How infrastructure bill will impact Palm Beach County

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. (CBS12) — The bipartisan, trillion-dollar infrastructure bill is expected to be signed by the president early next week. It will bring billions of dollars to Florida.

Palm Beach County spends about $20 million to upgrade our roads each year. With this new infrastructure bill, there should be $6-7 million more to go around.

Nick Uhren is in charge of the Palm Beach Planning and Transportation Agency, known as the TPA.

“We need to reconstruct our transportation system with all of our users in mind and this bill will provide additional resources to allow us to do more of that and do it more quickly,” he said.

In Palm Beach County, there isn’t a keystone project like a brand-new bridge. But you’ll notice roads becoming easier to navigate at problem intersections and safer for everyone on four wheels, two wheels or two feet.

And I-95 improvements that might not have happened for years are getting started a lot sooner.

Both of Florida’s Republican senators voted against this bill. And Governor Ron DeSantis warned about a study tucked into the small print that could change how drivers pay taxes.

“They want to monitor the mileage that you are driving in your car, and then tax you per mile. They open the door for that in the bill, and that will never fly in the state of Florida,” he said recently.

Agriculture Commissioner Nikki Fried thinks the bill is great news for Floridians but wishes we could have received more.

“This is a great starting place. Is it ever going to be enough? No, but certainly this is historic in what we can do moving forward,” she said.

Some of the funding in the bill requires local governments to match it dollar for dollar. In Broward County, where they have a transportation tax, they’re well positioned to take advantage.

Something the TPA is starting the conversation about in Palm Beach County, would voters support a similar tax?