Affordable-housing programs won't take a hit to boost funding for the environment, under a change Wednesday to the Senate's approach to meeting the demands of a new land-and-water constitutional amendment.
The Senate Appropriations Committee unanimously removed a controversial reduction in money for housing programs that had been included in a series of bills (SB 576, SB 578, SB 580, SB 582, SB 584, and SB 586) revamping trust funds to handle the voter-approved initiative known as Amendment 1.
"It was a just a choice we made to move on that issue," Sen. Charlie Dean, an Inverness Republican who is the author of the Senate trust-fund measures, said after the committee meeting.
The change restores the current percentage of money that goes into a trust fund for affordable housing from real-estate taxes known as documentary-stamp taxes.
The Senate trust-fund approach continues to include a number of differences from the House's plan for dealing with trust funds (HB 1291, HB 1293 and HB 1295). The largest remaining difference is a Senate proposal that would lead to a more than $100 million reduction in documentary-stamp money for transportation.
The affordable housing fund received about $266 million this year from the "doc stamps."
Dean's initial proposal would have cut about $112 million from the housing money starting with the fiscal year that begins July 1.
Instead, that amount will come from a percentage of money that usually goes from the "doc stamps" into the state's general revenue fund.
The approved change was welcomed by business, veteran and homeless advocates.
"It means that we'll be able to, assuming that it gets funded, provide a lot more affordable-housing dollars that will benefit the economy in a lot of different ways," said Jessica Scher, director of public policy for the United Way of Miami-Dade. "This is not just for those that need affordable housing, but the economy in general. It creates jobs."
Trey Price, of the Florida Realtors, said the change reflects the will of people voting for Amendment 1, "who stated their intention was not to harm other programs."
The trust-fund measures are just one of the approaches lawmakers are taking to carry out Amendment 1, which was supported by 75 percent of voters and sets up a 20-year funding pool for land-and-water conservation and management from revenue generated by the real-estate taxes.
Both chambers have advanced separate water policies tied to Amendment 1, which is expected to provide about $741 million for land and water projects in the fiscal year that starts July 1, up from about $470 million in the current budget year.