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A group of about a dozen cancer survivors, researchers and doctors from Tampa crossed the finish line at the state capitol today. The group biked to Tallahassee to raise awareness for cancer research and remind lawmakers of the work that’s being done at the Moffitt Cancer Centers. Moffitt CEO Bill Dalton says it’s important for the state to keep funding the Research Center.

Florida has the second highest number of cancer patients in the nation, but Moffitt is the only National Cancer Institute in the state.

Insurance companies and attorneys are about to do battle in Tallahassee over sink hole coverage for homeowners. Legislation is pending that would make it more difficult to claim sink hole damage, and as Mike Vasilinda tells us, much of what is covered today would not be covered under the pending revisions.

This is not your typical sinkhole claim in Florida. This is: a cracked drive way or a cracked wall. Insurance companies have been waging a five-year battle to restrict claims, some of them fraudulent. Spokesman Sam Miller says those bad claims are costing every homeowner through higher rates.

“Everybody in Florida is paying a $120 sinkhole tax,” Miller said.

The number of claims have tripled since 2006. The industry blames lawyers for filing frivolous claims that are hard to disprove. The chairman of the Senate Committee on Banking and Insurance says the industry needs more protection.

“We’re trying to responsibly address that expansive magnitude of false claims, or claims where people are taking checks and paying their mortgages off or buying cars,” Sen. Garrett Richter (R-Naples) said.

This Pasco County couple testified at a Senate hearing last week after their insurance company refused to pay their claim.  The pending legislation would require them to pay half the costs of sink hole testing if their insurer found no evidence of a sinkhole.

One of the most controversial provisions of the new legislation would say that insurance companies don’t even have to offer you sinkhole insurance.

Senator Mike Fasano has more sink hole claims in his Pasco County district than any other area of the state.

“Federal Home Loan Mortgage Cooperation, Fannie Mae, they have said ‘we want people to have full sinkhole coverage, otherwise we’re not going to offer a mortgage,” Fasano said.

The legislation comes back before a Senate Committee in two weeks.

Some lawmakers fear that if insurance companies stop writing sinkhole coverage, state run Citizen’s will be forced to pick up the extra policies.

Florida’s infant mortality rate is at an all time low. A study released today shows just under seven out of every thousand Florida babies die before their first birthday. As Whitney Ray tells us, the achievement is shedding light on a program that helps women deliver healthy babies at a time when shrinking state funds have everyone fighting for funding.

20 year old Tominique Hadley is all smiles, grateful her three week old baby is in good health.

When Tominique found out she was pregnant she turned to her mom, but her mom was fighting a losing battle with cancer. And Tominique found herself without a support system. That’s when she found Florida Healthy Start.

“I was not eating well. I was not sleeping well. I was definitely not going down the right path. I found out about the program and they got me on the right track,” said Tominique.

Healthy Start offers pregnant women prenatal care, diet advice, drug and alcohol counseling and other services proven to improve the chances of a healthy delivery.

The program was created by the legislature twenty years ago.

“Since Healthy Start’s inception, Florida’s infant mortality rate has dropped significantly,” said Judi Vitucci, Director of the Florida Association of Healthy Start Coalitions.

The state hit an all time low with statistics released Monday showing just 6.9 out of every thousand babies in Florida dying before they reach one. But with the state budget in shambles, changes to the program are in the works.

Last year, child advocates fought back budget cuts that would have left the program without any state dollars. This year there’s a proposed management change that has advocates concerned.

Right now they’re taking their case to lawmakers.

“A cut unfortunately of any size would probably hit us at a time when we’re least capable of handling it,” said Dixie Morgese, With Healthy Start in Flagler County.

Healthy Start receives just four million dollars from the state. Advocates say it saves taxpayers in the long run, by ensuring more Floridians begin life in good health.

Governor Rick Scott’s budget proposal holds Healthy Start harmless in funding, but moves the administrate authority over the program from the Department of Health to the Department of Management Services.

Governor Rick Scott has attended two media events where new jobs were announced, but expansion plans for the two companies creating the jobs were in the works long before Scott became governor. While both companies praised Scott’s commitment to lowering business taxes, as Whitney Ray tells us, the governor’s jobs agenda has yet to leave the runway.

