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As of Wednesday afternoon roughly 23,000 Floridians were without power due to now-Tropical Storm Elsa and for the second day in a row, state officials warned of the dangers of improper power generator use.

“There have been more deaths from carbon monoxide poisoning over the last four years than there have been for direct impacts in storms in Florida, and we’ve had some significant storms,” said Governor Ron DeSantis.

Between 2015 and 2019, 228 Floridians lost their lives to carbon monoxide poisoning, a deadly odorless gas released from many things including the exhaust of generators.

At the EOC in the state’s capitol county, we got a run down on some generator dos and don’ts.

“Most times during storms people put it in their garage. They think that that’s not a big deal, but you know, due to carbon monoxide poisoning we want to make sure that they’re 20 feet away from your garage space. You know, in an open well ventilated area,” said Sarah Cooksey, Public Information Officer for the Tallahassee Fire Department.

That includes away from windows and vents.

“Make sure it’s in a flat space. You want to make sure that it’s completely cooled off before you put fuel in it. You know, if it’s still hot that’s obviously a fire hazard,” said Cooksey.

If you do place a generator in an unsafe spot, be aware of the symptoms of CO poisoning.

“Being pale, sweaty, having a hard time breathing,” said Cooksey.

Because carbon monoxide is odorless, you should install a carbon monoxide detector in your home, so you can be alerted if there is a gas leak.

Call poison control if you are experiencing any symptoms of CO poisoning.

One of the most common mistakes however, isn’t related to the dangerous emissions, rather, plugging a generator directly into a wall outlet.

“This is what’s called back feeding and when you do that it puts our linemen at risk when they go to re-hook the utilities back up,” said Cooksey.

Perhaps the most important tip: Learn how to properly use your generator before you’re in a situation where the lights go out.

Florida’s Commissioner of Agriculture Nikki Fried hosted a virtual press conference with local elected officials from across the state Wednesday to urge the Florida Supreme Court to take up a challenge to penalties attached to Florida’s gun regulation preemption.

Florida barred local governments from passing gun restrictions stronger than those at the state level in 1987, but in 2011 the Legislature went further and threatened local officials who violate the preemption with $5,000 fines and removal from office.

Local officials sued the state and scored a victory in circuit court, which struck down the penalties, but that decision was reversed on appeal.

Fried, who has joined the lawsuit, said with the country seeing a 34 percent increase in annual gun-deaths over the past 20 years, local governments should have the right to make decisions on how to address gun violence in their communities.

“Let our mayors and our county commissioners and our city commissioners do the job that they were elected to do. And that is to protect and defend the people of their communities. We’ve got to do more and we’re asking the Supreme Court to step up and protect the people of our state,” said Fried.

At this point, the lawsuit does not challenge the underlying 1987 preemption, only the penalties.

In the conference, local officials said those penalties create a chilling effect, making it risky to even test the boundaries of what they can do to quell gun violence.

Florida’s Emergency Operations Center has been elevated to a level one, its highest activation, as the anticipated landfall of Tropical Storm Elsa grows nearer.

Many along the Northern Gulf Coast are taking precautions.

Billy Adams of Jacksonville wasn’t taking any chances and was pulling his 37 foot boat out of the water at Keaton Beach Tuesday morning.

“Just came here to get everything battened down,” said Adams.

The Williams Family from Valdosta rents there year round.

“Some say it’s coming in. Some say it’s not,” said Judy Williams.

We asked what made them decide to pack up and leave.

“Because we’re going to have a bad surge. Three to five,” said Williams.

They had planned to go scalloping and spend the rest of the week in Taylor County.

Instead, Elsa sent them packing.

“I’ll be honest, everybody’s got a different opinion about it. We just not going to take any chances. Take it home,” said V.J. Williams.

Campground owner Spyridon Aibejeris told us not everyone is making the same call.

“Some are waiting it out. Yeah. If you can wait until the last minute, they wait until the last minute. If not, they get prepared and leave,” said Aibejeris.

