Daily Clips for June 6, 2012

PROGRESS FLORIDA IN THE NEWS

Retirees, Super-PACs Boost Romney Over Obama in Florida
By Kenric Ward
Sunshine State News
Excerpt: Damien Filer, political director for the liberal group Progress Florida, said, "Florida voters want a fair shot at the American Dream, but Romney has one set of rules for the super-rich and another set for everyone else. "No amount of campaign cash will allow him to sell that bill of goods here in Florida," Filer said.

FEATURED STORIES

Gov. Rick Scott looks ready to fight DOJ over voter purge
By Marc Caputo
Miami Herald
Gov. Rick Scott’s administration is positioning itself for a showdown with the U.S. Department of Justice for demanding that Florida cease searching for and purging noncitizen voters.

Statistics show voter fraud is a rare occurrence in Florida
By Kathleen Haughney
Orlando Sentinel
Gov. Rick Scott and his Department of State have been talking about voter fraud in Florida since 2011, shortly after Scott took office.

Florida's top wetlands expert reinstated, but details remain murky
By Craig Pittman
Tampa Bay Times
The state's top wetlands expert has been reinstated after a three-week investigation, but the question of who initiated it and why remains unclear.

Most Florida students pass FCAT reading, math
By James Call
Florida Current
While state education officials were releasing the final batch of Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test 2.0 scores in reading and math, an outside audit offered only "educated speculations" Tuesday for drastically lower writing scores.

Rubio’s Chief of Staff Still Has Ties to Lobbying Firm
By Ashley Lopez
Florida Center for Investigative Reporting
U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., continues to move a little closer to being that “Washington insider” he campaigned against in 2010.

FLORIDA POLITICS

Moveon.org targets Gov. Rick Scott over non-citizen voter purge
By Dara Kam
Palm Beach Post
Activists at Moveon.org have launched a campaign demanding that Gov. Rick Scott drop a controversial non-citizen voter purge, calling it “the worst attack on voting rights in the country.”

A Floridian horror story
Editorial
Pensacola News Journal
As if the impending zombie apocalypse wasn’t enough to make modern living a terrifying experience, we Floridians have another sinister horde set to overtake society from the peninsula to panhandle: non-citizen voters!

League, other organizations gear up for voter registration drive
By Lloyd Dunkelberger
Sarasota Herald-Tribune
Faced with the prospect of harsh penalties under Florida’s new elections law, the League of Women Voters of Florida has been unable to register voters for the last year — an unprecedented hiatus in the civic group’s 72-year history.

Gov. Rick Scott's office admits 'oversight,' writes welcome letter for Palestinian-American group after all
By Matt Dixon
Florida Times-Union
A group representing Christian Palestinian Americans says it feels "mistreated" and is asking for an in-person apology from Gov. Rick Scott after he initially declined to write a welcome letter for its national convention in Orlando.

Another inevitable lawsuit
Editorial
Miami Herald
It was inevitable. Odebrecht USA, the American subsidiary of the Brazilian engineering, construction and energy multinational company, has filed a lawsuit in Miami federal court challenging a new state law that would ban state agencies and local governments from doing business with any company that also works in countries on the U.S. terror list, such as Cuba and Syria.

POLITICAL RACES

Walker survives recall election in Wisconsin
Associated Press
Tampa Tribune
Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker beat back a recall challenge Tuesday, winning both the right to finish his term and a voter endorsement of his strategy to curb state spending, which included the explosive measure that eliminated union rights for most public workers.

Obama up in Florida
By Tom Jensen
Public Policy Polling
PPP's newest Florida poll finds little change in the state compared to mid-April.

Ann Romney campaigns in Miami
By Daniela Guzman
Miami Herald
Mitt Romney’s wife, Ann, dropped by the Islas Canarias restaurant on Tuesday to talk to local Republican women, weaving a message that was both personal and political to a partisan crowd of supporters.

RNC party at Tropicana Field on Aug. 26 will have a zone for protesters
By Michael Van Sickler
Tampa Bay Times
Less than a month after Tampa approved rules for protests outside the Republican National Convention, officials in St. Petersburg are drafting similar regulations for an Aug. 26 kickoff event expected to take place at Tropicana Field.

LeMieux tells Niceville crowd he embraces tea party
By Tom McLaughlin
Northwest Florida Daily News
The tea party is alive and well locally, and its members came out in droves Tuesday to hear U.S. Senate candidate George LeMieux.

ENVIRONMENT AND ENERGY

Congress to pour millions into Everglades
By William E. Gibson
South Florida Sun Sentinel
The U.S. House today is expected to pass a bill that would pour $145 million into Everglades restoration projects from the Kissimmee Valley south of Orlando to a series of reservoirs in Palm Beach and Broward counties.

Sea Level Rise is real, predictions still to come
By Janelle Irwin
WMNF Tampa
New technology is making it easier for scientists to study changes in sea levels.

