ORLANDO, Fla. – Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis spoke Wednesday in downtown Orlando, announcing his proposals for a $117 billion 2026-27 state budget.
The governor talked at length about the money he wants set aside for education items, such as $30.6 billion overall for K-12, $1.7 billion for early-child education, almost $2 billion for the state college system, $4 billion for the state university system, a fully-funded Bright Futures scholarship program and $1.56 billion for teacher-pay increases, up from $1.36 billion last year.
He again promised future action on property taxes, saying the Florida Legislature was “working on some good stuff” and pointing to the growth of and taxes paid by commercial and non-homestead property owners as potentially being enough to offset an absence of homestead property taxes.
“We want to make sure that the taxpayers are getting breaks rather than have more spending, but put that aside, there’s some communities, some counties, that are fiscally constrained. We have 32 of them and they’re more rural and they don’t have the economic engine that an Orlando has, or that a South Florida has, or a Tampa or a Jacksonville,” DeSantis said. “I’ve put in the budget — and I’m not saying it’s even going to be necessary — but I put in the budget enough money to completely, 100%, reimburse any homestead-property tax reduction for those fiscally-constrained counties.”
DeSantis was joined at the Dr. Phillips Center for the Performing Arts by Florida Education Commissioner Anastasios Kamoutsas, Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles Executive Director Dave Kerner and Florida State Guard Executive Director Mark Thieme.
The state’s 2025-26 budget, which DeSantis signed in June, came out to $117.4 billion after vetoes, as well as after being referred to as a $115.1 billion budget during the signing ceremony.
News 6 is updating this story to reflect the latest information.
Watch the news conference again in the video player below or by clicking here.
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