You're watching southwest Florida InFocus.

Coming up, an expansion that has been grounded after falling months behind schedule and a budget ballooning into the hundreds of millions of dollars.

Airport officials are determining what to do next with an unfinished terminal expansion project.

It's a battle over a bird.

Conservation groups join a lawsuit to help ensure the protection of a critically endangered bird popular in the Sunshine State.

The Florida scrub J.

We like to call ourselves the doorstep to space.

That's that's Florida.

The threshold to orbit And the Economic Future of Florida is written in the stars.

How companies like Space-x are giving a multibillion dollar boost to the economy by making SpaceX big business in the state.

Hello, I'm Sandra Victorova Thank you very much for joining us.

Well, can more be done to lower the cost of home property insurance?

Should Floridians get a tax holiday on guns and ammo?

And should teachers get a pay raise?

Those are just some of the big questions facing state lawmakers as they head to Tallahassee for the next legislative session, which starts on Tuesday.

Joining us now to discuss some of the proposals lawmakers will be considering is WGCUs Morning Edition host and reporter John Davis.

Welcome, John.

Thanks for having me.

So let's start with property insurance.

In 2022, state lawmakers passed some significant legislation which was meant to control the insurance.

Lawsuits would switch certainly at least partially impacting premiums.

Do we know what state lawmakers might try this time when it comes to property insurance?

Well, I would just caution if you're expecting any kind of immediate relief, you're going to be disappointed.

We're not going to see that.

As you noted, the legislature's approach to dealing with the property insurance crisis has been really solutions aimed at helping insurance companies directly and not necessarily property owners themselves.

So, I think we're going to be seeing more of that.

Also, Citizens Property Insurance Corporation, which was created to be the insurer of last resort resort in Florida.

They regulators recently approved a 14%, rate cap for them.

So some homeowners are going to see their property insurance premiums increase by up to 14% if they have citizens, if they have policies through citizens.

Now, there is also a bill from from our own Southwest Florida Senator, Jonathan Martin.

And this wouldn't eliminate property taxes.

But if the bill passes, it would require a study about the feasible city of eliminating property taxes.

This has raised a lot of eyebrows because, as we know, property taxes are the primary funder of things like public schools, first responders, ambulances, firefighters, local police.

And it's, you know, a lot of local governments get a big chunk of their money from property taxes.

So that that's something that we'll be watching as well.

Want to turn to the condo crisis now?

I know the state requires these condo associations to keep financial reserves, obviously to hold them in case there's future repairs needed.

That's led to big condo fees and plummeting sales.

Do we expect any action on condos?

Again, I don't think we're going to see anything that would bring immediate relief.

There is a bill that caught my eye filed by a Democratic senator, Rosalind Osgood, and this would kind of delay the deadline for ways to fully fund those now required reserves.

And it would delineate between condos and higher risk areas.

It would also now this applies to buildings that are three stories or higher.

This would push that back to buildings that are five stories or higher.

But even among her own Democrats in the legislature, some are saying it's not a good bill.

It would just kick the can down the road.

Jason Pizzo, notably, his district includes Surfside, where the Champlain Towers South collapse occurred.

And he's not he's not up for this because he's saying anything that is going to just push those, push those requirements down the road might put some condo residents in danger.

I'd like to end real quick with the proposed budget.

We're looking at the governor's proposal at $115 billion, smaller than the current budget.

Give us the highlights on on that proposal.

Yeah, it's about DeSantis.

His budget proposal is about $3 billion less than the budget year that we're currently in.

And that was not unexpected.

As we're getting further and further away from all that, additional federal grant, program funding we got during Covid, that's gone now.

So we knew this was coming.

In terms of the budget itself, some highlights.

It does call for pay increases for law enforcement and first responders, 20 to 25%, depending on which ones they are and whether they're new hires or or veterans.

We're also looking at budget cuts, to excuse me, the budget would cut 741 state government jobs.

So that's something people are looking at as well.

That's from places like the Department of Health and the Department of Children and Families.

There are some pay increases for educators in the budget, but the for the education and Association, the statewide teachers union, says what the governor's proposing would just be nominal wouldn't make that big of a difference.

It wouldn't keep up with inflation costs, and neither would the budget proposal.

In terms of per student spending.

They're saying it wouldn't move the needle.

There.

I want to sneak one more in.

And that is the sales tax holidays.

Something new.

Is this this idea of the gun, tax holiday?

Tell us about that.

So one of the tax holidays DeSantis is proposing would be a sales tax holiday between Memorial Day and July 4th on gun purchases, ammunition and gun accessories.

The sales tax holidays in general have proved to be popular in past years.

Another one I want to talk about, though, would be the elimination of Florida's business rent tax.

