PROGRESS FLORIDA IN THE NEWS
By Lesley Clark
Excerpt: Progress Florida, which has opposed past efforts to lift bans on offshore oil drilling, reacted quickly to the news. "Offshore drilling, especially drilling as close as 4 miles from Florida's Atlantic beaches, tastes bad no matter which president from whatever party is serving it," said Mark Ferrulo, director of Progress Florida. "The President's support doesn't change the facts, expanded drilling won't lower gas prices and it represents a dirty and dangerous activity that risks catastrophic damage to our beloved beaches."
By Eric Staats
March 31, 2010
'Drill, baby, drill' -- Obama channels Sarah Palin but Republicans complain anyway
Los Angeles Times
FEATURED STORIES
By Aaron Deslatte
Ousted former Republican Party of Florida Chairman Jim Greer is under criminal investigation over a secret fundraising contract he signed last year with then-executive director Delmar Johnson that auditors have concluded paid them both at least $200,000 and sparked a revolt within the party.
By Mac Caputo and Steve Bousquet
The state Senate shifted rightward Wednesday by pushing plans to give private companies more tax money to manage prison operations and health care for the poor.
By Cristina Silva and Mary Ellen Klas
House lawmakers have been warned: Republican leaders do not want to see any amendments to the widely opposed "teacher tenure" bill because they want to push it through to the governor's desk, Speaker Larry Cretul said Wednesday.
By Alex Leary and Craig Pittman
Related: Newt Gingrich in St. Petersburg, supports drilling now
President Barack Obama moved decisively Wednesday to eliminate a hard-fought federal ban on oil drilling off Florida's west coast, drawing mixed political reaction and outrage from environmentalists.
By Paul Quinlan
The federal judge overseeing Everglades cleanup issued a ruling Wednesday that could be the death knell for Gov. Charlie Crist's controversial Everglades restoration land deal with U.S. Sugar Corp.
By Bill McCollum
Related editorial: Health care lawsuit more about politics than Constitution
LEGISLATIVE SESSION
By Jim Ash and Bill Cotterell
The Senate voted 36-0 on Wednesday to approve a $68.6 billion spending plan, setting up negotiations with the House, where leaders insist on spending $1 billion less.
By Josh Hafenbrack and Aaron Deslatte
The Florida Senate approved a bipartisan, $69.5-billion budget Wednesday that relies on gambling and federal stimulus money to both cut taxes and grow government spending.
By Gina Presson
Balancing the state budget in Florida has been a challenge.
By Dara Kam
Senate budget chief J.D. Alexander backed off a prison privatization plan that could have closed five state prisons, laid off more than 2,000 corrections workers and let as many inmates free early.
By Bill Cotterell
Government employees would begin paying into the Florida Retirement System, under a bill approved Wednesday by the Florida Senate.
By Bill Cotterell
The Florida Senate voted to break up the "embarrassing" Department of Management Services today, creating a new personnel agency and sending property-management functions to other state offices.
By News Service of Florida
A tweak to the state budget could provide $200,000 to create a commission through the Supreme Court to investigate wrongful convictions in Florida.
By Gina Jordan
It's not the glamour of show business that's behind a push to provide tax breaks to the film and entertainment industry in Florida.
By Gary Fineout
A bill to allow gay adoption, a sweeping anti-abortion measure and even a bill that mandates that children up to age 7 sit in car booster seats are among the hundreds of pieces of legislation that appear dead for the 2010 session.
By Jim Saunders
The 2010 legislative session is halfway done. But for many lawmakers, health groups and lobbyists, that just highlights this painful point: Their favorite bills are in neverland.
By Dan Gelber
Florida's annual Sunshine Week, held in March, is meant to encourage Floridians to learn about the benefits of an open and transparent government. However, the citizenry has a long way to go before it has a true open and transparent state Legislature.
POLITICAL RACES
By John Frank and Steve Bousquet
Gov. Charlie Crist's handpicked former GOP chairman is the subject of a criminal probe concerning a secret contract that funneled party money to a consulting company he owned, the party and the state's top law enforcement agency disclosed Wednesday.
