Daily News Clips for May 24, 2013

PROGRESS FLORIDA IN THE NEWS

Budget cuts making hurricane season more dangerous
By Amanda Warford
WAWS Jacksonville
Excerpt: With six major storms predicted in coming months, Mark Ferrulo, Executive Director of Progress Florida, says the government needs a better plan. "It's just really time Congress gets down to doing the people’s business. Now is not the time to be political posturing.  You're putting lives at risk."

FEATURED STORIES

In Florida, the scheme rises to the top
By Daniel Ruth
Tampa Bay Times
Maybe you are one of those 1 million low-income Floridians who are uninsured and were just informed by the Florida Legislature that if you get sick in this state, buster, you're pretty much on your own.

Left Out: FL’s Poorest Uninsured (AUDIO)
By Carol Gentry
Health News Florida
At 7 a.m. on a Monday morning, poor people who don’t qualify for government health programs such as Medicaid are lined up outside a health department building on a busy street in St. Petersburg.

Heritage president defends Citizens deal
By Charles Elmore
Palm Beach Post
Letters began rolling out to thousands of homeowners in Palm Beach County Thursday as company officials defended a $52 million deal to transfer up to 60,000 Citizens insurance customers to a start-up company that gave to Gov. Rick Scott’s political committee, but one lawmaker blasted it.

Sides debate whether Scott should sign 'Timely Justice Act'
By Patrick Kelly
Gainesville Sun
With 405 prisoners awaiting execution — a death row population exceeded only by California — Florida is looking for a way to speed up the death penalty process.

Boy Scouts End Longtime Ban on Openly Gay Youths
By Eric Eckholm
New York Times
The Boy Scouts of America on Thursday ended its longstanding policy of forbidding openly gay youths to participate in its activities, a step its chief executive called “compassionate, caring and kind.”

BEST OF THE BLOGS

Florida Progressives need to make environmental issues a bigger priority
By Kartik Krishnaiyer
The Florida Squeeze
Last year a coalition of Environmental Groups launched a petition drive to place a constitutional amendment on the 2014 ballot that would guarantee a consistent source of money for environmental protection.

Exonerated Inmates: Florida Bill To Speed Up Executions Would Have Cost Us Our Lives
By Nicole Flatow
Think Progress
Several exonerated men whose innocence of murder was proven years after they were sentenced to death are imploring Gov. Rick Scott (R-FL) not to sign a Florida bill that would set automatic timelines for imposing the death penalty, and likely would have resulted in the execution of these and other innocent people.

Thinking about water and conflict
By Gimleteye
Eye on Miami
Taxpayers view cheap, affordable water as a right. We pay the water utility bill and expect copious clean water to drink, flush and clean.

Falling in love with another girl lands Florida teen in criminal jeopardy
By Joan McCarter
Daily Kos
Florida teen Kaitlyn Hunt, 18, is seeing her young life turned upside down and her future jeopardized simply because she fell in love.

Michelle Rhee’s Pattern of Deceptive Marketing
By Bob Sikes
Scathing Purple Musings
Just days after PBS reporter John Merrow blew the door off Michelle Rhee’s cover-up of widespread cheating that occurred on her DC watch, she looked for a like-minded crowd of education reform partisans for comfort and affirmation.

FLORIDA POLITICS

New insurance deal, governor’s campaign raise eyebrows
By Troy Kinsey
Tampa Bay News 9
Two months after Heritage Insurance gave Governor Rick Scott’s 'Let's Get to Work' political committee $110,000 to help his re-election bid, the upstart company has gotten a $52 million deal with the state-run insurer Citizens whose board the governor helps oversee.

Dems take aim at Buchanan on tax issue
By Jeremy Wallace
Sarasota Herald-Tribune
The more U.S. Rep. Vern Buchanan joins in the criticism of the IRS, the more Democrats are going after him for his own past issues with the agency and demanding he recuse himself from the investigations into the IRS.

Gov. Rick Scott set to act on slate of bills, including some from First Coast lawmakers
By Matt Dixon  
Florida Times-Union
Each year during The Players Championship, Northeast Florida residents look to make a few extra dollars renting their houses out to visitors, golfers and members of the media.

POLITICAL RACES

Poll: Hillary Clinton tops in Iowa for 2016
By Kevin Cirilli
Politico
Hillary Clinton beats Sens. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) and Rand Paul (R-Ky.) in potential 2016 match ups in Iowa, according to a new poll Friday.

Fla GOP notices Nan Rich
By Adam C. Smith
Tampa Bay Times
Great news for longshot Democratic gubernatorial candidate Nan Rich: The Florida GOP is attacking her.

Crist boosts Gwen Graham’s House bid
By William March
Tampa Tribune
Two former governors — once political opponents — headlined a who’s-who-among-Tampa-Democrats fundraiser in Palma Ceia on Wednesday night for a candidate who hopes to retake a Panhandle U.S. House seat for the party.  

ENVIRONMENT AND ENERGY

4 DEP attorneys ousted, prompting Facebook backlash
By Bruce Ritchie
Florida Current
The removal of four Department of Environmental Protection attorneys this week is raising questions among some environmentalists after one attorney wrote that the DEP legal office is moving "not in the direction of environmental protection."

Protect imperiled waterways
By Lisa Rinaman and Jimmy Orth
Florida Today
On one point we can all agree — everyone wants a robust and stable economy that affords opportunities for jobs and economic prosperity.

