Daily Clips for February 2, 2012

PROGRESS FLORIDA IN THE NEWS

Interview with Damien Filer of Progress Florida (audio)
By Jeff Santos
The Jeff Santos Show
Damien Filer is our next guest, political director of Progress Florida, a nonprofit organization promoting progressive values through online organizing, media outreach and organizing, and we bring Damien to our microphones.

FEATURED STORIES

$69.2 billion House budget plan trades increased school funding for Medicaid cuts
By Steve Bousquet
Tampa Bay Times/Miami Herald Tallahassee Bureau
The House is advancing a $69.2 billion no-new-taxes budget that increases college tuition by 8 percent, cuts payments to hospitals and nursing homes and eliminates 4,700 more state jobs, many from the closing of six prisons.

Florida Senate president ousts committee chair for opposing prison privatization
By Dara Kam
Palm Beach Post
Angered at his inability to win votes to privatize Florida prisons, Senate President Mike Haridopolos on Wednesday ousted a budget committee chairman leading the charge against the bill.

Tuition hikes wear thin on students, administrators
By Lindsay Peterson
Tampa Tribune
When Florida lawmakers proposed steadily increasing university tuition until it hit the national average, students and university officials went along because they saw the promise of a better education.

Districts: A mixture of progress, failure
Editorial
Orlando Sentinel
Two years ago, Floridians voted 63-37 to change the state constitution to stop lawmakers from gerrymandering — drawing congressional and legislative districts with incumbents or parties in mind.

FLORIDA POLITICS

House panel approves budget that cuts jobs, preserves benefits
By Travis Pillow
Florida Current
Related: Haridopolos: Senate budget allocations expected next week, cuts possible
The House Appropriations Committee approved a spending plan Wednesday that would cut more than 4,700 state positions, limit some health care services and raise college tuition, while freeing up more than $1 billion in general revenue for education sought by Gov. Rick Scott.

South Florida gambling plans head for trouble
By Kathleen Haughney
Orlando Sentinel
A controversial plan to massively expand gambling in South Florida appears headed for more trouble as the House and Senate move in opposite directions.

Prison privatization plan may be crumbling in Florida Senate
By Kathleen Haughney
Orlando Sentinel
A massive plan to privatize 28 correctional facilities in South Florida appeared to be crumbling Wednesday as opposition to the plan that would cost the region nearly 4,000 jobs rose in the Florida Senate.

Union groups call senator’s chairmanship loss ‘sad,’ ‘deplorable,’ ‘a shame’
By Ashley Lopez
Florida Independent
Related: Corrections workers express fear as prison privatization vote nears
The AFL-CIO and the Florida Education Association are calling yesterday’s announcement that Florida Senate President Mike Haridopolos removed state Sen. Mike Fasano from a committee chairmanship “a shame,” “sad” and “deplorable.”

Democratic Progressive Caucus of Florida calls this week's ALEC meeting a “democracy killer”
By Sean Kinane
WMNF Tampa Bay
ALEC is holding an education reform academy in the Jacksonville area beginning Friday; the Democratic Progressive Caucus of Florida calling the meeting a “democracy killer” and suggests some Florida lawmakers may attend.

POLITICAL RACES

Rev. Jesse Jackson on Fla. primary: 'One person, one vote' undermined by money
By Jeff Weiner
Orlando Sentinel
In all the attack ads Florida voters saw before the Florida primary, not a single one attacked the plight of poor Americans, the Rev. Jesse Jackson said in Orlando on Wednesday.

Romney, Gingrich dig in for long run
By Adam C. Smith and Alex Leary
Tampa Bay Times
Related: More than 40 percent of Florida primary vote was in before polls opened
Had enough of the Republican presidential primary? There's only 95 percent of the race left to run.

Did Floridians vote for Mitt Romney or against Newt Gingrich?
By Doug Sword and Kevin O’Horan
Sarasota Herald-Tribune
Nowhere in Manatee or Sarasota counties did Mitt Romney do better than on the well-to-do southern half of Longboat Key, where he walloped Newt Gingrich by 54 percentage points.

Mitt Romney boosts Connie Mack’s Senate bid
By Erika Bolstad and Marc Caputo
Miami Herald
One of the unexpected winners in Tuesday’s Republican presidential primary in Florida wasn’t even on the ballot: Congressman Connie Mack.

Hasner officially switches races, drops Senate bid
Associated Press
Tampa Tribune
Former State Rep. Adam Hasner is making it official and dropping out of the Republican U.S. Senate primary.