By Bill Cotterell
The Republican Party of Florida's former chairman is under criminal investigation by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement in an alleged scheme to skim political contributions.
By Gary Fineout
The financial scandal that caused Republicans to oust their former party chairman earlier this year has now turned into a full-blown criminal investigation that is casting a long shadow over the U.S. Senate campaign of Gov. Charlie Crist.
The Associated Press
Former Miami Dolphins coach Don Shula is sticking with a former quarterback in Florida's U.S. Senate race.
BALLOT INITIATIVES
By Jeff Burlew
Most Floridians support the "Hometown Democracy" constitutional amendment but not in high enough numbers to pass the controversial measure this fall, according to the fourth annual Sunshine State survey, released today.
By Mitch Perry
One of the most interesting state wide races this year will Amendment Four, the Hometown Democracy Amendment.
ENVIRONMENT AND ENERGY
By Michael C. Bender
Oil and gas rigs could drill 105 miles closer to Florida beaches under a plan President Obama said today would strengthen national security and boost the depressed economy.
By Curtis Morgan
The Miami federal judge overseeing Everglades cleanup issued a ruling Wednesday that could prove the final nail in the coffin of Gov. Charlie Crist's controversial Big Sugar land buy -- or serve as a judicial kick in the butt to finally seal the much-delayed, twice-downsized deal.
By Kate Bradshaw
Environmentalists say a bill that the Florida House of Representatives is slated to take up next week may adversely impact Florida's water resources.
By Bruce Ritchie
Representatives of Florida cities and counties were warned Tuesday that there may not be state grant money again this year for their park and open space purchases.
LGBT
By Robert Lorei
For 33 years the State of Florida has banned adoptions by gay or lesbian couples.
By Lesley Clark
As he awaits a court ruling on the constitutionality of Florida's law banning gay people from adopting, Frank Gill and his recently adopted sons will attend this year's White House Easter Egg Roll.
Editorial
The Florida Legislature is setting its sights on rubbing out some of the state's most outdated and nonsensical laws, like the requirement that sheriffs live close enough to the county seat to get there by horse, or rules that regulate telegraph services that don't even exist any more.
EDUCATION
By Michael Mayo
In the last few weeks, Florida legislators have taken steps to overhaul teachers' salaries and raises, gut pensions and job security, and take standardized testing to a whole new insane level.
By Abel Harding
A new group - No Tallahassee Takeover, Inc. - has launched a Facebook page, Twitter account and unleashed an ad that directly targets State Senate President Jeff Atwater, R-North Palm Beach.
By Cindy Swirko
More than 200 Alachua County school employees rallied Wednesday against bills being considered by the Florida Legislature that they say will cut benefits, reduce classroom spending, increase testing and curtail local control.
JOBS, BUDGET, AND ECONOMY
By Christian M. Wade
Floridians are still very concerned about the economy and don't believe that the state government has been doing enough to create jobs and attract new investment.
By Mark K. Matthews and Robert Block
Obama NASA future: His budget for Kennedy Space Center has become a target for congressional critics who see it as an example of all that's wrong with his entire NASA proposal.
By Gregory Lewis
Recently in last place, Florida is catching up with the rest of the nation at returning U.S. Census forms.
HEALTH AND SENIORS
The Progress Report
Since the health care debate began over a year ago, Republicans and their conservative allies have relied on distortions, fabrications, and outright lies in their attempt to kill reform.
By John Lantigua
Democratic party leaders have pledged to pay for the new $940 billion health care reform law, in large part, by eliminating $500 billion in waste and fraud in Medicare over the next decade.
By John Dorschner
In a crucial issue for South Florida, one of the two original major components of healthcare reform was pushed to the background by the time the bill was finished last week -- controlling America's world-highest healthcare costs.
By Jim Turner
U.S. Reps. Tom Rooney, R-Tequesta, and Bill Posey, R-Rockledge, were among 11 Republicans from Florida to back Florida Attorney General Bill McCollum's lawsuit asking to overturn the massive health-care overhaul.
By Carol Gentry
A multinational company and two members of the Fortune 500 were named among six insurers found in violation of Medicare marketing rules when federal inspectors checked their books and sat in on presentations as "secret shoppers," documents show.
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