After veto, Florida coast-to-coast bike trail boosters look for other sources of money
By Martin E. Comas
Orlando Sentinel
A paved bike trail stretching from coast to coast across the center of Florida can still get built despite Gov. Rick Scott's veto of $50 million for the project, state Sen. Andy Gardiner said Thursday.

Congressional committee concerned about the state of U.S. weather forecasting
By Mark K. Matthews
Orlando Sentinel
With memories of Monday's deadly Oklahoma tornado still fresh, a U.S. House panel on Thursday debated the best ways to improve weather forecasting and reduce the number of weather-related deaths -- though firm answers proved elusive.

Forecasters: Thirteen to 20 storms expected in Atlantic this season
By Erika Bolstad
McClatchy Washington Bureau
Expect another busy Atlantic hurricane season, government forecasters said Thursday.

LGBT

Gay community in Orlando applauds Scouts decision
By Jeff Kunerth
Orlando Sentinel
The Boy Scouts of America's decision to lift the ban on gay Scouts is a big step in the right direction, gay community leaders said Thursday.

Boy Scouts of America decision to take in openly gay youth as members a bitter pill for John Stemberger to swallow
By Mitch Perry
Creative Loafing Tampa
John Stemberger is not a happy camper tonight.

Report: Student facing charges in same-sex relationship speaks publicly
Staff Report
Orlando Sentinel
Kaitlyn Hunt, an East Florida high-school student facing felony charges in connection with her same-sex relationship with a younger student, has spoken publicly about her experience, according to WPTV.com.

Felony charge for high-school romance doesn’t make the grade
By Andrew Marra
Palm Beach Post
Around Florida and across the country, cries are going up to “Free Kate!” Count us among them.

EDUCATION

Fla. using federal grant money to settle lawsuit
By Gary Fineout
Associated Press
Florida is dipping into federal grant money that was supposed to help improve the state's schools in order to settle a bitter contract dispute.

New round of FCAT results due Friday
By Jeffrey S. Solochek
Tampa Bay Times
The year's first big release of FCAT results comes Friday.

USF eyes degree programs for termination
By Stephanie Hayes
Tampa Bay Times
In tight financial times, Florida universities have been told to comb degree programs to figure out which ones work, which ones need help and which ones need to go.

FAU’s acting president takes helm after controversies, looks to raise long-frozen faculty pay
By John Lantigua
Palm Beach Post
Dennis Crudele, acting president of Florida Atlantic University after the resignation last week of embattled Mary Jane Saunders, on Thursday defended Saunders’ advocacy for accepting a donation from a private prison group.

JOBS, BUDGET, AND ECONOMY

Florida pays off federal loan used to keep unemployment benefits flowing
By Jeff Harrington
Tampa Bay Times
Here's one more sign Florida's jobs market is reviving: The state has paid back the $3.5 billion loan it needed to pay weekly unemployment benefits during the economic crisis.

In Show of Big Sugar’s Influence, Price Supports Continued in Farm Bill
By Trevor Aaronson
Florida Center for Investigative Reporting
This year’s farm bills in the U.S. House and Senate will cut back on many of the subsidies for the nation’s agriculture industry.

Gov. Scott's justification for rejecting Amazon, jobs, revenueis unreasonable
Editorial
Bradenton Herald
It's impossible to fathom the tortured logic that Gov. Rick Scott expressed in rejecting a sure-fire jobs initiative from none other than Internet retail giant Amazon.

HEALTH AND SENIORS

Video: Should Florida opt-in to the Affordable Care Act?
Staff Report
Florida Today
State Rep. Steve Crisafulli is a Republican who has been elected by peers to serve as House Speaker starting in 2014. Florida Today's Matt Reed asks him about the Affordable Care Act and Medicaid.

St. Mary’s, Bethesda among hospitals pledging no 2014 request for Medicaid-transition cash
By Jim Saunders
News Service of Florida
As Gov. Rick Scott considered budget vetoes last week, some of the state’s best-known hospitals, including St. Mary’s Medical Center and Bethesda Memorial Hospital, feared he would slice $65 million that lawmakers had set aside to help the industry move to a new Medicaid payment system.

Memorial Day: Statewide March Against Genetically Modified Seeds
By Stephanie Carroll Carson
Public News Service Florida
On Saturday, thousands of Floridians will start their Memorial Day weekend by speaking up against an international company.

DCF investigator may have falsified report
Associated Press
Tampa Tribune
Authorities say a child abuse investigator may have falsified the substance abuse screening of a South Florida mother who later left her baby to die in a hot car.

IMMIGRATION, CIVIL RIGHTS AND SOCIAL ISSUES

Survey reveals Floridians conflicted about immigrants, related policies
By Peter Schorsch
Saint Petersblog
Floridians have negative feelings about undocumented immigrants, but an overwhelming majority favor policy that would allow such immigrants a path to U.S. citizenship, a new University of Florida Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences survey suggests.

JUSTICE AND THE COURTS

Defense releases photos, texts of Trayvon Martin
By Mike Schneider
Associated Press
Data released Thursday by the defense from slain Florida teenager Trayvon Martin's cellphone includes texts with a friend about fighting, smoking pot and being forced to move out of his mother's house because of trouble at school, as well as photos of a gun and what looks to be a potted marijuana plant.

Condemned Man To Be Mentally Evaluated
Staff Report
Lakeland Ledger
Gov. Rick Scott has appointed a panel to examine whether a man set to be executed next month is mentally competent.

Justice for poor affirmed
Editorial
Tampa Bay Times
The Florida Supreme Court embraced justice for all Floridians on Thursday when it reaffirmed the right of the poor to adequate legal counsel.