Daily News Clips for May 6, 2013

PROGRESS FLORIDA IN THE NEWS

Special-interest successes mark legislative session
By Aaron Deslatte and Jason Garcia
Orlando Sentinel
Excerpt: But the session was also defined by some of the biggest-spending industry groups getting their way on major bills that hit their bottom lines. "What Republican leadership delivered was a 60-day corporate-special-interest feeding frenzy," said Progress Florida Executive Director Mark Ferrulo.

Tallahassee Roundup: Week 9
By Staff Report
Bradenton Times
Excerpt: Mark Ferrulo, executive director of the watchdog group Progress Florida, summed up the session as a giant disappointment. "In dissecting the 2013 legislative session," said Ferrulo, "one thing is clear, Florida has the wrong leaders with the wrong priorities. Floridians want effective and efficient government that improves our quality of life and protects the middle class. What Republican leadership delivered was a 60 day corporate special interest feeding frenzy."

FEATURED STORIES

Florida Legislature wraps up 2013 session with bipartisan tone
By Steve Bousquet and Mary Ellen Klas
Times/Herald Tallahassee Bureau
Related: 2013 session: Which bills passed, which bills failed
The Florida Legislature concluded its 2013 session Friday in a burst of bipartisanship, taking advantage of a resurgent economy to overwhelmingly pass the biggest budget in history and giving pay raises to state workers for the first time in seven years.

Hefty budget poses stark spending choices for Gov. Rick Scott
By Steve Bousquet
Times/Herald Tallahassee Bureau
The Florida Legislature's hard work is over and Gov. Rick Scott's is just beginning.

Legislature's inaction on Medicaid reform comes at a price
By Tia Mitchell
Times/Herald Tallahassee Bureau
Related editorial: The Legislature’s $51 billion failure
Republican lawmakers say they are champions for Florida's businesses. But their failure to expand health insurance coverage to 1 million or more Floridians will put many employers in a financial lurch.

Florida's shame: the Florida House
Editorial
South Florida Sun Sentinel
The legislative session ended Friday with state lawmakers scurrying out of Tallahassee with the one thing 3.8 million of their fellow Floridians lack — decent health care.

This Week in Poverty: Florida Gives Workers a Smackdown
By Greg Kaufmann
The Nation
If the Florida House Republicans have their way, here is what the state’s workers would stand to lose: paid sick leave, a living wage, wage theft protections and equal opportunity benefits (for same sex couples, for example).

Florida Lawmakers Approve Overhaul of State’s Problem-Ridden Voting Process
By Lizette Alvarez
New York Times
Six months after Florida became the butt of late-night jokes for a chaotic voting process that bedeviled the 2012 presidential election, the State Legislature passed a bill on Friday to remedy many of those problems.

EDITORIAL CARTOON OF THE WEEK

By Andy Marlette
Pensacola News Journal

FLORIDA POLITICS

The 2013 legislative session's biggest winners, losers
By Kathleen Haughney
Orlando Sentinel
Lawmakers put to bed another legislative session Friday night and, as usual, some people in Florida came out big winners and others came out losers.

Florida Legislature's evaluation: needs (lots of) improvement
By John Romano
Tampa Bay Times
All in all, during the final hours and days of the 2013 legislative session, your state lawmakers seemed very happy with themselves.

Gov. Scott has better session
By Jeremy Wallace
Sarasota Herald-Tribune
With a moderating tone and more deft political touch, Florida Gov. Rick Scott unquestionably had his best session since he was elected governor.

Two steps forward, one back on elections
Editorial
Tampa Bay Times
No one could have anticipated that after Florida's embarrassing November election that Tallahassee's mea culpa to voters would take the entire nine weeks of the legislative session to arrive.

Alimony Reform Supporters Shocked By Veto, Say They'll Be Back With Another Bill
By Ryan Benk  
WFSU Tallahassee
Both supporters and opponents of an alimony reform bill got a big surprise when Florida Governor Rick Scott vetoed the proposed reform late Wednesday night. But, that might not be the end to the alimony debate.

