The state still won’t fund a road to Moffitt Cancer Center.
Gov. Ron DeSantis once again vetoed funding for a connector road to access a Moffitt Cancer Center Life Sciences campus in Pasco County. That cleared $5 million out of the state budget he signed on Thursday.
Last year, then-Senate President Wilton Simpson had made a priority of $600 million in funding for that Moffitt campus in his home county, only to see DeSantis nix the whole deal.
Simpson later won election as Florida Agriculture Commissioner.
That type of commitment for Moffitt did not make it into the budget this year, but state Rep. Randy Maggard, a Dade City Republican, did seek funding for the roadway to make the campus accessible. He had sought $25 million for the project, but only $5 million was ultimately included in the budget approved by the Legislature.
Jamie Wilson of Moffitt and lobbyist Sydney Ridley of The Southern Group argued in a budget request that it was in the best interest of the state to pave a road to Speros so that employees and visitors to the center could safely drive there.
But the road hit a roadblock at the Governor’s desk. A list of almost $511 million vetoed projects included several line-items designates for specific roadways.
The Moffitt campus road was the most expensive of those to be killed by DeSantis. It held the same $5 million price tag as a Kathleen Road widening in Lauderdale Lakes that the Governor also stripped from the budget.
Other major road projects axed by DeSantis include a $4 million expansion of Fruitville Road in Sarasota, $1.5 million for design and construction on the Biscayne-Everglades Greenway, $1.5 million for reconstruction of Fort Florida Road, $1.25 million Auburndale Roadway improvements in Miami and $1.1 million tor route enhancements for Manatee County Area Transit.
Despite the budget veto last year, Moffitt leaders committed they would continue to pursue the Pasco County campus. The center is planned on 775 acres off Suncoast Parkway at State Road 52.
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