When Hermine came roaring through the same area in 2016, the storm pushed nine feet of water into the RV park.

“It could be a CAT 1, like we had during Hermine. We’re worried about that,” said Taylor County Director of Emergency Operations Kristy Anderson.

Flood maps covered a table in the Taylor county EOC.

As of midday evacuations were voluntary

“We usually have our storms later in the season, and this is a really early one,” said Anderson. “Usually our peak time is October and that’s when we usually see storms of this magnitude.”

As of Tuesday morning the state had called up just ver 200 National Guard troops.

Most were pushing supplies out of the state’s Orlando warehouse.

By Wednesday afternoon, those who stayed will know if they made the right decision.

Florida family physicians are worried the new Parents Bill of Rights signed into law by the Governor may have some unintended consequences when it comes to providing on-the-spot medical care.

They fear physicians may face misdemeanor charges if they help a child without written parental consent.

Provide emergency medical care to a child and possibly face a year in prison and up to $1,000 fine – That’s the dilemma the Florida Academy of Family Physicians has said doctors now face under the Parents Bill of Rights.

“It truly is the epitome of no good deed goes unpunished,” said Academy President Dr. John Gross.

Dr. Gross said situations where young athletes get injured during a game or even suffer heat stroke are scenarios where medical professionals may find themselves thinking twice before providing care without written parental consent.

“You don’t want that in the back of your mind of, if I help this minor without the parent’s written consent, you know, am I gonna be punished for this good deed?” Said Dr. Gross.

Sponsors of the Parents Bill of Rights have maintained that all the bill really does is make it easier for parents to understand the rights they already had.

“Now we have one section where they’re easily found, easily identifiable,” said Rodrigues.

Sponsors have also pointed to the fact that parents generally have to sign consent forms prior to their children joining school athletic teams.

And under Florida’s Good Samaritan Law, civil immunity is granted to anyone who in good faith renders emergency care.

But Dr. Gross told us the Academy’s attorneys believe more clarity is needed.

“There’s a lot of grey areas,” said Dr. Gross.

The Florida Academy of Family Physicians also said they need more clarity on how minors with abusive parents may seek medical care without parental consent.

Dr. Gross added that it’s his hope the clarity will come in the form of updated legislation.

As he put it, if the issue has to be resolved in the courts that means someone got hurt.

Commissioner of Agriculture Nikki Fried announced her department had secured $93 million from the USDA to help supplement a $262 million hit endured by school districts on lost lunch revenue throughout the pandemic.

The Tuesday announcement came after Fried claimed her calls for the Governor to redirect federal COVID relief funds towards the problem went unanswered.

She said the money will help rebuild reserves and ensure the 71 percent of Florida school children receiving free and reduced lunches in the state won’t go hungry.

“So many of our children, this is the only meal that they get a day, is at their schools. So we have to do everything possible to make sure that our children are getting fed and are getting fed nutritional meals,” said Fried.

Fried said the first of the money began flowing to school districts last week and districts opting for paper checks can expect the relief cash in the coming days.

Roughly 175,000 Florida teachers and 3,600 principles can soon expect $1,000 bonuses in their mailboxes as part of a $200 million investment asked for by the Governor and passed by the Legislature this year.

For the second time in two days, a federal judge has said no, at least temporarily, to the Governor and Florida Legislature.

The latest injunction stops a new limit on contributions to petition gathering efforts.

The ACLU argued restricting contributions to petition gathering campaigns would be the end of Citizens initiatives because they could never afford to get on the ballot.

In a 17-page ruling, a Federal judge stopped the law from going forward until a final court decision.

“This is a vindication of all Floridians rights to pool their resources, band together, and amend their state constitution,” said ACLU attorney Nathan Warren.

Citing a US Supreme Court decision, Judge Alan Windsor wrote that contributions are ‘political expression’.

“You’re really looking at creating a constitution for sale,” said State Senator Dennis Baxley.

