Welcome to

This year will be UF President Ken Fuchs last year as President of the Institution and his last trip to the Capitol for Gator Day as the schools top administrator. He noted for the crowd that Florida is doing a good job of funding higher education and that the University of Florida has a bright future ahead under a new leader.

“Specifically to the University of Florida, I really believe our ambition is not just to compete with public’s outside the state, but also the privates” Fuchs told us. “And we are indeed amongst that group of the best universities, but there’s ways to go in our global reputation and our national reputation and all of that just contributes to the success of the state.”*

Fuchs has agreed to stay on through the Fall 2022 semester and into early 2023 when a new president is named. He will return to teaching electrical and computer engineering.

Florida’s proposed ban on abortions after 15 weeks is now ready for a vote in the full House. As Mike Vasilinda tells us, opponents are angry because they believe their voices are being ignored. 

Security was exceptionally heavy, after protestors shouted down the previous committee stop last week. Sponsors Erin Grall began by describing fetal development.

“At twelve weeks gestation, an unborn child can open and close his or her fingers, starts to make sucking motions, and senses stimulation outside the womb.”

Public debate was limited to 45 seconds,. Both sides found themselves getting cut off. Madison Donnelly argued shortening the time from 26 to 15 weeks could hurt women.

“Fifteen weeks is an undue burden. Chair Colleen Burton interrupted “Ms. Donnelley, Miss Donnelley, your time is up thank you”.

The same thing happened to Ocala Doctor John Littell as he was speaking.

“To allow a mother who had not been able to achieve pregnancy for ten years to hear the heartbeat of  baby at 12 weeks is overwhelming. Its always overwhelming.” Again, an interruption. “Dr. Littell, you time is up.”

And in the end, the outcome was never in doubt.

“Show the bill reported favorably.”

The committee even finished 30 minutes early. It left opponents feeling their time had been limited on purpose.

“They don’t respect us” shouted on protestor afterward.

Then Littell, a supporter of the 15 week ban challenged opponents outside the building.

“The best way to save a babies life…cover your ears” he yelled.

The situation came close to becoming physical until Oponnent Lauren Branzel intervened stepping between Littell and an Oponnent of the abortion ban as the two shouted. 

“So tensions ar high and its really unfortunate to see them insert themselves” said Branzel, who works for Planned Parenthood.

If, and likely when this bill becomes law, abortions up to twenty-four weeks are still going to be legal Roe vs Wade, but the clock is ticking.

Florida’s ban is modeled after a Mississippi statute that has already made it to the US Supreme Court. A ruling is expected in June.

Neither the House Bill or its Senate companion contain an exception for rape or incest. Attempts to add the provision have failed.

Most city or municipal officials, including mayors and city managers file a limited financial disclosure that only lists broad categories, but now they may soon be required to provide full financial disclosure, which includes a complete list of your assess and liabilities. Critics on a Senate committee questioned the need, but Sponsor Jason Brodeur (Bro Deer) told the committee when people can decide million dollar purchases, they need to disclose.

“We now preserved the ability for somebody, if they don’t want to disclose some of this stuff, just file your tax return, so that’s been preserved as well.  Others have options to file married but separate, and if you want to do that. There are also options for folks who are concerned about it to not run for public office. Its an option.This is a privilege and if so you choose to do that, I think the voters deserve your full financial transparency.”

State lawmakers and other constitutional officers, including county commissions already file the more detailed information. The filing would become effective January first if the bill becomes law.

A rail car replica of those used by Nazi Germany was on display outside the state Capitol today. It provides a twenty-one minute virtual experience on the inside walls of the car, describing the trip Jews made from Hungary to a concentration camp. The governor went inside with about 40 people. In Germany one hundred or more were stuffed into the cars with no place to relieve themselves and no food.

“You can talk about the six million people that were killed” said the Governor. “We all know that’s terrible. You can read it on a sheet of paper, but what does that actually mean when you can see the tragedy. You can see videos, you can see some of the artifacts.” 

Florida has the toughest law on anti semitism in the country. It was signed into law in May 2019 in Israel when the Governor was on a five day trade mission.