Affordable-housing developers under investigation contributed to Miami-Dade political campaigns
By Patricia Mazzei
Miami Herald
The affordable-housing developers under investigation by a Miami federal grand jury for allegedly defrauding the U.S. government out of tax subsidies have contributed generously to politicians who in many cases had a say in funding the builders’ projects.

Lawmaker's company, Hardee grant under scrutiny
By William March
Tampa Tribune
A Tampa lawmaker's use of public grant money to bring high-tech business to a poor, rural county has set off allegations of conflict of interest and misuse of public money, including an FDLE investigation.

Fla GOP hires new executive director
By Adam C. Smith
Tampa Bay Times
The Florida Republican party has hired a new executive director to succeed Mike Grissom, who has moved on to the Florida Chamber.

10 people who deserve to be "Great Floridians" more than Bubba Watson
By Craig Pittman
Tampa Bay Times
Last month, Gov. Rick Scott named golfer Gerry Lester "Bubba" Watson Jr. and 22 other people (including some unemployed guy named Tebow) to the state's official list of "Great Floridians."  

ENVIRONMENT AND ENERGY

Senate, House agree on permitting legislation despite groups' sustained opposition
By Bruce Ritchie
Florida Current
The House on Friday approved a stripped-down environmental permitting bill, ending a session in which environmentalists said they again played defense to prevent bad bills from passing.

Study: phosphate mine expansion will cause 'significant' wetlands damage
By Craig Pittman
Tampa Bay Times
Creating three phosphate mines and expanding a fourth will destroy nearly 10,000 acres of wetlands and 50 miles of streams, causing a "significant impact," according to a study prepared to guide permitting by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

Miami congressman trekked to Everglades to meet U.S. secretary
By Curtis Morgan
Miami Herald
A scheduling conflict — namely, a meeting with Gov. Rick Scott — kept U.S. Rep. Joe Garcia from joining new Interior Secretary Sally Jewell for an air boat trip through the Everglades last week.

PSC's Lisa Edgar runs into rough patch in Senate before winning confirmation
By Bruce Ritchie
Florida Current
After clearing two committees without opposing votes, Lisa Edgar ran into opposition on the Senate floor Friday during her confirmation vote to continue to serve on the Public Service Commission.

LGBT

Obama supports including gays in immigration bill
Associated Press
Miami Herald
President Barack Obama says he supports recognizing gay unions in a broad immigration bill pending in Congress but won't say whether he would sign legislation that fails to do so.

A gay problem for Charlie Crist
By Adam C. Smith
Tampa Bay Times
Charlie Crist will be the keynote speaker at the joint "Kennedy-King Dinner" sponsored by the Hillsborough and Pinellas Democratic parties Saturday, May 11 at the Tampa Convention Center.

Billy Bean: It’s Jason Collins’ story, but it’s our day
By Billy Bean
Miami Herald
When I awoke early Monday morning, there were 25 text messages waiting on my phone.

EDUCATION

Florida lawmakers boost education spending, expand online learning
By Kathleen McGrory
Times/Herald Tallahassee Bureau
Teachers won raises. School districts got a boost in per-pupil funding. Charter schools nearly doubled their construction and maintenance dollars.

Education 'renaissance': Schools policy emerges as session focus
By Travis Pillow
Tallahassee Democrat
Some Florida middle and high school students will soon face new questions as they plan their course schedules.

Two-year degrees take longer in Florida
By Dave Breitenstein
Ft. Myers News-Press
Associate degrees are designed as two-year programs, but that doesn’t mean it takes two years to finish.

JOBS, BUDGET, AND ECONOMY

Tax-cut vote shows might trumps right
By Aaron Deslatte
Orlando Sentinel
The Florida House of Representatives embarrassed itself this week by ramming through a tax-cut that turns one of Gov. Rick Scott's top legislative priorities into potential litigation fodder.

