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Florida firefighters are celebrating a partial victory Thursday.

After 15 years of trying to get nearly two dozen cancers recognized as a leading occupational hazard, lawmakers have taken a big step toward agreeing.

The legislation will make it easier to keep working while treating cancer.

One by one, firefighters who got Cancer on the job told their stories.

“I’ve been diagnosed with occupation cancer twice,” said Jazz Zombo, who worked as a firefighter for 17 years.

“I never smoked a cigarette in my life,” said retired firefighter Jay Post.

Clay County resident Tracy McKay told lawmakers she is about to lose her firefighting husband.

“The doctors words exactly were, we do not fight this cancer. We’ll try to buy your husband some time to spend with your children,” said McKay.

Cancer is already covered under a firefighters health plan, but because it isn’t considered a work related injury, there is no time off for doctors.

Sick and vacation time are quickly burned.

“The financial burden on families is immeasurable,” said McKay.

But mandated changes in leave policy and a $25,000 one time payment to cover out of pocket costs could ease the burden.

“Seventy percent of the deaths that occur in the line of duty for firefighters are cancer related,” said Florida Chief Financial Officer and State Fire Marshal, Jimmy Patronis.

The League of Cities, which has blocked the legislation over cost concerns got raked over the coals.

“What is the value of a life,” Rep. Wengay Newton asked Amber Hughes, who testified on behalf of the league.

“Mr. Chairman, I am not an actuary. I prefer not to answer that,” replied Hughes.

The league was told flatly, “Just figure it out,” by Rep. Nick DeCiglie.

The bill passed unanimously.

Afterword Tracy and husband Jeremy were near tears.

Asked how it felt knowing his career as a firefighter led to developing terminal cancer, Tracy McKay’s husband Jeremy responded bluntly.

“It’s my job, you know, its what I love to do,” said Jeremy McKay.

Over the last 10 years as the risks have become more clear, best practices have been put in place, and that’s protecting newer firefighters.

But for firefighters on the job longer than ten or 15 years, the risk remains.

The legislation has more than 80 cosponsors in the House, virtually guaranteeing it will pass.

Sponsors unveiled a less onerous bill designed to make it harder to get constitutional amendments on the ballot.

Gone is a provision that only Flordia residents who register with the state can gather petitions, but the bill still requires more financial disclosure on the ballot including language that the desired change could have been enacted by lawmakers.

Rep. Dianne Hart questioned the motivation.

“Why are you putting all these obstacles in peoples way? Why can’t they just go out and gather petitions how ever they get them. You’ve clear said there is no fraud that you know of,” said Hart.

“Our constitution shouldn’t be open to the world, or open to different parties or ideologies to find some billionaire to go fund something to put into our constitution,” said bill sponsor Rep. James Grant.

The legislation keeps a provision that petition gatherers can’t be paid by the petition as is the case now.

It passed the committee Thursday on party lines.

The Florida House has more than 80 bills on its agenda and is expected to work into the evening hours Wednesday.

Perhaps the most controversial legislation it will consider requires a parents consent for a minor woman to get an abortion.

Sponsor Erin Grall hopes the measure will deter some women from having abortions.

“My hope is that in conversations with families, girls are able to come up with alternatives to ending a life, so I think that there is that hope for me, that we will reduce abortions among minors.,” said Grall.

But Planned Parenthood says the legislation could make parents out of teens ill-equipped to have a child.

You can’t legislate good family environments, right? So instead it delays a minor to access that care, putting them either later into pregnancy or denying them ability to make that choice and leading them into a forced pregnancy,” said Kimberly Scott with Planned Parenthood.

The legislation has so far stalled in the Florida Senate, but it could be one of many bills that is resurrected in the session’s final weeks as lawmakers in the House and Senate trade in the final days.

A Senate Committee in the State Capitol has cleared the way for a vote of the full Senate on banning sanctuary jurisdictions in Florida.

It requires local law enforcement to comply with federal detainer orders and hold a undocumented immigrant who has committed a crime for up to 48 hours.

Kiyan and Bobby Michael have been fighting for immigration reform since their son Brandon was hit and killed in 2007 by a driver who was here illegally.

“This should never have happened. If the laws on that we had on the books at the time had been enforced, all of this could have been avoidable,” said Kiyan.

The Michael’s were invited by Governor Ron DeSantis to his first State of the State address.