LGBT

ACLU moves to force Vanguard High to allow Gay-Straight Alliance
By Vishal Persaud
Ocala Star-Banner
The American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Florida has filed a motion requesting that a federal court order Marion County Schools Superintendent Jim Yancey and the School Board to reverse their refusal to allow two students to start a Gay-Straight Alliance at Vanguard High School.

EDUCATION

Independent review finds no problems with state FCAT scoring process
By Allison Ross-Ferrelli
Palm Beach Post
An independent organization hired by the state to do an analysis of the writing FCAT scoring process found that the state and its testing contractor meet "the standards of best practices in state-wide testing of writing," according a report released today .

Back off on FCAT testing, Osceola school board tells state
By David Breen and Lauren Roth
Orlando Sentinel
On the day the state released FCAT scores in reading, math and science, opposition to the testing program continued on two fronts in Central Florida.

School board takes stand against high-stakes testing
By Joey Flechas
Gainesville Sun
A resolution opposing the increasing use of high-stakes testing to evaluate students and educators was unanimously approved Tuesday by the Alachua County School Board.

Manatee school board members concerned about cost, burden of teacher evaluations
By Christine Hawes
Bradenton Herald
The new state mandate for teacher evaluations may sound good on the surface, but implementing the requirement may be inordinately expensive, time-consuming and complicated, school board members learned Tuesday at a workshop.

Florida community college professors say they oppose change to tenure rules
By Khristopher J. Brooks
Florida Times-Union
Florida's Department of Education is considering revising the policy that governs when a community college professor can apply for tenure.

Polytechnic board nets more than 80 applicants
Staff Report
Florida Current
As state education officials rush to build Florida Polytechnic University almost from scratch, about 80 people are vying for a chance to oversee the process.

JOBS, BUDGET, AND ECONOMY

Republicans Block Paycheck Fairness Act
The Progress Report
Think Progress
In their latest assault on women, Senate Republicans today unanimously blocked the Senate from even taking up the Paycheck Fairness Act. By contrast, every single Democrat voted in favor of the bill.

Rubio, Nelson split votes on pay equity bill
By Alex Leary
Tampa Bay Times
Florida Sens. Marco Rubio and Bill Nelson voted with their respective parties on a measure today that would have made it easier for women to seek equal pay as men.

Citizens insurance rates spark North vs. South battle
By Regan McCarthy
WFSU Tallahassee
Twenty-five Florida lawmakers are supporting a move by the state-backed Citizens Property Insurance Co., to reduce its size. But  it’s turned into something of a North versus South battle.

Housing agency expands eligibility for foreclosure prevention program
By Gray Rohrer
Florida Current
The U.S. Treasury Department last week approved the changes to a mortgage prevention program sought by the Florida Housing Finance Corp. that are designed to increase the number of homeowners helped by the program.

FL Habitat for Humanity Impacted by Budget
By Stephanie Carroll Carson
Public News Service Florida
Cuts to federal programs loom large over Florida's Habitat for Humanity chapters.

HEALTH AND SENIORS

4 Reasons why the Affordable Care Act (ACA) is good for Women
By Jenna Tosh
Orlando Sentinel
Many readers may not know this, but 1 in 5 American women has relied on Planned Parenthood’s low-cost health services at some point in her life.

Ahead Of Elections, GOP Readies Vote On Repealing Parts Of Health Law
By Mary Agnes Carey
Kaiser Health News
KHN's Mary Agnes Carey talks with Jackie Judd about two measures from the health law that the House GOP will attempt to roll back in votes this week.

ALF panel begins negotiations on tougher regulations
By James Call
Florida Current
The first of six public meetings to negotiate the rulemaking proposals for assisted living facilities (ALFs) was held Tuesday in Tallahassee.

CIVIL RIGHTS, PEACE AND SOCIAL ISSUES

UCF-Sentinel forum tackles issues of homelessness
By Kate Santich
Orlando Sentinel
Related: Crusade for homeless too crucial to abandon
Destiny Raynor is only 15, but she can already tell you what's wrong with the would-be safety net of homeless services in Central Florida.

What To Do With The Truth?
By Mary Jo Melone
Florida Voices
Could the facts really be heeded for once?

JUSTICE AND THE COURTS

Scott sends review of three justices to FDLE
By John Kennedy
Palm Beach Post
Gov. Rick Scott asked the Florida Department of Law Enforcement on Monday to review a legislator’s call for it investigate whether laws were broken by three Florida Supreme Court justices who received staff help in submitting their campaign papers to state elections officials.

Florida leads nation in longer prison sentences, study finds
By Aaron Deslatte
Orlando Sentinel
Thanks to its gung-ho approach to lengthening jail time, Florida led the charge in beefing up prison sentences during the past two decades at a taxpayer cost of more than $1 billion a year, according to a new study by the Pew Center on the States.