Teachers, state workers get pay boost in $74.5 budget passed on final day of session
By Gray Rohrer
Florida Current
Teachers and state workers are poised to receive pay raises, the Everglades will get robust funding and transportation funding saw a 15 percent increase in the $74.5 billion spending plan (SB 1500) passed Friday by the Legislature.

Citizens' sinkhole 'glitch' grows; premiums plunge if coverage dropped
By Susan Taylor Martin
Tampa Bay Times
Faced with skyrocketing premiums, thousands of Florida homeowners have been dropping sinkhole coverage they get through Citizens Property Insurance Corp.

Why Dolphins owner Stephen Ross — not House Speaker Will Weatherford — owns stadium-deal death
By Marc Caputo
Miami Herald
Success has many fathers in the Florida Legislature. The Miami Dolphins stadium deal is an orphan.

Even as economy recovers, long-term jobless struggle
By Jim Stratton
Orlando Sentinel
After a recession, here is the way things are supposed to work.

Jobless-claim process breeds frustration
By Jim Stratton
Orlando Sentinel
In 2009, as Florida's labor market slid into a sinkhole, I wrote this about the state unemployment system.

HEALTH AND SENIORS

Democrats wait for Scott to step up on health care
By James Call
Florida Current
Supporters of using federal money to reduce the number of uninsured Floridians are putting their ducks in place.

Doctor Protests Misuse of His Research for Politics
By Carol Gentry
Health News Florida
When science bumps up against politics, it can get bruised, even distorted beyond recognition.

On Medicaid, GOP politics trumps common sense
Editorial
Miami Herald
Surely the people of Florida had a right to expect that during the 60 days of the annual legislative session lawmakers would find a way to accept the federal government’s offer of $51 billion over the next decade to expand Medicaid.

House fails Florida on Medicaid solution
Editorial
Tampa Tribune
Put the blame squarely on House Speaker Will Weatherford, a Republican from Wesley Chapel who put his notion of conservative politics ahead of common sense.

Florida lawmakers protect bunnies, not the uninsured
Associated Press
Tampa Tribune
Florida lawmakers couldn't find a way to provide health care coverage for the state's 1.1 million uninsured residents, but they did pass a bill that would make it illegal to dye bunnies and chicks and another that would prevent people from using food stamps at strip bars.

Could Florida rejection hurt Obamacare?
By Laura Green
Palm Beach Post
When Florida Gov. Rick Scott agreed to expand Medicaid under President Barack Obama’s health-care law, it was hailed as a tipping point.

Assisted living facility reforms fail to pass
By Rochelle Koff
Herald/Times Tallahassee Bureau
A last-ditch attempt to pass legislation to reform the state’s assisted living facilities, measures sought since a 2011 Miami Herald investigation revealed neglect, abuse and death of ALF residents, failed on the last day of Florida’s legislative session.

Bill containing maternity unit for Miami Children's headed to Gov. Scott
By Tia Mitchell
Times/Herald Tallahassee Bureau
The next-to-last bill approved by the Florida Senate before session adjourned Friday authorized a 10-bed maternity wing at Miami Children's Hospital.

Villages get retirement home, Gaetz a trauma center
By James Call
Florida Current
The Florida Legislature found compromise on three health-related issues during the session’s final hour.

IMMIGRATION, CIVIL RIGHTS AND SOCIAL ISSUES

Unlikely allies, enemies for conservative Rubio on immigration reform
By George Bennett
Palm Beach Post
Organizing For Action — the policy-pushing remnant of President Barack Obama’s 2012 campaign — has brought demonstrators to Republican Sen. Marco Rubio’s Palm Beach Gardens office in recent months to criticize his stance on automatic spending cuts and gun control.

JUSTICE AND THE COURTS

Swift is not sure on death penalty
Editorial
Tampa Bay Times
In Florida and other death penalty states, it can take years and even decades for evidence of a prisoner's innocence to come out.