Florida’s debt level dropped this year for the first time in at least 20 years — helped along by Gov. Rick Scott’s veto of some $135 million in university construction borrowing and a two-year halt on environmental land buys, the governor and Cabinet were told Tuesday.

Florida’s debt level slid to $27.7 billion this year — down $500 million from last year’s record high. That’s a sharp contrast from a year earlier, when $2 billion in additional borrowing pushed state debt to double what it was in 2000, according to the state’s Division of Bond Finance.

Ben Watkins, head of the division, said the state still will have to spend $2.2 billion in next year’s budget just to cover payments on the IOUs. That’s actually up $100 million from last year because of timing of the state’s bond issues. But refinancing of existing debt has saved the state millions this year, Watkins told Scott and the Cabinet.

Fifty-seven percent of what the state owes stems from school, college and university construction. Scott last year, took steps to rein-in that spending with his veto of university building projects, including $3.2 million for new roofing and other work at Florida Atlantic University.

 The only significant university construction work Scott allowed to become law was $35 million for work at the University of South Florida Polytechnic’s Lakeland campus, which was advanced by Senate budget chairman J.D. Alexander, R-Lake Wales.

Scott, who was elected with strong tea party support, has been outspoken in his push to stem Florida’s rising tide of red ink. 

Since former Gov. Jeb Bush took office in 1999, ushering in a dozen years of Republican leadership, Florida’s borrowing has climbed by $12 billion. Roughly $10 billion more debt is expected to be issued through 2019, to cover currently authorized programs, the bond finance division said.

Public school and university construction projects, roadwork and environmental land purchases have driven much of the borrowing, records show. Major tax cuts enacted during Bush’s two terms and recession-forced budget reductions also helped steer lawmakers away from a pay-as-you-go approach in many spending areas.

The economy, however, has helped change the state’s spending policies. The Florida Forever land-buying program, which formerly used to borrow $300 million annually to preserve environmentally sensitive lands, has been mostly on hold the past two years.

The state’s gross receipts tax, which supports school construction projects, also has been declining. The tax is built on levies imposed on utilities — but the economic downturn and societal shift away from land-line telephones has dramatically reduced the dollars available for campus construction.

Connecticut gunmaker Colt’s Manufacturing Co., plans to open a regional manufacturing plant in Central Florida’s Osceola County, bringing with it 63 jobs, Gov. Rick Scott said Thursday.

Scott, who has vowed to create 700,000 jobs in Florida in seven years, also used the announcement to fire-off a defense of the constitutional right to carry one of Colt’s products.

“As a supporter of new job creation and the Second Amendment, this announcement sends the clear message that Florida is both open for business and a defender of our right to bear arms,” Scott said. “My primary responsibility as governor is to be our state’s chief advocate for job creation. My personal involvement in bringing Colt to Florida demonstrates my administration’s deep commitment to rebuilding our economy.”

State officials say Florida has added about 110,000 jobs since Scott was sworn-in in January.

He’s also nuanced his campaign pledge. Scott’s dropped the claim that he would add 700,000 jobs on top of what economists had forecast to be a likely 1 million additional jobs in that time frame, based on normal growth projections.

The 63 jobs expected at the Osceola County plant are expected to pay an average salary of  just over $45,000.

Colt plans to make a $2.5 million investment in equipment and retooling a vacant building owned by Osceola County. The company is getting $250,000 in state incentives and workforce training, while the county will do building renovations and offer a break on rent for the leased structure.

Former Florida Gov. and U.S. Sen. Bob Graham led a gathering of activists Wednesday calling for Gov. Rick Scott and legislative leaders to preserve the state’s water resources, while renewing its longstanding commitment to the environment.

“We need strong gubernatorial leadership to reverse the damage that’s been done,” Graham told a rally at the state Capitol.

Graham debuted Wednesday as leader of the Florida Conservation Coalition, which includes Audubon of Florida, 1000 Friends of Florida, the Nature Conservancy, Sierra Club, Trust for Public Land and League of Women Voters. The coalition plans to lobby Scott and the Republican-led Legislature to restore funding to water quality programs, the Florida Forever land-buying program, and Everglades restoration, which supporters say have been staggered by budget cuts since 2007.