The full House Appropriations Committee today approved cutting 200 million from the budgets of 12 districts that defied the states ban on mask mandates. But as Mike Vasilinda tells us, even with the cuts, lawmakers say each district will still have more money than the current year.

The sponsor of the move to cut a combined 200 million from 12 school districts that defied the states ban on mask mandates faced tough questioning Wednesday.

Representative Matt Wilhite (D-Palm Beach) asked “How is this not punitive to those twelve counties, or the parents in those twelve counties. You want to talk about parents, putting parents first?”

He was followed by Representative Fentrice Driskell (D-Tampa) “Putting parents first was intended to be punitive to the school districts that received those deductions?”

But Rep. Randy Fine held his ground.

“I don’t think its punitive” responded Fine. “I think its holding people accountable, and I think it is saying that we expect that the laws we pass be followed by all of our school districts.”

Two parents, both from Leon County spoke…one against.

Marie-Claire Leman of Fund Education Now called the legislation politically motivated. 

“This is being done to further divide our electorate. So one legislator ids proposing this because he thinks he can. And the rest of you are going to go along with it, stoking those divisions” said Leman. 

Parent Elizabeth Walker complained Leon school administrators dared her to sue if she didn’t like the mask policy” said walker..

“She has been denied entry into her class room without a mask. And she not given credit for any hour that she missed.

The budget was approved with the cuts. 

If these cuts remain in the budget, all twelve districts are still going to have more money in the next year than they do right now, but not as much as they would have had if they hadn’t bucked the state.

Representative Randy Fine told members “There’re going to have more funding per student, they’re going to have more funding over all. This is a way to send a message, an important message.”

So far there has been no effort to push the cuts in the Senate. But they are likely to be an issue when negotiations begin.

This coming school year Florida will spend 28 billion dollars on public education, up from 26.7 billion in the current year.

Florida Democrats today again called on the Governor to declare a state of emergency for affordable housing to stop dramatically ricing rates. They also want a 90 moratorium on evictions and legislation to help people evicted during Covid from having it used against their record when rent again. Representative Carlos Guillermo Smith (D-Orlando) pled with GOP lawmakers to do something.

“The reality is that rents are rising across Florida at an unconscionable rate. We are talking ten, twenty, thirty, forty, fifty percent rent hikes across Florida. And we know that our families can not afford thee types of rent hikes and something has to be done.”

This coming year, Florida will spend just under three hundred million on affordable housing, most of it distributed through local coalitions.

Garnet and gold balloons graced the courtyard at the state Capitol today to honor Florida State University. The marching ban played, cheerleaders cheered, and hot dogs and hamburgers were plentiful for the several hundred who came. President Richard McCullough told the crowd that more than seventy-three thousand students applied for just sixty-two hundred openings this school year, in part because of FSU’s dramatic rise in national rankings.

“There is no university that I can think of that has risen so fast in the rankings, from forty-three to nineteenth in just under six years” McCullough told the crowd. “And our student success is a driving force for what we do at Flordia State University.  Ninety-five percent of our students return after their freshman year, and seventy-four percent of them graduate in four years. That graduation rate is among the top in the country.”

The national champion FSU woman’s soccer team was also honored at the event. Coach Mark Krikorian noted the overall championship team GPA is 3.5.

Legislation that would prohibit the discussion of gender identity in the classroom moved forward today in the state Capitol after more than a hundred people voiced their displeasure with the idea. As Mike Vasilinda tells us, changes to the bill are expected, including clarifying which grades will be impacted.

It was standing room only as more than a hundred people showed up to speak against the legislation sponsored by Sen. Dennis Baxley (R-Ocala).

“We’re talking about K thru three” Baxley told the committee.

He argued that schools are lax about involving parents in discussions about sex and gender.

“These children belong to families. They are not wards of the state” says Baxley.

Senator Tina Polsky asked if the bill would prohibit a child from talking about their family in class. “Why does Johnny have two mommies?” She asked. “ What is the teacher supposed to say?”

Baxley responded, saying “I think you should talk, some discussions are for your parents.”

Dan Van Trice told us it will very much impact what his kids can say in class.

