FOUNDATIONAL ISSUES
Foundational Issues for Florida Engineers
Sustained Funding for Critical Infrastructure
Challenge: Underfunding critical infrastructure increases costs in the long term.Insufficient funding for critical infrastructure threatens public safety and human health. Without sustained funding, communities could face unsafe roads, unreliable transit, poor-quality drinking water, and increased pollution, which impede economic growth and prosperity.
Solution: Sufficient, sustained funding will strengthen our economy.
Robust funding to repair, maintain, and modernize critical infrastructure provides the foundation for a strong economy, which attracts investment and creates high-wage jobs. Maintaining the financial integrity of the Transportation Trust Fund is essential to preserving Florida’s ability to invest in safe, reliable, and future‑ready transportation infrastructure. Safeguarding the fund ensures long term stability for projects that support mobility, economic growth, and community resilience for Floridians.
Long Term Cost Savings for Quality Engineering
Challenge: Pressure to prioritize cost savings over quality engineering in publicly funded infrastructure projects results in higher costs down the road.
Safety risks, project delays, and expensive cost overruns are often the result of selecting underqualified engineering firms that offer below market bids to undercut the more qualified competitors.
Solution: Safeguard the Consultants’ Competitive Negotiation Act (CCNA).
Florida’s CCNA requires governments to select engineering professionals based on qualifications first, with the cost of services introduced in subsequent negotiations. Prioritizing qualifications in the procurement process protects taxpayers’ investment in public infrastructure by ensuring projects are designed to industry standards, which saves money in the long term.
Qualified Oversight of the Engineering Profession
Challenge: Spending taxpayer funds on public infrastructure designed by unqualified engineers will erode public trust.
Weakening licensure or defunding oversight of the engineering profession creates preventable threats to public safety and public health. Unqualified individuals could enter the field, leading to unsafe designs that cost additional time and money to repair and replace.
Solution: Preserve the role of Florida’s Professional Engineering Regulatory Board.
Florida’s Professional Engineering Regulatory Board plays a critical role in protecting public safety and public health by setting high standards and accountability for the profession, which ensures qualified engineers are designing critical infrastructure.
Engineering a Cleaner, Healthier Florida
Challenge: Florida’s water resources face growing strain from population growth, aging infrastructure, pollution, emerging contaminants, and increasing flooding risks.
Limited traditional freshwater supplies, impaired rivers and estuaries, contaminants such as PFAS, and more frequent extreme weather events threaten public health, environmental integrity, and the state’s long-term economic stability.
Solution: Florida’s engineers are delivering integrated, forward-looking solutions that secure water supply, improve water quality, and strengthen community resilience.
Through innovative water reuse, advanced treatment technologies, large-scale ecosystem restoration, and data-driven flood mitigation and resiliency projects, engineers are protecting natural systems while meeting the needs of a growing state.