Graham was joined by state Sen. Paula Dockery, R-Lakeland, Nathaniel Reed of 1000 Friends of Florida and representatives of environmental groups, which generally praised Scott’s environmental stance, but blasting legislative moves which reduced oversight and dollars for green programs.

Advocates derided the Legislature for approving a $210 million cut in water management district property taxes, which has led to wholescale staff layoffs and program reductions, the most profound occuring at the South Florida Water Management District. Graham said taxes were “reduced by the amount of two pizzas a year,” but that the cuts did wide-ranging harm to existing programs and services.

Environmentalists, though, withheld direct criticism of Scott, who campaigned for the reduction and embraced the  cuts. Instead, Graham, apparently buoyed by recent Scott comments which underscored the need for effective environmental policy and Everglades restoration, urged conservationists to “join Scott’s army.”

Graham also warned the coalition planned to hold lawmakers accountable for actions which hurt Florida’s environment.

“We want to alert the voters in 2012 who was responsible for what happened in 2011,” Graham said.

Solantic, the chain of urgent-care clinics Gov. Rick Scott founded — and which just announced plans to move its headquarters from Jacksonville to Nashville, took steps Thursday to downplay the impact of the decision on Florida jobs.

Scott, a day earlier said he was “disappointed,” with the move, which cast a shadow over the governor’s efforts to jump-start Florida’s stalled economy. Scott sold the company in June. His office said he has had no contact with the firm since then.

Solantic, though, appears to be trying to soften the optics of the move for Scott by unveiling numbers Thursday that downplay the impact.

Among them: Of the company’s 567 employees, only 35 work in the Jacksonville office. Even some of those jobs are staying, since Solantic plans to maintain its corporate billing and sales administration there, possibly even adding some positions in Jacksonville, the company said.

 ’The net impact for our Fl base is expected to be positive given the continued growth plans,” spokeswoman Mandy Villalva said in an e-mail.

Gov. Rick Scott said Tuesday that he returned from last week’s trade mission to Brazil with $61 million in deals close to completed, including a natural caffeine producer that will open a plant at the Port of Palm Beach.

“People like Florida. They know Florida. They like the people of Florida. They think we’re a good place to do business,” Scott said. “It’s pretty positive. Now, maybe they’re being nice to me.

“My goal is that at the end, so, I want to get to ‘yes,’” Scott added. “What’s the barrier to get to ‘yes.’”

The lineup of deals roughly finalized is still being compiled by Enterprise Florida, the state’s economic development arm, which organized the trip attended by 187 Florida government officials and business representatives. But Scott said the list spans a wide range of manufacturers and service providers.

The governor acknowledged his role is not so much deal-maker — but rather, schmoozer-in-chief. Scott said he was mostly a facilitator for discussions already in the works when the entourage arrived in Brazil.

“That’s all it is,” Scott said.

Gov. Rick Scott was among a host of political figures Monday touting Boeing’s decision to open a commercial space capsule assembly facility at Kennedy Space Center — eventually bringing a projected 550 jobs to Florida’s economically ravaged Space Coast.

Scott said the assembly site — housed in an empty shuttle hangar — will yield 140 jobs by June 2013 and as many as 550 positions by December 2015.  Boeing received $131 million from NASA to develop the commercial taxi service to bring astronauts to the International Space Station, beginning in 2016.

Democratic U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson and U.S. Rep. Bill Posey, a Rockledge Republican, were expected to be on hand at KSC for the formal announcement Monday.

“Florida has five decades of leadership in the space industry, which makes our state the logical place for the next phase of space travel and exploration,” Scott  said. “Boeing’s choice of Florida for its commercial crew program headquarters is evidence Florida has the world-class facilities and workforce expertise needed for aerospace companies to succeed.”

The move comes only a couple weeks after the latest round of  layoffs in the region, tied to the closing of the shuttle program. When the Space Shuttle Atlantis’ completed its last voyage earlier this month, 1,600 employees of United Space Alliance were dismissed days later — part of wholesale reductions that over the past three years are likely to cost the region some 10,000 jobs.

“This positions our state well for future growth and a leadership role in NASA’s next generation human space exploration initiatives,” said Frank DiBello, president of Space Florida, the state’s economic agency for space ventures. “It is also a key factor in ensuring Florida’s space-related economy continues to thrive in the post-shuttle retirement.”

