By: Lloyd Dunkelberger
This appeared in heraldtribune.com, see full story
With some critics charging Florida should be moving quicker to spend federal stimulus funds, state officials appear to be picking up the pace to begin distributing the state’s $13 billion share of the initiative aimed at reviving the economy.
State Department of Transportation officials said Wednesday that they expect to have a list of $902 million in state road projects ready for legislative review by the end of the week. That is part of the $1.35 billion for road and bridge work that Florida could receive this year, including $440 million that will also go for local transportation projects.
Also on Wednesday, Gov. Charlie Crist sent letters to state agency heads reminding them to meet the deadline for submitting federal paperwork to qualify for $165 million in unemployment aid and $394,000 that could save cultural and arts-related jobs.
Crist also announced that Don Winstead, the state’s stimulus funds “czar,” would be attending a meeting in Washington, D.C., today with Vice President Joe Biden, where state officials from around the country will talk about implementing the $787 billion American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.
“I think we’re in pretty good shape to be honest with you,” said Crist when asked what hurdles there were to getting the stimulus money to work.
But he also acknowledged that more than $2 billion in education funding remains in doubt unless the state can get a waiver from the federal government. To qualify for the money, the federal government says states must fund schools at 2006 levels. Florida is well below that because of its sliding tax base.
Crist said Winstead and state Education Commissioner Eric Smith were working on the waiver. “I’m confident they’ll be successful,” Crist said.
With some 800,000 Floridians out of work, Senate Democratic leader Al Lawson of Tallahassee said Crist should be more aggressive in getting the federal funds distributed, noting the state has yet to create federally required Web sites to inform the public about the spending. Some 29 other states have established the sites.
“The governor puts on a good show, but there has been a lack of concern from my perspective for moving these dollars into Florida,” Lawson said.
Lawson also sent a letter to Senate Ways and Means Chairman J.D. Alexander, R-Lake Wales, urging him not to send the road projects through the normal appropriations process but instead to let a separate panel of House and Senate members approve the projects as a budget amendment.
Lawson said using the Legislative Budget Commission would be quicker and would avoid the parochial politics that often intervene when the Legislature is trying to decide how to spend road money.
“It’s going to slow down the process,” Lawson said if lawmakers pass the road projects as a regular budget bill that must be approved by the House and Senate and then signed by the governor.
Alexander said the Senate was looking “at both options, quite frankly, to make money available as soon as possible.”
Alexander also said the Senate has been working diligently to prepare to use the federal stimulus money although many details remain to be worked out.
