Lawmakers just broke through an impasse on how much money to allocate for nursing home improvements under Florida’s next spending plan.

The Senate and House are setting aside nearly $137 million combined — $78.4 million and $58.4 million, respectively — for the state’s annual nursing home reimbursement rate adjustment through their end-of-budgeting “sprinkle lists.”

The sprinkle list, as its name suggests, is an assortment of supplemental funding initiatives the Legislature compiles as budgeting processes near closure to provide typically small apportionments (compared to other earmarks) to regional projects.

By that standard, the nursing home money — to be distributed across the state — is an outlier. It’s also notable for its size. The Senate funding is more than three times as much as the upper chamber’s next-biggest sprinkle list item. The House provided more than double its next-biggest item.

The funds come more than a month into protracted budget talks that required lawmakers to extend the 2025 Session and after the Senate and House were locked in disagreement about how much to provide nursing homes.

By June 4, the Senate had proposed reserving $62.75 million for long-term elderly care facilities. The House, meanwhile, offered nothing.

The “sprinkle list” provisions published Friday, which do not require cross-chamber agreement, include $18 million in recurring general revenue funds, $40.6 million in nonrecurring money and $78.2 million in federal trust fund cash.

Florida’s yearly adjustments to its Medicaid reimbursement rates for nursing homes is part of the state’s ongoing strategy to bolster the financial stability of long-term care facilities and enhance their residents’ quality of care.

While the $137 million now being set aside for that purpose seems generous, it’s roughly a quarter the increase Florida enacted in 2023, which amounted to about $470,000 per facility.

The state also increased the Quality Incentive Program Payment Pool that year from 6% to 9% of non-property-related payments, a change meant to reward facilities that meet certain quality benchmarks and encourage improvements in patient care.

Further, the Agency for Health Care Administration (AHCA) increased Medicaid reimbursement rates for private duty nursing services in 2024 by 7.19%. The adjustment raised the hourly rate for registered nurse services from $30.07 to $32.23 and for licensed practical nurse services from $26.25 to $28.14.

There are 691 licensed nursing homes in Florida with close to 84,500 beds and an occupancy of about 85%, accommodating some 71,000 residents at any given time, according to AHCA. Florida also has 3,080 assisted living facilities with more than 106,000 beds.

Long-term care is a significant contributor to the state economy, supporting some 286,000 jobs and making an estimated $27 billion impact annually, the Florida Health Care Association found.

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Jewish day schools in Florida will get some extra protection in the coming fiscal year through last-minute allocations in the coming budget.

In “sprinkle lists” the Senate and House released hours before a final vote was expected on the state’s 2025-26 spending plan, the two chambers submitted earmarks for Jewish school security totaling $10 million.

The Senate set aside $7.5 million. The House allotted $2.5 million.

Combined, the sum is $1 million more than Gov. Ron DeSantis recommended Feb. 3 in his “Focus on Fiscal Responsibility” proposal to hire school safety officers, upgrade equipment, improve transportation provisions and enhance school hardening and safety measures.

The Governor’s Office noted then that the schools and preschools may also be eligible for Nonprofit Security Grant Program funds if they meet U.S. Department of Homeland Security criteria.

The sprinkle list, as its name suggests, is an assortment of supplemental funding initiatives the Legislature compiles as budgeting processes near closure. Sprinkle items typically small apportionments (compared to other earmarks) to regional projects.

Some, like the Jewish day school items, are for statewide projects.

Notably, the combined funding allotted Friday is half of what the Senate proposed for security guards, transportation grants and capital outlay funding for Jewish day school security through a pair of line items on which it didn’t reach accord with the House.

But it’s equal to what the House offered: $7 million for security and transportation and $3 million for fixed capital outlay.

Antisemitic incidents in the U.S. have skyrocketed since Hamas terrorists entered Israel from Gaza on Oct. 7, 2023, killing 1,200 people and taking some 250 hostages, more than 50 of whom remain in captivity, according to Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

In the time since, Israel’s devastating campaign in Gaza has killed more than 55,000 people, according to the Hamas-run Palestinian Health Ministry, whose count doesn’t differentiate between combatants and civilians. The fighting has displaced 90% of the territory’s roughly 2 million population, sparked a hunger crisis and obliterated vast swaths of Gaza’s urban landscape.

Within a year of the attack, the U.S. saw more than 10,000 antisemitic incidents, including over 3,000 during anti-Israel rallies, 2,000 at Jewish institutions and at least 1,200 on college campuses, according to the Anti-Defamation League.

Hostilities in recent months have given rise to several deadly attacks on U.S. soil, including an arson attack on Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro’s residence in April, the murder of two Israeli embassy staffers in Washington, D.C., in May, and a firebombing attack in Boulder, Colorado, that injured at last 16 people.

As he had done in years prior, DeSantis signed bills in 2024 to address the issue, including measures to codify a definition of antisemitism in Florida Statutes and allow recurring state funding for private Jewish school security.

Localities have done their part as well. Following the Washington attack, Miami-Dade County Sheriff Rosie Cordero-Stutz announced she was ramping up patrols around Jewish schools, cultural institutions and places of worship.

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The Senate wants to spend $300,000 on a controversial intellectual freedom survey of higher ed students and faculty that has seen low participation previously.

That line item was one of the projects listed in the Senate’s sprinkle list. The sprinkle list, as its name suggests, is an assortment of supplemental funding initiatives the Legislature compiles as budgeting processes near closure to provide typically small apportionments (compared to other earmarks) to regional projects.

The Senate is proposing spending $150,000 for the survey for Florida’s public university system and another $150,000 for the Florida state college system.

In 2021, lawmakers passed legislation to start doing annual voluntary questionnaires to understand students’ and employees’ viewpoints via the 20-plus question survey. In 2024, the survey doubled to 52 questions.

Some faculty groups protested the surveys and urged professors not to fill them out. 

“Of the more than 1.36 million individuals who received the student survey, 7,213 responded, representing a total response rate of 0.5 percent,” read a 2022 report by the Florida Department of Education (FDOE).

The universities had a better response. A survey emailed to 338,000 students brought in 49,132 responses, or a 14.5% response rate, a 2024 report said.

Some students said they found the questions inappropriate, like when students were asked last year if they would be friends with someone depending on whether they voted for Donald Trump or Joe Biden.

“The fact that they actually named the Presidents — it really rubbed me the wrong way,” said Noah Barguez-Arias, a University of Florida student who called the survey “slimy,” according to a Fresh Take Florida story last year. “I feel like the universities just shouldn’t really worry about that.”

The GOP has targeted higher education and fought back against what Republican lawmakers call “woke” ideology. 

“The two survey instruments were designed to assess the extent to which students and employees feel free to express their beliefs and viewpoints on campus and competing ideas are presented on campus,” FDOE said on its website.

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