Scott wasn’t alone in courting Boeing. Among the organizations luring the aerospace giant were the Economic Development Commission of Florida’s Space Coast, Enterprise Florida, the Brevard County Board of County Commissioners and Brevard Workforce.

A couple weeks after Gov. Rick Scott approved a $45.6 million loan for the financially strapped state court system, a workgroup of judges and county clerks of court Friday recommended some sweeping changes to stabilize the system.

The workgroup doesn’t call for increasing filing fees, fines, charges or court costs. Instead, the group, which included Palm Beach County Court Clerk Sharon Bock basically found there is plenty of money now in the system to finance core court functions.

But courts are drawing 80 percent of their basic financing through foreclosure fees, which have rollercoastered the past couple years. And the group is recommending that as much as $22.6 million in fees, fines and other court-related revenue — now scattered across other state agencies — be confined in the court system to help cover costs.

The report is here:   http://www.floridasupremecourt.org/

A federal judge Monday temporarily halted drug-testing of Florida welfare recipients, siding with opponents of the new law championed by Gov. Rick Scott and the Republican-led Legislature.

U.S. District Judge Mary Scriven said the testing requirement amounts to an unreasonable search and seizure, chiding state lawmakers for ignoring an “overwhelming body of case law,” when they approved the measure last spring.

The legal challenge was brought by the ACLU of Florida and the Florida Justice Institute, which hailed the judge’s decision.

Sen. Arthenia Joyner, D-Tampa,  said Scott and state officials should just abandon efforts to defend the drug-testing policy for applicants for benefits under the state’s Temporary Assistance for Needy Families.

“Not only is the new law a punishment for being poor, it’s a waste of tax dollars; the overwhelmingly majority of TANF applicants test negative,” Joyner said. “Now, taxpayers are on the hook for millions of dollars to reimburse these families for a test that exclusively benefits the drug testing industry.”

Since Florida’s new law testing welfare recipients took effect July 1, 7,030 passed, 32 failed and 1,597 did not provide results, according to Florida Department of Children and Families records.

The only other state to implement a similar drug-testing policy, Michigan, had its drug-testing law overturned in 2003 by a federal court.

Florida’s budget hole for next year was officially put at $2 billion Thursday — and the revised forecast from state economists also put it in the red through 2015.

The shortfalls reverse what had been an optimistic forecast delivered to lawmakersonly last month — by the same analysts. But that was before the European debt crisis deepened and sent shockwaves through consumer confidence across the nation, including the Sunshine State.

Tax collections “hit a wall,” in mid-summer, said Amy Baker, head of the Legislature’s Office of Economic and Demographic Research.

Baker and other analysts told the Senate Budget Committee they have downgraded earlier state revenue forecasts by $600 million for the current year and almost $1 billion for next year. Rising program costs — especially in public schools and Medicaid — also must be layered-in, resulting in what she said would be a $2 billion shortfall facing lawmakers when they begin crafting the 2012-13 budget in January.

The Senate Budget Committee took the bad news in stride Thursday. But Chairman J.D. Alexander, R-Lake Wales, said he also feared that if the economy stumbled further, tax collections wouldfall even further off projections.

“We could have more challenging numbers,” Alexander conceded, adding, “or they could be better.”

A day after unveiling his latest seven-step themed plan – this one toward creating jobs and spurring economic development — Gov. Rick Scott turned into saleman-in-chief Thursday, pitching his plan at appearances in Jacksonville, Panama City and on talk radio.

Scott gained some additional talking points with Congress ending a deadlock that spanned two presidencies and approving a series of free trade agreements, including those with Panama and Colombia.

In his jobs’ plan, Scott highlighted the prospect of enhanced trade with Central and South America as a motive behind his push for more public works projects at Florida’s 14 deepwater sea ports.

“Free trade with Panama and Colombia will benefit Florida’s economy and businesses for years to come,” Scott said after the bipartisan vote in Congress.  “By eliminating the need to pay tariffs in order to export Florida goods and products to those expanding economies, Florida companies will now be able to invest their money in creating jobs.”

