Senator Rick Scott visits Port Panama City to share plans for ports, Tyndall, and more

A well-known visitor stopped by Port Panama City Thursday; Senator Rick Scott.

During his visit, Senator Scott shared his plan for getting $140 million to help improve ports in Florida, including Port Panama City.

"All of our ports have been growing in the last eight years but the federal government has not been a great partner," said Scott. "While I was governor, we put up the federal share to get projects done. They owed that money back."

Panama City Port Authority Executive Director Wayne Stubbs said the money will fund bulkheads and several other projects.

"We're out of space. That means we need more dredging. We finally found some dollars for dredging but in the years ahead we'll need to expand our facilities," said Stubbs.

Scott said the money will be used to beef up security as well.

"Whether that's at our airports, our seaports, we have to invest more money to make sure we're all protected," said Scott.

Scott also spoke about securing money to help Tyndall Air Force Base rebuild.

"Tyndall's gotta have the money. We've got a disaster bill that we still haven't got approved. Hopefully, we vote on that in the next couple of weeks," said Scott.

During the press conference, Scott said he plans to work on ways to help preserve the environment.