Currently, businesses pay a 2% tax when they rent property in the Florida in the state, and Florida is a bit of an outlier on even having that tax.

So if that went away, that would save businesses around $1.6 billion.

So, that's that's a very popular item among, business owners in Florida.

John Davis, we appreciate the preview, and we'll have you back to tell us what happens.

Thank you.

Thank you.

The clock is running for a contractor to put together plans, timelines, and cost to complete one part of the expansion of Southwest Florida International Airport.

That work is more than a year behind schedule and likely to soar far overbudget.

One Lee County commissioner acknowledges it's one of the biggest construction nightmares in Southwest Florida history.

Mike Walter reports.

This is why managers want to expand the existing terminal at the airport.

We know as far as it's crowded and the population's booming.

And this is what, $331 million in contracts has bought.

Unfinished work, including steel rods exposed to the elements instead of reinforcing concrete.

It's been this way for a year.

Manhattan Construction and a design company called Atkins North America were supposed to have finished the work three months ago.

I'd say this whole thing is a terrible mess.

Lee County Commissioner David Mollica also sits on the Port Authority board that governs our S.W..

He has spent many hours poring over this project change work orders, noncompliance items, and accusatory letters.

I'm frustrated.

Astounded.

Mollica knows building.

For more than 20 years, he's owned and operated construction companies, the third generation in his family to do so.

And the more I dig, the worse it gets.

Manhattan Construction received the contract for phase one expansion in 2021.

The pay $309 million for its part of the work Manhattan would build what Atkins designed.

They would connect the existing concourses and make more space for security and waiting areas.

The companies battled almost from the start.

Both the contractor and the engineer said they've never seen a project go this bad this fast, for this long.

You know, Manhattan says it's all Adkins fault, and Adkins says it's all Manhattan's fault.

And I think they're both right, because I think they're both to blame.

Work stopped when Manhattan said Atkins plans would cause the new buildings roof to blow off, and a category five hurricane with winds of 157 miles an hour and greater now Manhattan has asked the airport for another $100 million or more to finish the work.

Some research say like 85% of last year's projects experience, project overruns and delays.

Professor Long Nguyen is chairman of the Whitacre College of Engineering at RFQ.

He says most construction problems are solved quickly, but not this one.

When the small problem occurs, people try to not to go to the bottom of it, but when it slow it, you know, by the time we know it already make, significant delays or cost overruns, it's too late to, you know, bring the project back on track.

Phase one expansion is supposed to give people a more comfortable, a faster and better experience.

Airport workers also would get some more space, and some people are not at all happy with delays and likely extra costs.

You know, I'd be upset if I traveled through here all the time.

It's not a good feeling.

I mean, if we can't rely on them to resolve something like this, right now.

Airport managers Manhattan and Atkins are saying nothing about the situation.

Manhattan has until about mid-March to come up with a timeline and new price tag.

Then the airport board will decide to go with Manhattan again or hire another builder.

Commissioner Bonica says the board has to get it right this time because S w is the number one economic driver for this region.

I want the citizens of Lee County know that as leaders, we will fix this and we're going to succeed.

We will straighten this out.

Whatever happens, the money doesn't come from Lee County property taxes.

It comes from fees from the airlines and grants from the state and federal governments.

For WGCU news, I'm Mike Walcher Now, phase two of the airport expansion is far bigger than phase one with a price tag of $1 billion.

Manhattan Construction is not involved in phase two.

It involves building a second terminal with more gates.

The new terminal work is underway, according to Mollica.

It's going well and should not be delayed by the issues with phase one.

Coming up, all roads lead to Florida as NASA tries to return to the moon.

How?

Florida's long history in space exploration has continued to expand thanks to some of the leading tech companies.

Corporations are pumping billions of dollars into Florida's space industry, leading to unprecedented growth.

Last year, Cape Canaveral hosted a record setting 90 launches.

Those rockets carried more than 1300 payloads, weighing more than 2.5 million pounds, giving us a look at how the space program is changing and growing and what that means to Floridians is Brendan Byrne, space reporter for Central Florida Public Media.

Brendan, thanks so much for joining us.

We appreciate it.

Great to be here.

Thanks for having me.

So I remember, you know, the announcement that the space shuttle program was going to end and hearing that was going to be devastating to Florida's space program.

Tell us really what happened to the space industry when the space shuttle was retired and how we got to where we are now with this explosive growth?

Certainly, it was definitely devastating to the Central Florida economy.

It had been long planned to retire the space shuttle.

The space shuttle was built to bring big, heavy things into orbit, mainly to, to build the International Space Station.

It was a, you know, NASA's pickup truck or semi truck to get cargo into orbit.