Scott on Thursday is scheduled to tour an aviation center at Jacksonville’s Cecil Field and an industrial and retail complex near the year-old Northwest Florida Beaches International Airport outside Panama City.

Gov. Rick Scott laid out the “job creation and economic growth agenda” he’s been hinting at lately — a wide-ranging plan aimed at repealing more than 1,000 state rules and regulations, reducing the corporate income tax, and pouring money into port and road projects to spur more jobs.

The Republican governor — who has promised to create 700,000 jobs in seven years — has conveniently settled on seven steps toward jump-starting Florida’s sputtering economy.

Scott unveiled the plan Wednesday morning at a metals and plastics plant in Orlando. With an election year coming, Scott also used the event to draw contrasts between his plan and the jobs proposal pushed by President Obama, now languishing in Congress after a negative vote Tuesday in the Senate.

“Unlike our elected leaders in Washington, D.C., I realize that it is Florida’s families and businesses, taking risks with their ideas, capital and time, that create jobs and grow an economy,” Scott said. “We will continue to attract new jobs by consistently lettting businesses know through our actions that we want Florida to be their home.”

Scott’s latest proposal builds on many of the themes he endorsed in his first-year as governor.

 After scaling back benefits for Florida’s almost 1 million unemployed — to reduce costs for businesses — Scott now wants to require job training for those drawing assistance. He also wants to double the corporate income tax exemption approved last year by the Legislature, an increase that would eliminate the levy for about 25 percent of the companies still paying.

Scott also puts more pressure on state colleges and universities to produce more graduates in science, technology, engineering and mathematics — which he said will help promote economic growth. He also wants the K-12 system to do its part in advancing STEM education.

“Florida will become the nation’s leader in job creation and economic growth by consistently doing the right things month after month to create the nation’s premier environment to start, relocated or expand a business,” Scott said.

Gov. Rick Scott said Tuesday that cutting regulations, taxes and toughening requirements for those receiving unemployment benefits will again be part of his legislative wish-list next year — along with the new priority of pushing schools toward helping students gain job skills.

Scott used a lunchtime speech before a Tallahassee business group to echo his recent talk radio rant against anthropologists — saying schools need to teach more science, technology, engineering and mathematics courses to meet marketplace demands.

“Do you want us to use your tax dollars to educate more people that can’t get jobs?” Scott said. “In anthropology? I don’t. I want to make sure that we spend our money where people can get jobs when they get out” of school.”

He later added that his approach to state budgeting is rooted in business.

“We have a $69 billion state budget. If those were business dollars, we’d say ‘I’m going to put those dollars where we get the best return,’” Scott said. “My job is to take the $69 billion we have in the state budget, and allocate them the best way possible.”

But Scott acknowledged that his budget plans have been complicated by Tuesday’s downsizing of Florida’s anticipated tax collections by state economists. Rising education and health care costs, combined with shrinking revenue, will likely leave the state facing a $2 billion budget hole next year.

“We thought we were going to have a nice budget surplus…but we’re not. Now we’re going to have a budget deficit,” Scott said. “We’re going to have to do the same thing: ‘How do you prioritize those dollars when they’re not growing dollars?’”

While Scott talked about boosting the role of “STEM” courses in education, he later conceded that could be tough amid declining dollars.

 Last year, Scott signed into law a state budget that slashed $1 billion from public schools, and vetoed another $200 million allocated for almost 50 college and university building projects. On Tuesday, Scott also said higher education administrators shouldn’t just feel that tuition increases are automatic but should rather ask, “Do we need to do all those programs?”

“It’s hard,” Scott conceded. “We’re going to go through and prioritize and spend the money the best we can….How can we change how we do it, to make it less expensive?…What can we be doing differently in education. Using technology, leveraging our best teachers. But you’re right, it’s going to be tough.”

Gov. Rick Scott is beginning his latest push for jump-starting Florida’s economy, offering a preview at a lunchtime speech Tuesday in Tallahassee and a new video his office prepared.

Scott plans to unveil much of his legislative and budget package for 2012 in the days leading up to his taking part in an Enterprise Florida trade mission to Brazil, Oct. 23-27.

In the video, the first-year governor touts tax cuts, shrinking the size of government, and fanning the flickering flames of the economy to where Florida added more than 87,000 jobs since January. No mention of the still-brutal unemployment rate: 10.7 percent in August.