Baxley, who’s committee co-sponsored the $3,000-per-person contribution is clear in its desired effect: Making initiatives harder.

“If you’ve got the money and you can figure out the right wording, you can put it on the ballot, then you can just put it directly into the constitution. And the constitution is the defining document of the relationship between the people and their government,” said Baxley.

Since state lawmakers went home on April 30th, a dozen initiates have been filed for 2022.

Many of them have been trying to raise as much cash as possible before the limits would have kicked in.

Warren expects the case to be finalized quickly.

“This is long standing precedent. This is long standing case law here,” said Warren.

Legislation that would have raised the approval threshold from 60 percent to two thirds for a constitutional amendment failed this year.

After this ruling, it’s likely to be back again next session.

State lawmakers have been making it harder to get an amendment on the ballot ever since the 2006 election when the threshold for passage was raised from 50 to 60 percent.

Ironically, it passed with less than the 60 percent threshold it created.

A federal judge blocked Florida’s new law that takes aim at big tech just hours before it would have gone into effect.

The 57-page ruling essentially found every part of the law likely violated the first amendment.

Social media companies would have been subjected to new transparency and content moderation restrictions and could have faced civil suits and daily fines for violations under the law.

The judge said all of those requirements likely violated social media companies’ first amendment right to curate their platforms.

“This ruling was great, not only for social media platforms, but for Florida citizens who don’t have to be subjected to a host of lawful, but awful content,” said NetChoice Vice President Carl Szabo.

Governor Ron DeSantis told us last week an initial defeat was expected.

He anticipates a lengthy court battle.

“It will be appealed either way. Whatever that disposition is, one that will either vindicate what we did, or potentially give us a road map. And say, okay if you don’t like what we did, what would we need to do to tweak it?” said DeSantis.

But in this ruling at least, the judge provided little guidance for legislators to learn from, declaring not only did the entire law likely violate the constitution, but that the goal of law did not serve the public interest.

“The court’s ruling makes clear that trying to force private sector actors to be more fair in what speech they permit or do not permit in their forums is simply not a legitimate government purpose,” said Matt Schruers, President of the Computer and Communications Industry Association.

In a statement the Governor’s office said it was disappointed in the ruling and plans to immediately appeal the decision.

“Governor DeSantis continues to fight for freedom of speech and against Big Tech’s discriminatory censorship,” said DeSantis Press Secretary Christina Pushaw.

The case is now expected to head to the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta, from there, the Governor has speculated the fate of the law will ultimately lie in the hands of the US Supreme Court.

Florida’s new $100 billion dollar budget took effect Thursday.

It’s a ten percent increase over last year’s spending.

The state will spend about $4,600 for every man, woman and child in the state at the rate of $11.5 million an hour, every hour of every day.

Dominic Calabro of Florida TaxWatch said the spending plan is sound and somewhat surprising following the pandemic.

“We saw the GDP at the national level annualized 34 percent reduction GDP. Annualized. But Florida ultimately only had a three percent reduction. So now, our gross domestic product of Florida is actually higher today on an annualized basis than it was, you know, a year, a year and a half ago. So we’ve recovered extremely well. I think it speaks well to the fact we don’t spend money we don’t have, our constitutional checks and balances, our triple A bond rating,” said Calabro.

Just under a third of the budget will go to schools, colleges, and universities.

Heath care makes up the biggest portion of the budget, while the budget for the state courts is just seven tenths of a percent of the overall budget.

The condo collapse in South Florida has highlighted varying inspection regulations across the state.

Miami-Dade requires a 40-year inspection, but most counties do not.

Now a leading condo law firm is calling for the state to pre-empt local regulations to the state.

Attorney Pete Sachs argued without swift action from the state, sales could plummet.

“People that live in the high-rise buildings are concerned right now about their own safety. People who are thinking of buying a condominium are going to think twice, three times or more before buying in a high-rise building. If we don’t take action, we can affect a very important industry in this state,” said Sachs.

There are an estimated four million condos in Florida.