“Now their son Brandon was killed by a foreign national who was illegally in our country, had been deported two prior times,” said DeSantis.

Sponsors of the legislation, which is on a fast track to becoming law, say it will stop about 4,600 in state and county jails from being immediately released.

“This bill only deals with criminals who are going through the process or are in the judicial system right now,” said Senate Sponsor Joe Gruters. “This is about keeping all Floridians safe.”

Since the governor was sworn in and talked about ending sanctuary cities in his inaugural address, the number of counties complying with Federal law has gone from 29 to 34.

The 17 member Senate Democratic Caucus unanimously opposes the legislation, fearful it will make undocumented crime victims afraid to come forward.

“We shouldn’t put individuals in a position to make those type of decisions,” said Senator Perry Thurston.

But the Michaels say they know what permanent separation from their child is like.
“What we have experienced is horrific. It’s a loss no one should have to go through,” said Kiyan.

Their son Brandon was preparing to be married when he was hit and killed.

Both the House and Senate bills could come up and be on the Governor’s desk as early as next week.

The Florida Senate has approved $50 million to fund the state’s primary tourism marketing agency, but the funding is far from guaranteed in the House.

Lawmakers coming into the Capitol Wednesday morning were greeted with a cup of green slime on their desks (a nod to last year’s toxic green algae outbreak) and a flyer highlighting the importance of the state’s primary tourism agency, Visit Florida, which advertised to the rest of the country that Florida was still open for business through recent natural disasters.

$50 million in funding for the agency was unanimously approved by the full Senate Wednesday morning.

Senate sponsor Joe Gruters says the funding is essential.

“For every dollar invested in tourism we get $2.15 return. There’s thousands of jobs that rely on the tourism that we bring to this state,” said Gruters.

While causing no controversy in the Senate, the House is threatening to cut off funding for Visit Florida altogether.

Early on in session House Speaker Jose Oliva made his position clear.

“We need to fund Visit Florida until it expires and beyond that we haven’t had any intention,” said Oliva in March.

However, some House members like Democratic Representative Evan Jenne believe Visit Florida plays an important role, despite controversial spending decisions in the past, like paying Miami Rapper Pit Bull $1 million for promoting the state in a video titled ‘Sexy Beaches’.

“I think that we’ve done a lot to reign them in in terms of how they spend their money and how much money they spend over the past few years, which has been a good thing,” said Jenne.

Senate President Bill Galvano says he’s hopeful a deal can be worked out to save Visit Florida.

“I think that’s an issue that will remain open until conference and we’ll work on it from there,” said Galvano.

For the past five years Visit Florida funding has averaged about $75 million annually.

Even if the Senate’s current proposal passes, the agency will see a 33% budget cut this year.

Only two weeks remain in session for the two chambers to come to agreement.

After six months without a federal disaster relief bill following hurricane Michael, a panhandle based group known as Michael’s Angels has taken matters in their own hands.

Over 150 panhandle residents brought their voices and their blue tarps to the Capitol today for their rally Rally in Tally.

The non-partisan, non-profit group of women are calling on legislators for hurricane Michael relief funding from both Congress and the state Legislature.

Lawmakers like Senator Bill Montford, Florida’s CFO Jimmy Patronis and Attorney General Ashley Moody lent their voices to the cause.

“Our people in north Florida, especially children, are suffering because of the gridlock in Washington. It’s wrong. Its unAmerican. People need to start doing their job in Washington,” said Montford.

The women now have their eyes set on rallying in the nation’s Capitol.

Cities and counties are fighting back against at least thirty bills that would pre-empt regulation of scooters, vacation home rentals and much more to the state.

City and county commissioners today cried foul, saying lawmakers are talking out of both sides of their mouths.

“I find it highly ironic that the same Florida Legislature that continuously rails agains the Federal Government and says Federal Government stop imposing things on us, stop unfunded mandates, stop telling us what to do, then turns around and does the exact same thing to local governments,” said Broward County Commissioner Steve Geller.

Several speakers blamed the move to take power away from local governments on special interest contributors who find it easier to influence lawmakers than local officials.

Both the House and Senate bills could come up and be on the Governor’s desk as early as next week.

The Florida Senate gave tentative approval to legislation that would expand the state’s school safety program, including a measure that would allow classroom teachers to carry a gun on campus.

Democrats attempted to tag on more than two dozen amendments, one of which would have removed the language that would allow for teachers to be armed, but it failed, facing heavy opposition from Republican lawmakers like Senator Dennis Baxley.

