State agencies and departments are getting their budget priorities together as we count down to the opening of the Legislative session March 4th. One priority for the governor and the Florida Department of Veterans Affairs is to make room for older veterans waiting for a bed in a state-run, veterans’ nursing home.
The six state nursing homes for veterans run at 99% occupancy and many have a waiting list according to Mike Prendergast, executive director of the state department of veterans’ affairs."The governor has recommended funding for all of the preliminary work for us to build two additional nursing homes in the upcoming fiscal year", Prendergast said.
Prendergast will unveil recommendations on where to build those new 120-bed nursing homes.
"We will solicit from those communities proposals to put the facilities in those communities and we will work our way through some decision making criteria and report back to the governor and cabinet on where the next home should be built and where the one after that should be built and where the one after that should be built", said Prendergast.
Federal grants pay for two-thirds of the building costs and the state pays the other third. The last home built in St. Augustine cost more than $32 million. The nursing homes will provide veterans with private rooms, and half of the beds will be reserved for veterans with dementia or Alzheimer’s Disease.