Our local legislative delegation has been bragging about how well Escambia and Santa Rosa counties did in the past session. Well, what we got from the state budget pales to the $150 million that Miami-Dade received….thanks to House Speaker Marco Rubio.
- Miami-Dade County will pay $1 a year for 99 years for the South Florida Evaluation Treatment Center, an $18 million building where the county plans to house and treat jail inmates with psychiatric problems.
- $5 million to help the county construct a new health department building.
- Miami-Dade schools will get an extra $13 million, for a net increase of nearly $102 million in the coming year.
- $13.6 million to create the nonprofit organization to coordinate services for needy children and families in Liberty City.
- $20 million for Jackson Memorial Hospital,
- $5.4 million for a Florida International University medical school
- $80 million for a genetics research institute at the University of Miami
The truth is we got our butts kicked in Tallahassee. We get the scraps and are made to believe it’s the main course.