Welcome to

Despite one of the meekest state budgets in years, Crist recommended that lawmakers adopt his plan to provide health care to the needy.

�This lack of access to health care is unacceptable. Together we can seek a comprehensive, market based strategy that can provide uninsured Floridians with affordable health and dental care. I am proposing 63.9 million for the Florida Health Access System. This three year pilot joins the State, local hospitals and county health departments in partnerships to provide preventive and primary health care service to the uninsured,� said Crist.

After Tuesday night’s State of the State address, Governor Charlie Crist spoke with reporters about the Florida�s delegate debacle.

�The people have already voted in Florida and that vote needs to be respected, it needs to be recognized. Those Delegates need to be seated and it�s not just the Democratic party, it’s my own party as well, they�re not seating half of ours, so I hope cooler heads prevail and the leaders of the DNC and the RNC will seat all the delegates at their respective convention,� Crist said.

The Florida Legislature is back in session. The opening gavel sounded just after 11 this morning. As Mike Vasilinda tells us, Making do with less is going to make this one of the toughest sessions in two decades.

The gavel marked the 110th time lawmakers have met since statehood

�So please, Oh God…� Two ministers, a priest and a rabbi took note of the state�s dire straights.
Rabbi Jack Romberg of Tallahassee told lawmakers not to forget children �Whatever sacrifices must be made, let them not be at the expense of our children.�

The first thing lawmakers must do is cut half a billion from the current budge. Then reduce next years spending by 5 times that much. Senate President Ken Pruitt told fellow senators darkness is always followed by light. �It�s times like these when our metal is tested. It�s a whole lot easier when there�s a lot of money.�

The House Speaker painted a much darker picture. Marco Rubio made it clear no taxes or fees are on his plate.
�It�s not a bad year for government, it�s a bad year for people. There�s a reason we have less revenue, it�s because people have less money. They�re suffering economically. People are hurting.�

It is ironic that it�s raining here on opening day, because the biggest battle is between the governor and the legislature over the state�s use of the rainy day fund to plug a budget hole.

There will also be a battle over who sets tuition and controls the state universities…The Board of Governors or the Legislature. �Do they want an unelected board to set tuition?� was the rhetorical question asked by Senate President Ken Pruitt in his opening address.

By the end of the 60 day session, hundreds of bills will be considered. The state land buying program will be renewed, more cameras to catch red light runners will be authorized. But in the end, the state will have less money to spend than it has the last two years.

State employees are on pins and needles across the state. Tight budgeting has potential pay raises in limbo. Governor Charlie Crist has proposed a 2 percent pay hike, but some lawmakers are balking. State Senator Al Lawson, whose district includes Tallahassee, says a second year in a row without a raise would be sending the wrong message.

�It�s going to be a tough year but I think that we should give the state employees a raise, we gave them a bonus last year,” says Lawson. “It�s extremely important if you want to stimulate the economy, that we give them a pay raise. They�re hard workers. They�re the backbone of all of this that we�re doing here today and I think we need to show respectability by taking care of the workers.�

Florida ranks 49th in the number of employees per state resident.

Who controls college tuition is promising to be one of the biggest battles of the legislative session. The leadership of� the Senate wants a constitutional amendment that would clarify that lawmakers, not the Board of Governors, has the power to set tuition. Senate President Ken Pruitt says ultimately, the people will decide.

�Senators, we are going to allow the people to have a clear and transparent vote on the issue. Do they want an unelected board to set tuition or do they want the legislature, a body elected by the people, to set it?�

If voters approve, the legislation would also restore an elected Education Commissioner.

State lawmakers are proposing the state return to an elected Education Commissioner. The post was abolished in 2002, when our current governor held the post.� Senate leaders are pushing the change. Budget Chairwoman Lisa Carlton of Sarasota sites the class size amendment and the Pre K amendment as evidence that people in Florida want to vote on education issues.

“These are issues that are of paramount importance to the citizens of Florida. It seems to logically flow from that,� that the person that heads up the education system in the state, Pre-K all the way streamlined through 20, should be an elected official, directly appointed by the people, � says Carlton.

Currently, the Education Commission is appointed by the state board of education, which is itself appointed by the Governor.

Thousands of documents requested from Allstate by a select Senate Committee are just beginning to arrive. During four days of grilling insurance executives last month, lawmakers found that companies were using loss prediction models not sanctioned by the state. It also discovered the state has few teeth if insurance companies ignore state requests for information. Jeff Atwater, who chairs the select committee says legislation to fix the problems they discovered is on the way.