“They take pictures of their family to school and they put them up on the bulletin board, and they talk about their families. Well, my kids won’t be able to participate in that” the father or two worries.

Jackson County Teacher Anita Hatcher spoke about her transgender son and his father.

“When you reassert parental authority, sometimes you get the parental authority of my child’s father, who told him it would be better if he took his own life” Hatcher told the committee, stressing the anxiety kids questioning their gender face.

And while this bill only applies to kids up to the third grade, parents tell us it needs to apply to all classrooms.

January Littlejohn was one of handful who testified in favor. She has filed suit in Federal Court after Leon schools went behind her back counseling her 13 year old about her sexual preferences.

“They told me they could not tell me anything about the meeting.” Littlejohn told us.  “That my daughter was protected from me.”

As written, the bill would allow parents to sue school boards that violate the law.

The ability for parents to sue is expected to be stripped from the bill at its next stop and be replaced with a fine or other sanctions.

After a lengthy hearing on parents rights in their child’s sexual orientation discussions, Sen. Gary Farmer (D-Broward) held a news conference to say he has filed legislation to repeal the “Fairness in Womens Sports Act, passed last year that bans someone born a male from participating on a woman’s team.

“It’s unfortunate that we have to keep reminding people” says Farmer. “But I;’m happy to keep saying it, and I’m not going to stop saying it, is that trans girls are girls, and trans rights are human rights. So I know everyone up here joins me in saying, let the kids play. That’s what this is about”

There is also pending legislation that would provide an option to choose non-binary on your drivers license, which means you neither identify as male or female.

Legislation allowing grandparents to visit their grandchildren when one parent is accused in the complicity of the death of the other cleared its second of three committees today. The bill is narrowly tailored and based on the murder for hire of FSU law professor Dan Markel in 2014. His parents have been forbidden from seeing his two sons. Both his wife and mother in law have been named by police in the case, but neither has been charged with a crime. Senator Keith Perry is sponsoring the bill. 

“When you think about grandparents in general, and as a matter of fact we talked about broadening the scope of this bill at some point in time, When you think about grandparents who have relationships with grandkids, really close, and sometimes I think it might be in the best interest to have the grandparent have a relationship with that child. Not lose that,” says Perry.

Under the bill, if a surviving parent was convicted of a crime involving the other parents death, or found liable in a civil suit, grandparents can ask a judge to be involved in their grandchildren’s lives.

Twelve Florida School districts that defied the state’s ban on mask mandates are now scheduled to lose two hundred million dollars in the budget as a consequence to their action. As Mike Vasilinda tells us, the plan is to spread the money around the other fifty-five districts that followed the Governor’s executive order.

The twelve districts that defied a ban on mask mandates now collectively face a loss of two hundred million dollars.

“They didn’t defy the mask ban, they broke the law” says State Representative Randy Fine. “They acted in an illegal way and they engaged in the second largest state sponsored act of child abuse in the history of Florida.”

But now the powerful appropriations chair says the districts must face the consequences of their actions.

To try and sweeten the pot and get enough votes to pass this plan, the House version would take the two hundred million and give it to the fifty-fife school districts that didn’t buck the state says House K-12 Appropriations Chair Rep. Randy Fine (R-Brevard).

“And we have to send the message that when you follow the law, you are rewarded. When you do not follow the law, you are not.”

Leon Superintendent Rocky Hanna tells us his constituents wanted masks worn in schools despite the state saying no.

“Would you do all of that again?” We asked Hanna. 

“Absolutely. Absolutely, I would” he told us. “And if we need to go to war with him, with representative Fine and this issue with salaries, we’ll just lawyer up and have at it.”

Democrat leader Evan Jenne thinks it would be foolish for any GOP members from the 12 counties to agree to moving the money.

“How any legislature can turn around and tell his community that I am here for you, ,or she turns around and says I’m here for your kids  don’t tell me that when you’ve just yoked millions of dollars away from their education” says Jenne, who represents Broward, one of the counties facing a loss of millions.

The plan gets its first test on Wednesday when the proposed budget goes before the full appropriations committee.