“The mere presence of the message that says someone already here is prepared to act if something goes wrong, that’s the power. It”s not having everybody armed. No educator is being asked to be armed,” said Baxley.

But Senator Perry Thurston who sponsored the amendment hopes Republicans will have a change of heart before the bill comes to a final vote.

“I think that we raised enough issues where the teachers will be concerned about it. Being targeted for the weapons, not getting any additional compensation for this. I just think it’s unnecessary, the current system is working,” said Thurston.

The legislation will likely come up for a final vote early next week.

The House has also not taken a vote on the bill.

It was temporarily postponed two weeks ago.

Florida firefighters won a major victory at the State Capitol Tuesday.

They have been fighting for years to include cancer coverage as part of their benefits, but have been rebuffed over who would pay for the coverage.

Now, the Speaker of the House, who has been blocking the bill, has had a change of heart.

It was political pressure like a handful of firefighters gathering petitions outside the Capitol, calling for the House to hear the bill that seemed to have done the trick.

“Because firefighters are fourteen percent more likely to come down with cancers, and there’s a long list of them,” said South Walton Firefighter Bob Wells.

The legislation firefighter are advocating for would provide $25,000 to cancer stricken first responders to pay for out of pocket expenses such as room and travel for cancer treatments.

“All the things we’re finding our for all these years that were hazardous to us, I mean it’s just been coming out in the last few years,” said South Walton Firefighter Dan Corcoran. “We’ve made changes, we’ve made the job as safe as you can make the job, but we’re still exposed to carcigians and the guys who’ve been on the job for any amount of time are already exposed.”

The legislation has more than 80 house cosponsors, but one main opponent.

House Speaker Jose Oliva.

“If we can get this one the floor, we feel really good about our chances,” said Corcoran.

The Speaker has objected to forcing the costs on local governments.

He was accused of political retribution over a past election, but the accusations gave the Speaker pause.

By mid afternoon Tuesday, he had a change of heart.

“I think its moved too far past the original debate and its best to just let it go,” said Oliva.

Over the last five years, the legislature has spent five million dollars trying to figure out how to keep firefighters from getting cancer.

The protections they want cost about $5 million a year.

Sponsors say firefighters today are less likely to get a cancer because they’ve adopted best practices they didn’t know about even five years ago, but anyone who fought fires 10 or 15 years ago could still come down with the disease.

A group of conservative lawmakers called on the full legislature to protect confederate monuments in the state Tuesday morning.

State Representative Anthony Sabatini, a Republican from Lake County, calls the dismantling of monuments an attempt to whitewash history.

“We need people to come up here and prevent those many people who believe in political correctness and want to whitewash American history, and they want to destroy American history. But we don’t need to do that. We need to take these pieces of American history and remember them. To learn from them,” said Sabatini.

Legislation to protect Confederate monuments has not gotten a hearing this year.

Legislation that would raise the age to purchase cigarettes and e cigarettes is now ready for a vote on the House floor, but the bill is still facing opposition from cannabis advocates, Libertarian lawmakers and even some health advocates.

With one out of five teens in Florida vaping, lawmakers say the issue is now an epidemic.

“Just when you thought that smoking was on the decline, the tobacco companies came up with a product that targets our youth, with e-cigarettes, vaping and Juuls with cotton candy flavors,” said Rep. Jackie Toledo.

To tackle the issue legislation moving in both chambers would raise the age to purchase tobacco products and e-cigarettes to 21.

The House version would also require medical marijuana patients under the age of 21 get a recommendation from a pediatrician to smoke their medicine.

Cannabis patients say it would severely limit access.

“Are there enough pediatricians to serve all the minors in Florida? How far will patients have to travel? Will they overcharge due to the high demand,” said Tanya Bailey with Vets for Buds.

Health advocates take issue with a carve out for tobacco and vaping for active duty military members under 21 included in both bills.

“Cancer doesn’t discriminate based on your military record,” said Rivers Buford with the American Heart Association.

Some lawmakers who lean Libertarian oppose the age increase outright, saying it’s an infringement on civil liberties.

“At some juncture people are an adult and in Florida that age is 18. We should treat people like adults,” said Senator Jeff Brandes.

With some Republicans in opposition, bipartisan support will likely be needed.

House sponsors say there’s time to make changes.

“I think the military exemption for example will be open to change,” said Toledo.