 ”The proposals you will see reflect my three most important jobs as Governor— getting our residents back to work by growing quality jobs in the private sector; keeping the cost of living low for all Floridians; and building a world-class education system through continued improvements in our K-12 and higher education institutions,” Scott said. “These ideas are based on the countless stories I have received from Floridians who have contacted my office… and from the personal conversations I’ve had while traveling the state over the past year.”

See Scott’s video here:  http://bit.ly/nEL0LK

The amount of cash Florida lawmakers will have on hand to build next year’s state budget looks likely to drop from earlier predictions by between $1.4 billion and $1.7 billion, according to estimates unveiled Tuesday by state economists.

The state’s Revenue Estimating Conference, a gathering of analysts representing the Legislature, state Department of Revenue and Gov. Rick Scott’s office, are meeting most of the day to update their latest forecast of tax collections.

 The amounts settled on Tuesday will guide the budget proposal Scott will present later this year to the Legislature — and go a long way toward shaping the spending plan lawmakers put together when they begin the 2012 session in January.

The House budget committee last week said that because of declining tax receipts and rising costs — particularly in public schools and Medicaid spending – that a shortfall of $1.1 billion to $2.2 billion was expected, likely resulting in another round of program cuts and employee layoffs next year.

Tuesday’s revenue forecast looks likely to bolster those storm cloud predictions. Sales tax collections — which provides about three-quarters of the state’s general revenue — is the root of the state’s problem.

In a faltering economy,  sales tax receipts are expected to be down as much as $881.4 million next year from the estimating conference’s forecast earlier this year. Sales tax dollars also are off earlier estimates by as much as $257.5 million in the current budget.

With Gov. Rick Scott planning to begin rolling out his latest push to jump-start the state’s stalled economy, his administration also is spanning the globe seeking companies looking for a foothold in Florida.

Scott plans to go on an Enterprise Florida trade mission to Brazil later this month. But Lt. Gov. Jennifer Carroll is already overseas — spending this week in England and Spain on a Space Florida junket, meeting with aerospace companies that could begin operations at Kennedy Space Center.

The Space Florida mission includes time with Cella Energy, a British company building hydrogen storage facilities at KSC, where it also is expected to move some employees and maybe even hire a few locals.  Florida’s Space Coast has been staggered by some of the state’s highest unemployment with the closing of the Space Shuttle program.

“International trade and cooperation is key to growing Florida’s economy and creating jobs,” Carroll said in a release issued by Space Florida. “Space, aerospace, science and technology are growing sectors in the world marketplace and these sectors are part of Florida’s economic culture and industrial strengths and an area where Gov. Scott and I will continue to work to create good, high-wage jobs.”

Rising government costs and crumbling tax collections are leaving lawmakers facing a $2 billion budget shortfall next year, Senate President Mike Haridopolos said Thursday, a prospect few saw coming only months ago.

“Everything is on the table,” said Haridopolos, R-Melbourne, although he acknowled that tax increases are not. “But in June, I thought we’d be in a continuation budget. All the signs had us pointing in the right direction….But now we’re very concerned with revenue shortfalls.”

The House budget committee earlier Thursday estimated that lawmakers could come up between $1.1 billion and $2.2 billion short next year. The current year’s $69 billion budget was balanced by cutting spending, pulling cash from trust funds, and making government employees pay 3 percent of their pay to help cover pension costs.

A similar balancing act looks likely to commence in January, when lawmakers convene the 2012 session.

Florida economists are scheduled to meet Tuesday. They are expected to revise the state’s revenue forecast downward, with tax collections declining in the increasingly fragile economy.

Glimmers of trouble were evident this week, when funding for courts, road projects and school construction all reported shortfalls linked to the economy. But the news is a sharp departure from early last month, when economists forecast three years of clear budget sailing.

At that time, though, another leading senator, Don Gaetz, R-Niceville, conceded lawmakers would be wise not to celebrate over what appeared to be sufficient revenues to cover state spending through 2015.

Gaetz, in line to lead the Senate following next year’s elections, said last month that Florida’s economy is “on a knife’s edge.”

“We can’t move much, one way or the other, without some real damage,” Gaetz said.