Musical chairs in S. Fla. District 22: Hasner enters, Murphy may leave, 2 Broward Dems ponder
By George Bennett
Palm Beach Post
Related editorial: This battle is for survival
Redistricting-fueled intrigue continues to swirl around Palm Beach-Broward congressional District 22.

ENVIRONMENT AND ENERGY

Under pressure from environmentalists, water privatization proposal scrapped
By Brittany Alana Davis
Tampa Bay Times/Miami Herald Tallahassee Bureau
Under pressure from environmentalists, Tampa Mayor Bob Buckhorn and Rep. Dana Young, R-Tampa, scrapped a controversial proposal Wednesday to "privatize" the state's treated wastewater.

Environmentalists call Florida congressman’s bill ‘a gift to polluter-lobbyists’
By Virginia Chamlee
Florida Independent
A coalition of Florida environmental groups is speaking out against a new bill introduced by Rep. Steve Southerland, R-Panama City, that would, he says, “empower Florida officials, rather than bureaucrats at the EPA” to implement water pollution standards.

Department of Environmental Protection completes oil spill inspections of state beaches
By Virginia Chamlee
Florida Independent
The Florida Department of Environmental Protection today announced it has completed a series of post-hurricane season beach inspections, as part of the response to the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill.

EDUCATION

Florida college, university students to pay 8 percent more tuition under House plan
By Michael Peltier
Naples Daily News
Pitting the chamber against the wishes of Gov. Rick Scott, the House Appropriations Committee on Wednesday approved a spending plan that calls for an 8 percent tuition increase at state colleges and universities.

Rising college costs leave middle class behind
By Scott Maxwell
Orlando Sentinel
Nine years ago, when my son was born, we decided to enroll him in Florida's prepaid tuition plan.

Florida eyes school bus ads for extra money
By Leslie Postal and Lauren Roth
Orlando Sentinel
Florida school districts mired in budget woes might soon get a new fundraising option — selling ad space on their fleets of yellow school buses.

Parent trigger bad policy
Editorial
South Florida Sun Sentinel
It's understandable that parents who have seen little improvement in their children's poor-performing Florida schools would have itchy trigger fingers.

JOBS, BUDGET, AND ECONOMY

Florida Ranks Near Bottom for Income, Financial Security of Residents
By Howard Goodman
Florida Center for Investigative Reporting
In the run-up to Tuesday’s Florida Republican presidential primaries, our state’s distressed economy got national attention from the likes of the New York Times, NBC News and Bloomberg News.

Business-tax breaks exceeding $125 million clears key committee
By Jason Garcia
Orlando Sentinel
An influential state House committee unveiled plans Wednesday for more than $125 million a year worth of new business-tax breaks, ranging from broad cuts sought by Republican Gov. Rick Scott to narrower ones for everyone from manufacturers to private-airplane owners and oil-drilling concerns.

HEALTH AND SENIORS

Senate proposal could reduce hospital plans by 9.5 percent
By Christine Jordan Sexton
Florida Current
Senate Health and Human Services Apropriations Subcommittee Chairman Joe Negron is expecting to have to make $850 million in general revenue reductions next week when his committee meets.

Proposed cuts to Medicaid will impact us all
By Larry Bishop
Florida Today
The reason I write this monthly column is to bring issues to your attention that I believe will impact your health.

Florida's shift to private managed care means longer Medicaid waiting lists, study finds
By Stephen Nohlgren
Tampa Bay Times
When the Legislature decided last year to cap Medicaid funding and turn long-term care over to private managed care companies, some experts warned that growing waiting lists would drive people into expensive nursing homes.

Rep. Stearns at center of Planned Parenthood funding dispute
By Bill Thompson
Ocala Star-Banner
The major player in the fight against breast cancer has cut off funding to Planned Parenthood, reportedly because U.S. Rep. Cliff Stearns is investigating Planned Parenthood for possibly using taxpayer money to pay for abortions.

New Attacks in the Right-Wing War on Women
The Progress Report
Think Progress
Right-wing attacks on abortion and access to basic women’s health care aren’t anything thing new, but in the year since Republicans took control of the House of Representatives and state legislatures across the country, we’ve seen these attacks turn into a full-fledged war on women.

CIVIL RIGHTS, PEACE AND SOCIAL ISSUES

ACLU, Anti-Defamation League denounce state Senate’s school prayer vote
By Ashley Lopez
Florida Independent
Civil rights groups are speaking out against a recent vote in the Florida Senate in favor of a bill that would allow students in public schools to pray during any school event.

Rubio's bill imposes religious agenda in workplace
Editorial
Tampa Bay Times
U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio believes that women who work for religiously affiliated hospitals, universities and charities should be subject to a religious agenda as a condition of their employment.