But it was also dangerous and expensive.

There were, two missions that ended in the loss of crew 14 in total.

And it was very expensive.

It was not as reusable as hoped, and it didn't fly as often as NASA wanted.

So that decision was made.

It eventually ended in 2011, but NASA still needed to get stuff into space.

So, that's when they began the process of looking for commercial companies to ship supplies up to the International Space Station.

And among some of those companies that were picked, was this scrappy upstart, that we are all very familiar with now, SpaceX.

But it was very close to, to being bankrupt at the time.

They, they were not able to to get their, their Falcon one rocket launched.

And eventually they did get it to launch, with almost no cash left in the tank.

NASA gave them a, a, an award, a contract award to ship supplies to International Space Station, essentially save the company.

Since then, other companies were awarded those contracts, which spurred development.

And then shortly afterwards, NASA was looking for ways to get astronauts to the International Space Station and awarded SpaceX and Boeing those contracts to, to, to to transport astronauts to the space station.

Now, this opens, NASA up to working with commercial partners in a way that it hadn't done before.

Right.

It's looking for services, to get stuff into space and really began the post shuttle boom here along Florida's space Coast.

Run it.

Help us understand the role these private companies play in NASA's big missions is these big priority missions.

I'm thinking about the return to the moon, exploring Mars and of course, maintaining research on the International Space Station.

Yeah.

So these these private companies are really doing the heavy lifting.

NASA likes to think of horizon goals.

So places to go, like, the moon and Mars.

It's kind of doing the long game.

And it's relying on the private partners to, to help, get us there in the short term.

So the Artemis mission, that's our it's our new moonshot that you mentioned, returning humans to the moon for the first time in more than a half century.

That rocket is primarily built by private company Boeing.

The lander that is going to take those astronauts to the lunar surface.

Starship that's built by space X.

Future landers are going to launch, are going to be launched that are built by Jeff Bezos backed companies like Blue Origin.

So those private companies are getting there.

The International Space Station is going to retire in 2030.

The commercial companies, companies like Axiom Space based out of Houston, they're going to be building new space stations that NASA astronauts can use for science and research as well.

So as as NASA looks beyond low-Earth orbit, looks to the moon, looks to Mars.

These private companies are going to be helping with the day to day operations of living and working in space.

Can we end on this?

And that is the economic impact for Floridians.

I assume you've seen tremendous, growth and I'll assume job growth.

That is, there is.

Yeah.

And it expands beyond just launch providers.

One thing you notice here, on the Space Coast is there is so much construction going on at these old launch pads and Cape Canaveral and Kennedy Space Center, they've been dormant since the 1950s and 1960s.

These commercial companies are coming in and they're building new launch pads.

So that is helping with, construction and the labor economy here.

New roads are having to be built to transport these rocket parts and all of the materials that you need to launch things into orbit and really transforming, what is going on along the Space Coast?

There's also areas outside of of these launch facilities that are building the payloads and processing the payloads that are going into space.

In fact, there are vocational programs, in Brevard County, that are teaching high school students how to work on these high tech manufacturing lines to help build all of these satellites that are being launched from the Space Coast.

And it extends even farther.

This, you know, Space Florida, which is the state agency that is in charge of courting these private companies.

They see this as an entire state wide, initiative where you can see all of these space companies are in Jacksonville, they're in South Florida, they're on the West Coast.

They they extend all the way across the state.

So really, we like to call ourselves the doorstep to space.

That's that's Florida, the threshold to orbit.

Brendan Byrne, we so appreciate your coverage of the space industry in our state.

Thank you so much for your good work.

Thank you.

Oh thank you.

My pleasure.

Since 1987, the Florida scrub ja has been listed as a federally threatened species because of its decreasing population and the loss of the animals habitat.

It is the only bird species exclusively found in the Sunshine State.

Numerous bills have been proposed to make the scrub jay Florida's official state bird instead of the northern mockingbird.

Now, a lawsuit is threatening to scrub jays protected status and looks to upend a decades old habitat conservation plan in the process.

To learn more about this lawsuit and how it could impact the Florida scrub recovery efforts, we're joined now by Michael J. Parr, president of the American Bird Conservancy.

Michael, welcome.

Thanks for your time.

Yeah, thanks.

Thanks for asking me to join.

So let's start with this.

Your organization has joined three others recently filing a request to defend the protections for the Florida Scrub J here in southwest Florida.

Explain that plan for us.

And and you know how it's supposed to protect the bird in Charlotte County.

Yeah, well, we're joining, in support of a lawsuit that's been brought against the the Fish and Wildlife Service.

