budget

The Department of Health plan calls for a “three-pronged strategy” to attack the pandemic, including funding for testing, support staff and a media marketing campaign.

Advocates for poor, elderly and disabled individuals, who have been pressing the DeSantis administration to leverage the additional funding since spring, hailed the plan.

The governor said the federal money had strings attached that made it unusable for the proposed emergency fund.

Lawmakers directed $91.1 million to hometown health and human services projects, including clinics, meal-delivery programs and a hurricane center. Not all will make it past the finish line.

The endowment, currently valued at about $958.4 million, was created in 1999 to provide support for health care programs and biomedical research. The bill will fold it into a budget reserve.

Advocates worry about a worker shortage that, they say, will only grow worse as more people qualify for the program unless lawmakers do something about increasing wages for people who provide services.

Along with addressing the federal pandemic relief funds, the Senate on Monday decided to go along with a House plan to not reimburse the Chiles Trust Fund for $300 million that was borrowed.

Key decisions by Florida lawmakers included backing off hundreds of millions of dollars in proposed Medicaid cuts for hospitals and nursing homes.

Top Senate and House budget negotiators met Wednesday but did not make public offers on health care spending.

The state learned this week that it will receive about $400 million in additional federal Medicaid funds, but lawmakers so far haven’t included it in a proposed budget they are trying to finalize.