Weather | Sports | Forums | Comics | Classifieds | Calendar | Movies
LUCY MORGANSenate President Jim King and House Speaker Johnnie Byrd managed to get permanent funding for their pet projects.
TALLAHASSEE - Gov. Jeb Bush said Tuesday that the Legislature should repeal a 2004 law that guarantees millions of dollars would flow forever to the pet projects of legislative leaders.
Last spring, lawmakers approved $30-million for three projects pushed by Senate President Jim King of Jacksonville and House Speaker Johnnie Byrd of Plant City. But few of them realized they also obligated the state to spend $30-million a year forever.
The future money would be from liquor taxes and flow directly to the three new programs, a chiropractic school at Florida State University, an Alzheimer's center at the University of South Florida and a biomedical study program at the Department of Elder Affairs.
Bush said he expressed concern about the way lawmakers were obligating future money when he signed the bill in March. He wants lawmakers to repeal the law next spring.
"It should be undone," Bush said. "It's an issue where the Legislature did something that was inappropriate in my opinion, and we'll ask them to undo it."
Bush said he agreed to support the projects, but he did not commit to having them funded forever without going through the annual appropriation process.
The highly unusual agreement was not disclosed to most lawmakers at the time the bill passed.
Incoming Senate President Tom Lee said Tuesday he was unaware of how the money had been appropriated until he recently met with the governor.
"Even the governor couldn't explain it," said Lee, adding that the governor called in an aide to describe it.
Lee said he wants to talk to King before taking any action.
King said Tuesday he has no objection to future appropriations being subjected to annual review. He said the bill was designed to make sure everyone took their desire to create a chiropractic school seriously.
"We are confident we can justify the chiropractic college on an annual basis," King said.
King did express concern over the possibility that the Board of Governors will insist on approving the chiropractic school. He said the school was approved by legislators long before the board was created by voters in 2002.
"I think that would be a dangerous way to start out," King said. "I think the Legislature is primed to work with the Board of Governors, but we are working on the basis that we had a chiropractic college approved beforehand. They should remember the Legislature has to fund the Board of Governors."
A group of citizens plans to sue the Legislature challenging their right to create the college without approval from the Board of Governors.
Lee said the appropriations issue can be worked out.
"I'm going to encourage the Senate to do the right thing without someone having to file a lawsuit to determine what that is," Lee said. "I want to respect a Senate president's legacy, but my personal preference is to see these issues addressed in an appropriations bill and subject to annual review."
Lee said last year's agreement was reached between King, Byrd and the governor to get a contentious issue out of the way at the beginning of a legislative session that Bush has labeled "dysfunctional."
Incoming House Speaker Allan Bense, R-Panama City, said Tuesday that the governor accepted the bill earlier this year to keep a fight from breaking out.
Bense said he favors spending money for the chiropractic school at FSU and for Alzheimer's research at USF, but he said the appropriation should be scrutinized each year.