From the wing of a Boeing 737 Governor Rick Scott, was flying high over the prospect of 4-thousand new Florida jobs.

“I want to be the “Jobs Governor” and get this state back to work,” Scott said from a news conference in Destin on January 17th.

Scott wants to create 700-thousand jobs in seven years. It’s not clear if he’ll use the 4-thousand jobs that could be created by Vision Airlines in his final tally. The company’s expansion plans were in the works before Scott took office.

Another company with prior Florida plans announced 244 jobs Thursday. Scott made the announcement.

“Do about one a day and about seven hundred days and a thousand jobs a day and I’d make my goal,” said Scott.

Bing, a science based company, offered Scott some credit for influencing their final decision.

“The tipping point in our decision to move to Florida is the governor’s pledge to try and eliminate the corporate income tax, it’s huge,” said

Scott took the credit, but won’t elaborate on how involved he was in Bing’s move.

“Calling companies every day talking to people about coming here, but it’s nice when things like Vision and Bing happen,” said Scott.

While it’s unclear how many jobs Scott’s created, its crystal clear how many he’s eliminated. Friday he let go fourteen administrators from the Department of Corrections. Eleven were let go when he put the state air fleet on the auction block and four were fired when Scott closed the Office of Drug control.

Scott has been on the job less than two months so it will likely be a long time before jobs created in Florida can be directly tied to his actions. Economists also predict a million jobs will be created over the next seven years as the economy recovers. Scott has promised his job creation will be on top of the million.

Scott has been on the job less than two months so it will likely be a long time before jobs created in Florida can be directly tied to his actions. Economists also predict a million jobs will be created over the next seven years as the economy recovers. Scott has promised his job creation will be on top of the million.

If Governor Rick Scott has his way no Florida State Parks will be closed to save money. Scott toured the Department of Environmental Protection today. Scott’s budget proposal calls for the 150 million dollar spending reduction for DEP. Scott says that can be done without closing state parks.

“We have beautiful parks. As you know we’ve gotten two gold metals for our parks. We have I think its 20 million plus visitors so no we have great parks so we need to make sure we preserve them and take care of them,” said Scott.

Now the onus is on the legislature. Members will spend the next three months crafting next year’s state spending plan.

Drastic changes to Florida’s unemployment compensation program are in the works at the state capitol. Legislation would make it harder for the unemployed to make a claim, shorten the number of weeks the state would award benefits, and as Whitney Ray tells us, require people receiving checks to volunteer for four hours a week.

A group of fed-up unemployed Floridians stormed the state capitol Thursday. Deanna Wade traveled from South Florida to tell lawmakers to leave jobseekers alone.

“If you don’t have that skill, you can’t have a job,” said Wade.

The group was stirred to action by proposed changes that would shorten the number of weeks the state would pay benefits from 26 to 20, make it harder for laid off workers to qualify and require volunteer service in exchange for weekly checks.

“Just shortening the weeks or things like that when there are no real jobs on the other end of that pipeline would really put people in jeopardy,” said Badili Jones with Florida New Majority.

The changes are being billed as a jobs creator, because they would lower business taxes.

The unemployment reform legislation comes as Governor Rick Scott lays off 15 people from the Department of Corrections and calls for another 86-hundred state jobs to be eliminated.

But Scott says handing out pink slips to state workers will help create private sector jobs.

To prove his point, Scott announced 244 new science jobs being created in Tallahassee.

“A lot of things like this are going to happen across the state,” said Scott.
At the center of the debate is a bill that comes due this fall. Florida has borrowed two billion dollars to pay unemployment claims. Unless the legislature takes action, business taxes will go up to pay the money back.

The unemployment reform legislation passed through a house committee this afternoon, on a seven to four vote.

The federal government may offer a helping hand to Florida’s unemployed, but Governor Rick Scott plans to slap it away. President Obama is planning to allow Florida to keep half a billion dollars of the two billion the state has borrowed to pay the unemployed. The catch is that Florida would have to raise its business tax in 2014. Florida Senate President Mike Haridopolos says the interest on the money already borrowed is concerning, but he wants to take a look at the long term picture before he sets a senate agenda on the proposal.

“Interest payments cripple families and interest payments can cripple the state if we are not careful and we want to find a long term solution,” said Haridopolos.

