A.G. Gancarski
House Speaker Jose Oliva addressed media after a Monday floor session that included clearing and decontaminating the House Chamber.
The extraordinary action, due to a number of legislators potentially coming in contact with someone who tested positive for COVID-19, underscored what was an extraordinary day in the House.
Oliva started off the day by saying that a second look at the budget may be needed in light of “panic” over the disease.
Budget items where House and Senate committees couldn’t agree were bumped up to chairs; however, any review of budgets Monday was happening outside public view.
While Gov. Ron DeSantis thinks the agreed upon coronavirus funding level of $25 million will be enough, Senate President Bill Galvano said the hit may be as high as $200 million. Though he believes big ticket items like affordable housing and teacher pay raises shouldn’t be cut to reach that threshold, negotiations could still play out in order to build reserves, “in case we need to utilize it from an economic standpoint or to stabilize our budget.”
Floridians could also expect fewer tax breaks from a package the House approved last week as legislative leaders hammer out the final details of an estimated $92 billion budget for next fiscal year.
Oliva addressed these issues with media Monday night after the marathon floor session.
“That’s one of the largest recurring expenditures that has been proposed this year,” Oliva said of teacher pay raises. “I think it has to be looked at.”
Regarding the budget, Oliva noted that Appropriations “Chairman Travis Cummings is working with [Senate counterpart] Rob Bradley to put together some sort of reduction in spending package.”
“What we’re going to see now from here on out and probably into the summer is a difficult economy,” Oliva added. “We both want to make sure, the Senate President and myself, to put enough money into reserves.”
However, Oliva suggested that certain things will be off the table for cuts. Affordable housing might not be one of them.
“We probably want to take a look at everything,” Oliva said. “But we know the importance of and how everybody feels strongly about affordable housing.”
The goal: “to stay away from cuts in that area.”
That number is $370 million, the highest spend in years.
Oliva also discussed the coronavirus scare in the House.
“The members themselves said they would voluntarily be tested if it put everyone at ease. They weren’t showing any symptoms,” Oliva said.
They were screened, Oliva said, and under the Department of Health’s “algorithm,” the members didn’t “have signs” of infection.
“The distance from the time that they were at this event, and the fact that they weren’t in any close proximity with the person with the virus,” Oliva said, offered reassurance.
“This was us handling matters inside our own chamber,” Oliva said. “We tried to be as open and transparent about the process [as possible].”
_____
Content from the News Service of Florida was used in this report.
