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Waiting on Washington

January 21st, 2009 by flanews

Florida is waiting on Congress to pass an economic stimulus package to fund, schools, heath care and road construction.

Hear it Here: Waiting on Washington

President Barack Obama has been pushing the 825 billion dollar package to create jobs. Florida is asking for seven billion dollars, but, as Whitney Ray tells us, some say the state will be lucky to get half that.

As state sales tax revenue continues to dwindle, Governor Charlie Crist is looking to Washington for help. Crist was in DC Tuesday asking members of congress for seven billion dollars for schools, health care and roads.

“I’m optimistic about it I really am. You know inevitably when you do something that big and bold there are challenges and there are some critics and cynics but that’s not something that won’t be over come,” said Crist.

Crist says the money would make an immediate impact on the state’s highways. The state has 7 billion dollars in road projects ready to go, but it’s still unclear just how much money Florida will get. The president of Floridians for Better Transpiration, Doug Callaway, said the state will likely get far less than Crist asked for.

“If you look at what traditionally Florida gets, we get about four to five percent of the national total for highway funding. You apply that four or five percent to the 30 billion in the house bill, that would mean we would probably get in the order of a billion or a billion and a half,” said Callaway.

Spending a billion dollars on road construction creates 28,000 jobs and generates more than 5 billion dollars in economic growth. The state is also asking for a billion dollars to spend on Medicaid Programs.

Posted in Charlie Crist, Economy, Education, Health, Highways, State Budget, State News | No Comments »

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