The president’s plan for the unemployed will be released next week as part of his 2012 spending plan.

If one legislative leader has his way Florida will be the gatekeeper on the road to the White House in 2012. Senate President Mike Haridopolos is inviting presidential candidates to visit Tallahassee during the next three months. There’s only an unofficial field of possible candidates to challenge President Obama at this point and most of them are at the CPAC conference today, but apparently Haridopolos knows who’s in and who’s out because he’s already talked to them.

“You will see a number of these presidential candidates, they’ve reached out to me, I’ve reached out to them. I think it will be beneficial to Florida to find out some of their ideas because we face a multitude of problems in the state and if a person is seeking the presidency I think they should come to Florida and let us know what they think,” said Haridopolos.

Haridopolos says there’s an open invitation to President Barack Obama, but the Senate leader doesn’t think the president will bite.

The battle to ban offshore oil drilling in Florida waters in raging on two fronts. A petition drive and legislation to create a constitutional ban on drilling were both announced today at the state capitol. As Whitney Ray tells us, some familiar faces are heading up the efforts.

Sand and sea oats laid way for former Governor Charlie Crist and CFO Alex Sink’s return to the state capitol. The two are joining forces to write an oil drilling ban into the state constitution.

“It’s important to not only protect the beach, but also an important industry called tourism,” said Crist.

Crist’s attempt at an oil ban in a July special session, drew a defiant gavel and go from lawmakers.

Now Crist and Sink are taking their case straight to the people; co-sponsoring a petition drive to put a ban on the 2012 ballot. The group is using the BP oil spill as its main argument for a constitutional ban.

The spill threatened the state’s 65 billion dollar tourism industry for five months last summer. It led legislative leaders to promise not to pass drilling, but if a case is made in the future that drilling is safe Governor Rick Scott may be onboard.

“Focus on everything, from all the alternative fuels, all those things, to the extent that they make sense, and also look at offshore drilling when we know we can do it safely,” said Scott.

But Scott’s former foe, Alex Sink, says drilling will never be safe enough for Florida.

“There’s always human error. We can’t afford any kind of human error within 10 miles of our beaches,” said Sink.

Crist was the first to sign the petition, and now the enormous task is underway to gather the nearly 700-thousand signatures needed to put the ban before voters. Democratic lawmakers are also trying to get a ban on the 2012 ballot. Legislation has been filed to allow voters to decide, but it’s not expected to make it out of committee.

The Florida Chamber of Commerce is releasing its legislative agenda and the focus is no surprise. Job creation is the main theme of the business group’s goals. The Chamber wants to create jobs by lowering taxes on businesses, making it harder to sue and improving the state’s education system. Chamber President Mark Wilson says if the legislature follows their recommendations thousand of jobs will be created.

“We believe that we can create 135,000 new net jobs this year in Florida. We believe that we can grow our population again by about 138,000 new residents by the end of this year. And when you add that up we believe that we can create 40 billion dollars of new economic activity this year,” said Wilson.

The Chamber also praised Governor Rick Scott’s freeze on state regulations and his new budget.

The National Transportation Safety Board is taking aim at Florida in an attempt to pass more roadway restrictions. Florida is just one of three states that don’t require car booster seats for children four to seven. There’s also no law banning texting while driving. NTSB Chairwoman Deborah Hersman says the lack of laws endangers children.

“We know that the solutions are simple: booster-seats, not being distracted while you’re driving, addressing teen-driver issues, drunk driving, motorcycle helmets. These are all very well-known and very understood issues that can save lives,” said Hersman.

Bills to ban texting while driving and requiring booster seats for children under seven have been filed in Tallahassee. They have NTSB support, but growing distaste from government interference among state lawmakers may kill the bills.

State pensions aren’t the only retirement plans raising concerns in Florida. The Leroy Collins Institute released a report today, claiming city and county pension plans are heading toward disaster. The report shows growing health care costs are having a huge impact on retirement costs. FSU Professor Carol Weissert contributed to the study and says the economy has exposed city and county pensions as broken systems.

“The cities have these obligations at the very time when they’re having their revenues constrained so it’s a double-whammy on them,” said Weissert.

