Florida is cutting funding for transit — and exposing the true cost of business tax breaks

Florida in Five: Five stories to read from the past week in Florida politics.

Photo credit: Phillip Pessar

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Welcome to another installment of Florida in Five: Five* stories you need to read from the past week in Florida politics.

There’s an ugly story playing out in south Florida right now.

Tri-Rail, the commuter train system the connects Miami, Fort Lauderdale and West Palm Beach, is at risk of shutting down because of a sudden budget crisis.

It’s a crisis created by politicians in Tallahassee — first by a Legislature that chose to slash funding for public transit in order to give more tax breaks to businesses, and then by a governor who decided to break the law.

This involves two separate — but connected — laws that were passed back in 2009, when former Gov. Charlie Crist and Florida lawmakers made a big push to expand passenger-rail service in Florida. The laws were part of a larger package that, among other things, helped to stabilize Tri-Rail, which began service in south Florida nearly 40 years ago, and launch SunRail, the commuter train that runs through Orlando.

The first law created a new pot of money for passenger-rail projects around the state.

It was added to the section of statute that controls a state tax on real-estate transactions commonly known as the “doc stamp tax.” This particular law set aside $60 million in annual doc stamp tax collections, deposited the money into a special fund overseen by the Florida Department of Transportation, and ordered FDOT to spend the money on rail-related grants awarded through an entity known as the Florida Rail Enterprise.

The grants have helped finance investments in both Tri-Rail and SunRail, as well as upgrades to rail crossings in other communities where freight trains have been rerouted to accommodate the commuter trains

A passage from Section 201.15 of Florida Statutes before the law was changed this year.

The second law established a dedicated source of funding specifically for Tri-Rail, which is operated by a multi-county agency called the South Florida Regional Transportation Authority or SFRTA.

This law was put into a part of statute dealing with regional transit agencies, and it requires FDOT to transfer at least $42.1 million a year to SFRTA. The mandatory annual subsidy includes $15 million annually specifically for Tri-Rail operations, maintenance and dispatch, plus at minimum of $27.1 million each year to maintain the tracks — which the state owns but the local agency oversees and which are also used by Amtrak and CSX freight trains.

The annual support from Tallahassee, which has continued for more than a decade now, has been critical to sustaining the south Florida railroad. FDOT gave SFRTA more $60 million last year. It was poised to provide another $62 million this year, according to Stet News Palm Beach County.

A passage from Chapter 343.58 of Florida Statutes.

But now Tri-Rail has been thrown into chaos.

It began in June. That’s when Florida’s Republican-controlled Legislature decided to erase the first law — and eliminate the $60 million a year that had been set aside for passenger rail grants.

This was one of the subtle ways in which Republican lawmakers in Tallahassee paid for a nearly $1.6 billion package of tax breaks — a package in which 80 percent of the tax savings are going to businesses.

In fact, the funding cut was included in the very same bill (House Bill 7031) as all the tax breaks. It shows up just a few pages before another provision that completely eliminated a tax that businesses used to pay when they lease property.

An excerpt from House Bill 7031 (2025).

That would have caused plenty of problems on its own — although the precise impacts of the cut would have been hard to pinpoint because they would have been spread across FDOT’s multibillion-dollar budget.

But the DeSantis administration is now using that cut as an excuse to ignore the second law — and its obligation to support Tri-Rail.

In early July — just few days after DeSantis signed House Bill 7031 into law — SFRTA Executive Director Dave Dech said he received a phone call from DeSantis’ transportation secretary informing him that FDOT was reducing its contribution to SFRTA to just $15 million.

Dech says FDOT Secretary Jared Perdue told him that the agency had been using some of the $60 million it had been getting for rail projects under the first law to cover some of its annual obligation to Tri-Rail under the second law. And since the Florida Legislature cut FDOT’s funding, FDOT was now cutting Tri-Rail’s funding.

The decision has ripped an enormous hole in Tri-Rail’s budget. Dech says SFRTA has enough money to cover the shortfall for one year, using a combination of leftover COVID-19 stimulus funds from the federal government and budget reserves. But unless something changes, SFRTA expects to run out of money a year from now — at which point Tri-Rail would have to shut down.

