appropriations Act, the Senate’s proposed state budget for the 2022-2023 fiscal year, as well as the implementing bill and conforming bills associated with balancing the state budget for the upcoming fiscal year. The Senate Appropriations Committee is scheduled to consider the proposals on Wednesday, February 9, 2022. The House Appropriations Committee is expected to publish its own proposed state budget, implementing bill, and conforming bills later today, and will be considered in the House Appropriations Committee on Thursday, February 10, 2022.
Next week, both chambers' primary focus will be dedicated on finalizing their respective budget proposals for the 2022-23 fiscal year. This session the House of Representatives will be hosting Florida’s budget conference, which is expected to begin shortly after the House and Senate Appropriations Committee finalize their proposed state budgets and place each Chamber’s proposals for consideration on the House and Senate Floors.
Legislative Updates:
$500 Million for Emergency Fund
A proposal to provide $500 million for the governor to immediately access during emergencies is now ready to be considered by the Florida House. On Monday, the House Appropriations Committee backed two measures, HB 7023 and HB 7025, that would take $500 million from state general revenue and put it into a new emergency fund that the governor could access during emergencies. Lawmakers initially considered providing $1 billion to the new emergency fund, but the Senate cut that amount in half and then approved its version of the proposal, SB 96 and SB 98. Lawmakers approved an emergency-fund proposal last year, but Governor DeSantis vetoed it after questions were raised about directly using federal stimulus dollars for the fund. The difference in this fund is that the money would come from general revenue and not federal dollars.
House Budget Cuts Hospitals by $259 Million and Redirects $100 Million to Nursing Training
Representative Bryan Ávila rolled out a $47 billion health care spending plan on Thursday that cuts hospital rates by almost $252 million and redirects a portion of that money to help train future nurses to decrease the state’s nursing shortage. Ávila, the House Republican in charge of the Health Care Appropriations Subcommittee, said the chamber decided to remove $100 million in recurring revenue from hospitals and direct it toward training nurses after finding out that the industry profited $6.3 billion in 2020. Ávila said the $100 million in general revenue being removed from his proposed budget will be redirected to the House Education Appropriations Subcommittee to use. It’s not clear if the $100 million will continue to draw down the additional federal money once redirected to nurse training. (Florida Politics)
Redistricting Update:
New redistricting maps are on their way to the Supreme Court. The full Senate unanimously approved a 40-district state Senate map and 120-district House map on Thursday. Supporters of the new map proposals said the maps are more mathematically compact and split fewer cities than the maps drawn a decade ago. Those in opposition argued there aren't enough minority districts, saying the maps should better reflect the increase in minority populations around the state. The next step is for the Attorney General to present the maps to the Supreme Court, which would then have 30 days to review them.
