NEW SMYRNA BEACH, Fla. – Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis on Wednesday held a news conference in New Smyrna Beach, where he signed the state’s $100 billion budget
The signing took place around 10:30 a.m. at The Garlic, an Italian restaurant.
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Prior to the budget signing, DeSantis touted the state’s economic recovery coming out of the COVID-19 pandemic.
When you start to see the fallout from COVID last spring, the forecast for Florida — and really everywhere in the country but particularly a service- and tourism-based economy like we have in Florida — those predictions were dire,” the governor said.
He added that the state is now expecting to have a $10 billion reserve after June.
“Right now, the budget will show about 9.5 billion in reserves, but that does not account the additional money that we will likely get in June. So remember, they did the most recent estimate in April, we got almost $800 million overestimate in April. It looks like for May, we’re going to be a half a billion dollars over estimate in terms of revenue coming in. We anticipate something similar for June, so you get another half a billion,” DeSantis said.
The budget includes a minimum wage increase for state workers to $13 an hour. Also, state attorneys, public defenders and district court judges will get a 10% pay raise.
And first responders, teachers and early learning instructors will get $1,000 bonuses. Schools will also receive $550 million to raise the minimum teacher salary.
“Our budget here supports K-12 education, more than the state has ever done,” DeSantis said. “A lot of people were predicting steep cuts to K-12. That did not happen.”
DeSantis reiterated his push to raise the average minimum starting salary for teachers to $47,500 throughout the state.
“That’ll make us one of the top handful of states in the country (for teacher pay). We were (in) the bottom half of states. Now we’re getting closer to being one of the better states,” DeSantis said. “That (makes) a big difference in terms of trying to get people who are talented to go in to the profession.”
The governor also boasted over the money set aside in the budget for environmental issues, which includes $625 million for Everglades restoration, $302 million for water quality improvements and $100 million for beach renourishment, which is also getting a $50 million boost from federal funds for a total of $150 million for beach renourishment.
The governor did veto more than $1.5 billion from the state’s budget, the majority of which called for using federal funds to create an Emergency Response Fund. According to the governor, the U.S. government issued guidance that would not allow the state to use those funds in that manner, which forced the veto.
You can see the full list of vetoed funds by clicking here.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.