Sponsors say that might also include changing the pediatrician recommendation for smokable medical marijuana to that of a regular doctor.

So far 11 states have passed some version of the Tobacco 21 Act.

If Florida lawmakers are able to come to an agreement, Florida would become the 12th.

Minnesota Senator and Democratic Presidential hopeful Amy Klobuchar met with Florida Democrats Tuesday afternoon to discuss key issues facing the state.

Senator Klobuchar says she discussed Amendment 4 implementation, healthcare, hurricane relief, Venezuela and climate change in during meeting.

When asked how she plans to take Florida in 2020 if she wins the Democratic nomination she pointed to her ability to commitment across the isle.

“I just think it’s a very important state in the General Election and if all we focus on in this very competitive primary, if all we’re focusing on is our own side then we can’t win. So you’ve got to reach out to independent voters and you have to reach out to moderate Republicans,” said Klobuchar. “That is how I’ve won in a purple state. There’s a reason the President was in Minnesota yesterday.”

Klobuchar is one of 18 Democrats running for President.

Other big name candidates include Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren and former Texas Congressman Rep. Beto O’Rourke.

A sweeping criminal justice reform package has cleared its second Senate committee.

The Florida First Step Act as it’s called, would allow for non violent prisoners to serve only 65% of their sentence if they participate in educational or work related programs in prison.

The bill increases the felony theft threshold from $300 to $1,000.

It also removes barriers for certain professional licenses for former inmates and allows for judges to divert away from mandatory minimum sentences for certain drug offenses.

Senate sponsor Jeff Brandes says it will help address the growing crisis in Florida’s corrections system.

“We’re trying to tell a story with this legislation that we’ve got to focus on diversion on the front end, we’ve got to help people transition back into society on the back end, but in order to do that we’ve got to fix the middle. And that middle is looking at the criminal punishment code, looking at downward departures, allowing judges to actually be judges and not simply tabulators,” said Brandes. “This really is focusing on a variety of different areas that we think are problematic in the existing system and trying to build bold reforms to move forward.”

The House and Senate bills have some key differences, but Brandes says he’s confident some version of the legislation will pass this year.

A Senate committee was told that Florida’s Forgotten coast has really been forgotten when it comes to Hurricane Michael.

Former Congressman Steve Southerland, who chairs Stand Up for North Florida says Thanksgiving and Christmas followed by the Super Bowl has limited coverage of the plight of many who are still suffering from the storm.

“People in my county, citizens an hour and a half from where you sit today are still living in tents. tents. I burn a cord of firewood every year in Panama City. It gets cold there. Temperatures in the high twenties, but people with children still living in tents. It’s difficult to watch,” said Southerland.

The Legislature does have one point six billion in the budget for hurricane relieve, but most it will go to cities and counties to cover loans for debris removal and overtime for first responders.

Governor Ron DeSantis is urging all of the state’s 12 Universities and 28 Community and State Colleges to adopt “The Chicago Statement” which is considered the premier policy for protecting free speech on campuses.

The Governor also wants to focus on civics education as part of the solution.

A Gallup survey of 3,000 college students found that one in three believes that it’s okay some of the time to shout down offensive speakers.

Philosophy major Ellie MacGill believes in free speech, but agrees it ’s also okay to drown out offensive speech.

“It’s their free speech too, right,” said MacGill.

Now, Governor Ron DeSantis has asked all of the states colleges to sign what is know as the Chicago Statement.

It’s considered the gold standard for free speech guidelines.

“The University’s role is to really expose people to ideas with which they may disagree. You know, I think we’re showing that Florida welcomes debate. The cure for an idea that you disagree with is to point out why that idea is wrong,” said DeSantis.

Asked how students should respond to speakers like white supremacist Richard Spencer’s visit to the University of Florida, the Governor says don’t go.

“If they give a speech and only eight people show up, that is really the worst, because they really feed off trying to gin people up,” said DeSantis.

FSU President John Thrasher says colleges and Universities learned a lot from the University of Florida’s handling of the Spencer visit.

“What this does is say to anybody that this is a campus that is open anybody to debate ideas,” said Thrasher.

The Governor says part of the problem is a lack of civics education, particularly for high school students.

In 2018 state lawmakers outlawed corralling students in free speech zones on campuses.

Under the 2018 law, someone who believes a college has not protected their right to free speech can file a lawsuit for damages.