In the report called “Tough Choices’ the Collins Institutes suggest more transparency of local plans, an increase in the retirement age and defined contributions as a few ways to improve the current systems.

With the release of his budget, Governor Rick Scott drew a line in the sand. Now it’s up to the Republican-led legislature to choose to stay on Scott’s side and pass his bold spending plan, or as Whitney Ray tells us, stand up against the layoffs, education cuts, and tax breaks and spark a GOP civil war.

With the GOP in control of the House, Senate and the Governor’s office… there was little room for dissent until this.

“Everything in this budget is basically what I believe in,” said Scott.

Monday Governor Rick Scott released his bold budget proposal: eliminating 86-hundred state jobs, reducing school funding by three billion dollars, and cutting taxes at a time when revenues are already low.

It’s now up to lawmakers to produce their budget. They say Scott’s suggestions are brazen. Dissenting viewpoints are at a whisper right now.

“I’ve already heard from many of my Republican colleges, not Democratic colleges, but Republican colleges that are having a hard time swallowing some of the proposals,” said Senator Mike Fasano.

“Governor Bush had Republican legislatures as well and very rarely if ever did his budget go all the way through,” said Representative Erik Fresen.

Monday night Scott met with Senate leaders and asked them to pass his budget. But the legislature isn’t likely to give the governor everything he wants. If Scott doesn’t like their budget he can veto it, but then it goes right back to lawmakers.

And if they have the votes, the can override the governor’s veto. There’s also some confusion over the governor’s proposal for the legislature to pass a two year spending plan. Right now no one knows if the legislature wants to look that far into the future.

Lawmakers want to shut down a state-funded group home accused of encouraging its mentally disabled residents to have sex. The accusations against the Human Development Center in Seffner, near Tampa, are from 2008. State Senator Ronda Storms investigated the claims and says caregivers would send male patients into rooms, give them condoms, and shut the door. Storms says the Agency for Persons With Disabilities, the agency in charge of oversite, was slow to respond to the sex scandal.

“Did they do any onsite immediate inspections? Did they do any announced visits? Did they go do any monitoring? The answer to that question is, no,” said Storms.

Random visits by state investigators have been increased at the home, but lawmakers want the state funding eliminated and the patients moved.

Legislation to stop local governments from enacting tougher restrictions on gun purchases is shooting through the legislative process. The legislation would create a five million dollar fine for city and county governments that pass ordinances to trump state and federal gun laws. The bill passed a house and a senate committee today. NRA lobbyist Marion Hammer says the bill is meant to send a message to cities and counties.

“Nobody wants to put local government officials in jail. Nobody wants to rip huge amounts of money out of county and city coffers, but it has to be a deterrent. If they want to break the law then they should have to pay like everybody else. They are not above the law,” said Hammer.

The legislation is the first of three high profile bills aimed at protecting gun rights. One of the bills would prohibit doctors from asking their patients if they own a gun. Another would allow people with conceal carry permits to take carry their guns in more public place, like college campuses.

The governor says he will cut the tax on corporations by almost half in an effort to lure more companies to the state.

“They know they have a governor that is going to sit down and try to solve problems if they have any problems in the state,” Scott said. “That’s going to give a great incentive for people to come here rather than any place in the country.”

Florida ranks 15th in corporate taxes, and state Senator Eleanor Sobel says low taxes aren’t what companies are interested in most.

“We do know that the first question that corporations ask is “tell me about your education system,” Sobel said.

Even the State Senate’s budget chairman, a conservative from the Governor’s own party, is skeptical.

“I haven’t seen some of the details of the proposals he’s put together, so until I’ve had a chance to read them, understand them, talk to him a little bit about it in detail, it’s kind of hard to comment on it,” Sen. J.D. Alexander (R-Lakeland) said.

Lawmakers, not the Governor, will have the final say.

Think of the governor’s plan as a roadmap. The only problem here is that there are 160 other drivers and not all of them want to go the same way.

Activists point out Florida is already one of the lowest taxed states in the country.

“The notion that somehow we can cut five billion dollars out of this budget is just very unreasonable,” Karen Woodall, with the Center for Economic and Fiscal Policy, said.

Scott made history when he chose to unveil the spending plan outside the capitol. Now lawmakers will decide if different is also good.