House Budget Chair Denise Grimsley, R-Sebring, said next year was beginning to look all to familiar.

 “2012 is going to be another challenging year as we face a potential $2 billion shortfall; however, I am confident we will once again solve our budget challenges while keeping taxes low and encouraging private sector economic activity,” Grimsley said. 

Mitt Romney swept through the capital of the nation’s biggest swing state Wednesday, meeting voters at a restaurant, talking jobs with business professionals, and working to nail down dollars and support from some of Florida’s most influential Republicans.

The former Massachusetts governor cast himself as the candidate most likely to get the economy moving again – and the Republican best positioned to beat President Obama.

“My approach is a fundamental change in the way we’re doing things,” Romney told a dozen Tallahassee-area business officials, who complained to him about the faltering economy, while lunching on fried chicken and steamed vegetables.

On Wednesday, Romney seemed intent on making significant strides with those who can help drive his campaign in Florida, huddling at the state Capitol with Gov. Rick Scott, Attorney General Pam Bondi, and a roster of lobbyists who double as prominent Republican fund-raisers.

Florida Republican Gov. Rick Scott offered some rare praise Monday for Barack Obama — touting the president’s decision to send three free trade agreements to Congress for approval.

The pacts with South Korea, Panama and Colombia were negotiated under the Bush administration, but delayed while Obama pressed for more aid for displaced American workers — a measure Republicans in Congress resisted. The package is expected to be approved quickly now.

Scott said:

“I am extremely pleased President Barack Obama moved these critical free trade agreements off his desk and into the hands of Congress.  These agreements are vital to our state and nation, and for far too long,  U.S. companies, including many in Florida,  have had to pay billions in excessive tariffs to Colombia and Panama for the ability to export American goods to those nations.

” A successful jobs plan is dependent on immediate ratification of these agreements, and I urge Congress to quickly pass them.”

Florida Gov. Rick Scott earned some national face-time Thursday morning, co-hosting CNBC-TV’s Squawk Box — using the program to make a pitch for businesses to come to Florida and peppering a few guests with questions.

On set, Scott shared a screen with guest including Adrian Jones, general manager of the new Legoland opening in Central Florida, and Texas Gov. Rick Perry, the presidential contender and Scott’s rival for the self-bestowed title of  jobs governor.

Scott tossed a few questions out to the guests. And he also used the big platform to get his own points across about the economy and governing.

Among them:

On dealing with federal environmental regulators: “My goal is to build a relationship,” Scott said, saying he has been trying to work with the feds on an acceptable Everglades policy and water standards.

On Florida’s economic rebound: “One of the things we have to have in Florida is more manufacturing,” Scott said, saying tourism is a given, but producing goods will yield jobs.

On Europe’s debt crisis: “Stop spending money,” Scott said, likening the Continent to truculent teen-agers.

On cutting unemployment benefits, as Florida has:  ”You can’t afford it,” Scott said of businesses struggling to pay unemployment benefits. “Don’t give companies a reason not to hire people.”

Scott also came close to his own “Ponzi-scheme” moment, when he chimed in on Perry’s defense of his characterization of Social Security as effectively a criminal fraud because it pays current beneficiaries with money from those new in the system.

Scott said the Florida Retirement System also is less than fully funded, although he left out the part about how it has been declared actuarially sound by state and national analysts, the latest blessing coming just this week from state economists.

“You’ve got to make it sustainable,” Scott said of the FRS, and Social Security. Scott reiterated that he still wants to see the pension plan disappear, and be replaced with a 401(k)-style plan for government workers.

Gov. Rick Scott joined in with the recurring them of the Conservative Political Action Conference session Friday in Orlando, telling a cheering crowd of several thousand that he was looking forward to Florida becoming a “model for the nation.”

“Be optimistic. This is our time,” Scott assured delegates, on a steady diet of Obama-bashing from the Republican presidential candidates.

Scott also used his time at the microphone to promote his first nine months as Florida governor saying, “We’ve had plenty of success so far, not enough.”

He also offered a partisan math lesson, saying Florida has created 87,200 private sector jobs, since he was elected. Scott also claimed the state has lost 15,000 government jobs in the same period.

“We’re heading in the right direction,” Scott said.