�I think you�ll see that those are things like getting into what the profit factor is clearly more defined, clearly what would be defined as to what kind of model someone should be able to use, also clarifying what the office of insurance regulation has the power to do when someone ignores a subpoena or ignores sending documents. Those are the kind of places we�re at now.� says Atwater.

The state also found that many companies could hide profits by including some add on fees to policies that were not calculated as part of their profit margin.

Lawmakers will decide how to cut more than 300 million dollars from the state�s education budget. The cuts come while school leaders worry about amendment one taking an additional chunk out of available funds. As Whitney Ray tells us, cuts made before July are just the first wave for schools, and lawmakers will cut even more.

Hear it here: School Funding Cuts This Year, Next Year

The fear of impending budget cuts has Educators across the state tightening their belts.

�We�re really going have to look at our enrollment numbers for next year and really look at decreasing our overhead,� said Leon County High School Assistant Principal Bill Epting.

With foreclosures reaching record highs and people in fear of a recession, many Floridians aren�t spending, which means no sales tax revenue.

�We can�t buy groceries like we should. We can�t go out and buy clothes like we should,� said Josephine Miller who is struggling financial because of mortgage problems.

Lawmakers must slice 542 million from the current budget. Three hundred fifty million dollars will come from public school funding.

�We�ve been working with the commissioner of education, the school board association and the superintendents association to make sure it doesn�t affect the classroom in any great degree,� said state senator Stephen Wise.

While millions will be cut by July of this year, Governor Charlie Crist wants to increase education spending by a billion dollars in the 2008 � 2009 fiscal year. Lawmakers aren�t so optimistic.

�The real problem will probably be next year when teachers, we give the money in a lump sum to the school districts and I suspect the school districts will not have enough money to give the teachers pay raises,� said Wise.

The Budget will be a hot issue as the 2008 legislative session begins this week. Despite the Governor�s recommendations, where money gets cut and who takes the brunt of the blow remains up to legislators. Both educators and lawmakers says they�ll do what they can to keep from cutting jobs, and will only look at teaching positions as a last option.

State leaders met with bank executives and borrowers Monday to try and figure out how to fix Florida�s foreclosure problem. In its first meeting the Florida Home Ownership Promotes the Economy, or HOPE taskforce spoke with bank presidents from across the state. The taskforce will look at laws that could help cut the number of foreclosures. Foreclosures in Florida are reaching record highs. People who are in jeopardy of losing their homes attended the meeting to rally the taskforce to act quickly.

�I�m not looking for a hand out. I�m looking for the laws to be changed to protect people in the future so this doesn�t happen again because, I hate to say it this way, but at least Jessie James used a gun, These people use a pin and they take advantage of people,� said Travis Miller, who almost lost his home to foreclosure.

In April, the HOPE task force will present recommendations to Governor Charlie Crist, the speaker of the house, and the president of the senate.

The standoff between the state judges and lawmakers is over. After weeks of threats by judges to close courts across the state, lawmakers have decided to give the court system trust fund money. The battle began after an appropriations committee asked the court system to hold back four percent of its budget. When it came time to pay the piper, the money wasn�t there.

�Unfortunately a lot of the districts put their employees at risk by blazing through their budgets and not heeding our warnings and as we approached the end of the fiscal year and started to ask for some of this money back because we don�t have the dollars to give to them, they weren�t able to do it. They put their employees and their rank and file at risk of layoff and furloughs and that�s just not acceptable,� said Senator Victor Crist.

The courts will receive about 12 million dollars to get through the end of the fiscal year in July, but lawmakers warn of bigger cuts next year. They�ll ask the courts to hold back six percent of its budget.

With a shaky economy and state budget cuts hitting almost every public service, one group wants to make sure Florida�s senior citizens can weather the storm. The Public Service Commission will hold events all week to teach seniors how to cut cost. The commission kicked off its 10th annual Consumer Protection Week in Tallahassee. This year members teach seniors how to cut down on utility bills. They�ll also warn senior about scams.

�Because of the generation that they grew up in, they grew up when people trusted one another that makes them vulnerable to a lot of con-artist. So what we�re trying to do, is to say just because a person is sweet and kind it�s not your grandson, so we want to try and tell them some of the kind of things to be aware of and watch out for,� said Matthew Carter, the Public Service Commission Chairman.

The commission will also offer help to senior who have problems paying their phone bills.