{"id":291732,"date":"2026-06-01T13:39:10","date_gmt":"2026-06-01T13:39:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/291732\/"},"modified":"2026-06-01T13:39:10","modified_gmt":"2026-06-01T13:39:10","slug":"anna-eskamani-secures-3m-for-central-florida-in-budget","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/291732\/","title":{"rendered":"Anna Eskamani secures $3M for Central Florida in budget"},"content":{"rendered":"

Rep. Anna Eskamani<\/a> is touting $3 million in local projects that she helped secure for Central Florida as lawmakers passed a $114.5 billion budget<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cI am proud to work across the aisle to bring taxpayer money back to our district,\u201d Eskamani said. \u201cOrange County contributes more than $4 billion to the state in sales tax alone; it\u2019s essential that we build relationships with our colleagues across the aisle to bring these dollars back to our community.\u201d<\/p>\n

Eskamani\u2019s local funding requests that ended up in the budget include $500,000 to improve Central Florida\u2019s waterways by cleaning up excess nutrients in Winter Park\u2019s Mead Botanical Garden<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Another $500,000 would go to Share the Care<\/a>, a nonprofit helping seniors and adults with disabilities, to build a wellness center. SCORE Florida would also receive $400,000 to give free mentoring and business-education services to entrepreneurs across the state.<\/p>\n

The city of Belle Isle<\/a> would get $350,000 to replace two old marine patrol boats and add a side-by-side utility vehicle to improve the city\u2019s emergency response, search and rescue, and patrol operations. The town of Eatonville<\/a> would get $350,000 for planning and architectural design services for a new public safety building.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Shalom Orlando<\/a> would receive $350,000 for generator power backup for its three schools, the Jewish Community Center, adult learning, senior programming and the Holocaust Memorial Center.<\/p>\n

Another Eskamani-supported project includes $127,500 to study the impact of building an indoor skateboard Olympic training facility in Orange County. Orlando was recently chosen to host the U.S. Olympic qualifiers in 2028. Skateboarding is played at the Olympic Q-Series, though it\u2019s unclear which of the four chosen host cities will get it. The $127,500 will also support starting five smaller outdoor skateboarding programs across Florida.<\/p>\n

Eskamani also backed $200,000 for Samaritan Resource Center<\/a> to help the homeless, $150,000 to support sexual abuse victims and $140,000 for Summer youth programs on art, sports and science.<\/p>\n

Money for these and other projects isn\u2019t guaranteed until Gov. Ron DeSantis signs the budget. He holds line-item veto authority and can eliminate individual spending projects.<\/p>\n

DeSantis has been clear he uses his veto pen to punish lawmakers who don\u2019t support his agenda.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cIf the members are supporting good policy, then, you know, I see their budget items, that\u2019s just something you take into account,\u201d DeSantis said last month<\/a> at The Federalist Society.<\/p>\n

Eskamani, a progressive Democrat from Orlando, is often a fierce critic of DeSantis\u2019 agenda on immigration, abortion, LGBTQ rights and other issues.<\/p>\n

\u201cObviously Gov. DeSantis and I disagree on a lot but where there has been commonality is water quality. So I\u2019m very hopeful that partisanship will not get in the way of this project,\u201d Eskamani said, pointing to the water project at Mead Gardens as an example.<\/p>\n

This is Eskamani\u2019s final budget process. She is term-limited in the House and is running for Orlando Mayor<\/a> in 2027.<\/p>\n

The 2026-27 budget, approved Friday, would take effect July 1.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Rep. Anna Eskamani is touting $3 million in local projects that she helped secure for Central Florida as…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":291733,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[74811,2217,17459,4773,28,30,29,1335,139,123250,123251,5987,123252],"class_list":["post-291732","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-florida","tag-2026-27-budget","tag-anna-eskamani","tag-belle-isle","tag-eatonville","tag-florida","tag-florida-headlines","tag-florida-news","tag-orange-county","tag-orlando","tag-samaritan-resource-center","tag-score-florida","tag-shalom-orlando","tag-share-the-care"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/291732","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=291732"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/291732\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/291733"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=291732"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=291732"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=291732"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}