And the concern is that, the Florida scrub j the lawsuit is, is bringing a, a suit basically to remove the the scrub j from protection from the federal Endangered Species Act.

And, you know, the implications of this could be rather far reaching, because the the idea of, of the lawsuit that's being brought that we're defending against is that the species that only occurs in one state should not be governed by the federal Endangered Species Act, but in fact, most of the species listed under the endangered Species Act are actually restricted to single states.

This actually doesn't apply that as much to birds as some other species, but it does apply.

The Florida scrub J applies to some birds in Hawaii.

And the purpose of the Endangered Species Act is to prevent birds from going extinct, regardless if they're in one state or multiple states.

That's the intent of the act, is to protect species from extinction.

So we obviously, as a bird conservation group, want to stand up for that and protect the the scrub j along with other birds that we, we see as conservation targets because they are they need the protection of the Endangered Species Act.

Michael, why is this bird so controversial?

Well, you know, unfortunately, threatened species tend to be threatened because there's some kind of conflict with, habitat use.

They live in places where people also want to live.

And most of the most endangered birds are facing these kinds of issues.

There's, you know, economic reasons or other reasons why people want to live in scrub J habitat.

That's completely valid.

I mean, we understand, you know, people want to have a home.

But in this particular case, there is a fee built into, the land designed to make sure that people and scrub jays can coexist in perpetuity.

So this should be a way to solve this, a way that doesn't require the whole Endangered Species Act to be unraveled.

There is recourse for the land owner.

I don't know if they've pursued that, but I think that would be the first avenue, to look at.

And if not, you know, we have to make some decisions.

What what do we want?

Do we want to have scrub jays at all?

Because eventually, if we keep going like this, we won't have scrub jays.

So there needs to be some agreements around what the limits of development are.

And the science says we need at least 10,000 birds or more for the species to be safe, and we're not even quite there yet.

So we need to we need more habitat, not less.

Michael J. Parr we thank you for your time.

Thank you very much.

Appreciate it.

Coming up.

It's just slightly more complicated than a video game controller.

Lee Health turn students into medical field trainees by allowing them to play with some of their robotics.

Robot assisted surgery continues to grow worldwide.

These devices allow surgeons to offer minimally invasive procedures, which lowers the risk for complications and improves recovery times.

Recently, Lee health gave students a better understanding of robots in the operating room with a hands on approach to learning.

WGCUs Amanda Inscore Whittamore shows us how future medical professionals handled their robotic game of operation.

Lee.

Health doctors recently welcomed middle school students to test out two of the surgical robots used to care for patients at local hospitals.

Set up in a large trailer at Gulf Coast Medical Center, pulmonologist Doctor Shyam Kapadia showed how the robots are used.

So we have two robots here inside.

One of them is our Da Vinci, which is our minimally invasive surgical platform.

We also have our iron robotic system, which allows us to get to the far reaches of the lung to detect lung cancer.

I that my students laughed and cheered as their classmates used the da Vinci robot to pick up $5 bills and rubber bands.

Students also use the iron robot to insert a scope into a model of human lungs.

This is actually something.

They love it.

They think it's so cool that they're able to play with the robots actual robots, not Lego robots, but really understand the impact of what it means for them in the future.

We need to know a lot of physics math.

Exact number.

Doctor Juan Ibarra is the progra manager of robotic surgery for Lee health.

He emphasized how robots can appeal to students interested in fields beyond medicine.

This robotic technology allows them to see what they can do in the medical field, but also can they can do in engineering or in design.

Zoe Teske, a seventh grade student at the Creswell School, tried using a robot.

Yeah, you kind of have to move your hands.

It was hard to move it.

It kept, like freezing, and I was it was really hard.

Kapadia said that Lee health doctors have performed more than 20,000 robotic procedures, 6000 in the last year alone.

These robots take care of people in a way that we weren't able to do ten years ago, before we would have to make a large incision as opposed to now we can make really small holes and take care of the disease that's going on inside of your body.

Kapadia is also passionate about educating kids on lung health and the effects of smoking and vaping.

And why do you avoid that stuff?

It causes cancer, right?

And you want to be able to play with robots, not have one inside.

For WGCU news I'm Amanda Inscore Whittamore.

Coming up next week, the robo revolution continues.

We head to Babcock Ranch to learn about the new technology that is developing first of its kind homes in Southwest Florida, and could lead to the future of construction.

At night, time is a critical part of the day to restore your body and mind.

With Daylight Savings Time on the horizon, a look at how your sleep schedule will change and how that can impact your overall health.

Those stories and more next week.

And for more in-depth interviews and previous segments, be sure to like and subscribe to our YouTube channel to keep up with everything important to Southwest Florida.

Thank you for joining us and have a great week.