The DeSantis administration has yet to publicly acknowledge any of this. Perdue, the FDOT secretary, delivered the news to Dech verbally, and FDOT has ignored requests for comment from news organizations, including Stet News, the South Florida Sun-Sentinel, and Seeking Rents.

There’s probably a reason the governor and his staff have avoided putting anything in writing: Because what they are doing here is likely illegal.

The law governing FDOT’s obligation to SFRTA is clear: The Florida Department of Transportation “shall transfer annually” at least $42.1 million. This isn’t optional: FDOT has to turn over this money.

It doesn’t matter that the Legislature cut the $60 million for rail projects that had been carved out of doc stamp taxes. In fact, when FDOT was getting that money, the agency was forbidden from using any of it to cover its other obligation to SFRTA and Tri-Rail.

An except from 343.58 as it stood before this year’s legislative session.

Now, SFRTA could sue the state. But the agency is, for obvious reasons, reluctant to pick a fight with the governor. In fact, Dech stressed that SFRTA still has a positive relationship with FDOT and that he’s confident that everyone involved wants to find a resolution that keeps Tri-Rail running.

Unless and until that happens, though, the fate of a transit system that carries nearly 5 million commuters a year will remain in limbo.

Basically, two things just happened.

House Speaker Danny Perez (R-Miami), Senate President Ben Albritton (R-Wauchula) and almost everyone else in the Florida Legislature who voted for House Bill 7031 decided that tax breaks for businesses were more important than funding for passenger rail.

And now Ron DeSantis is trying to concentrate the consequences of that decision specifically on Tri-Rail — perhaps as a way to squeeze Perez, who is from south Florida and with whom DeSantis has been bitterly feuding for months.

Again, the governor is likely breaking the law by doing so.

But on the other hand, at least he’s also exposing the often-hidden price we all pay every time Tallahassee gives away more money to businesses.

*To paraphrase Barbossa, five is more what you’d call a guideline than an actual rule.

Weird how this keeps happening with charter schools

New disclosures only deepen mystery of Rep. Donalds’s wife’s charter school companies (Florida Bulldog)

See also: Firms belonging to wife of Rep. Donalds grabbed millions in charter school contracts (Florida Bulldog)

See also: Charter School Queen: How an elected official is cashing in big on a publicly funded school (Florida Trident)

See also: This Polk school received an A in July. Now it's 'Persistently Low Performing'? Here's why (Lakeland Ledger) ($)

When you let the Heritage Foundation run public education in your state…

Florida flunks sex ed in national report (Central Florida Public Media)

See also: Two more books are removed from Hillsborough County schools (WUSF)

See also: Where did the students go? Fear, migration fuel steep enrollment drop at Miami schools (Miami Herald) ($)

See also: Florida rapidly expanded publicly-funded school vouchers. Two years later, students are lost in the mix (WLRN)

See also: Florida officials say there’s ‘strong’ interest in budding states-led college accrediting board (Politico Florida) ($)

More dangerous by the day, part one

Post-ruling, many law enforcement agencies have stopped enforcing Florida open-carry ban (Florida Phoenix)

More dangerous by the day, part two

Hepatitis B is rising in Florida. The vaccine against it will soon be optional for infants (WUSF)

See also: Florida surgeon general begins striking school vaccine mandates, offers parents ‘freedom’ but no guidance (Florida Trident)

See also: DeSantis’ surgeon general won’t say if kids should be vaccinated (Tampa Bay Times) ($)

The Senate Bill 180 storm keeps getting bigger

Orange County fights new state law, aims to save Vision 2050 (Orlando Sentinel)

See also: 1000 Friends of Florida warns about the potential impact of a new law (WMNF)

Perspectives

Byron Donalds’ dollar signs are huge warning signs (South Florida Sun-Sentinel) ($)

Most pan DeSantis vaccine plans. One medical group dodged. (Orlando Sentinel) ($)

When Florida tried to pass open carry, Republicans understood why it was risky (Miami Herald) ($)

I'm a former Florida legislator and doctor. Vaccines offer parents freedom, peace of mind. (Florida Times-Union) ($)

Health and Back to School: Florida’s Inadequate Implementation of Child Health Policy (Florida Policy Institute)