The twelve districts account for half of the public school enrollment in the state. The 200 million is based on the number of administrators in a county making more than one hundred thousand dollars a year.

Florida Congressman Michael Waltz, a former green beret, has produced a television spot named “Genocide Games,”taking the Chinese government and the International Olympic Committee, and US companies to task for holding and supporting the games in a nation rife with human rights abuses.

https://twitter.com/michaelgwaltz/status/1489992217284407300

The ad also encourages Americans to stop buying products made in China, with Waltz telling consumers to “put them down.”

“Let’s not have American companies supporting a Chinese dictatorship that is abusing its own people, but seeks to replace the UnitedStates as a world leader” says Waltz. “And I think we’ve got to start voting with our wallets, and again in the ad, if you see made in China, put it down. It’s not just a human rights issue or a jobs issue, its now national security issue.”

NBC has refused to air the ad on its local station in Washington DC because it shows the logos of US companies. But more than half a million have seen the ad on You Tube as of mid afternoon today.

Legislation aimed at ending midnight flights of immigrants into Florida cleared its first House Committee today in the state Capitol. As Mike Vasilinda tells us, the state can’t stop those who transport the immigrants, but it can stop the companies from doing business with the state or local governments.

The staff analysis for House Bill 1355, quoting News4 Jax, says that 78 charter flights carrying unaccompanied children landed at Jacksonville International during a six month period last year. 

“A number of children have been locked on airplanes in the middle of the night and left on tarmac’s” said Sponsor John Snyder (R-Stuart), the Sponsor.  

“There are individuals from every corner of the earth that know, if you can make it to Mexico, there’s an open ticket” added Snyder.

The bill goes after common carriers, those who transport people for money, from getting state or local contracts if they were hired to transport immigrants who were apprehended at the border.

“How many contracts like that are in force?” Asked Democrat Gearldine Thompson 

“We don’t know what we don’t know” responded Snyder.

Advocate Karen Woodall told lawmakers the Feds are just following the law.

“The transport is not illegal. It’s required by Federal law.”

Then there was Zachery, a 12 year old who asked  “Why are you attacking kids who look like me? Kids, we’re just kids.”

The bill was approved twelve to five.

The legislation did garner the vote of one Democrat.

Outside, Yenniser Molina, Zachery’s mother, was near tears.

“We’re here to provide for our families. We don’t want to do any harm. We love it here.”

The legislation is one of the Governor’s top priorities.

A first of its kind study by the Bonefish and Tarpon Trust sampled 93 bonefish in Biscayne Bay and the Florida Keys and found pharmaceuticals in their flesh, absorbed from poorly treated wastewater.  The study points to the need for continued improvement of waste water systems says Bonefish and Tarpon Trust CEO Jim McDuffy.

“58 Pharmacutical contaminants were detected in these fish. Drugs that are commonly prescribed for humans. Seven, an average of seven drugs were detected for each bonefish” said McDuffy.

The most commonly detected pharmaceuticals were: Blood pressure medications, Antidepressants, Prostate medications, Antibiotics, and Pain relievers. Not one of the ninety three fish sampled was free from drugs.

Florida’s investor owned utilities want lawmakers to restructure what they are required to pay roof top solar homeowners who sell excess power back to the companies. Currently the utilities are required to pay retail for the power. They are asking lawmakers to make the payments equal to what it costs the utilities to generate a kilowatt hour, claiming customers with rooftop solar are being subsidized by those without solar. But George Cavros of the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy told lawmakers that despite asking for hundreds of millions in higher rates, solar was never mentioned.

“The state’s big three monopoly utilities last yea requested rate increases from the Public Service Commission.  Not one utility, not one utility identified last revenue Fromm roof top solar customers as a reason for the rate request. Not one.”

Sponsor Lawrence McCure of Lakeland calls the current payments unfair, but says he is working on a compromise that will satisfy solar installers.

“This is in real time a mandate to take it in whether they need it or not.” McClure said afterward.  “So, we take that all into consideration. I pledged to committee members, my colleagues, and everyone in the industry, we’re going to work on it.”

Solar installation companies said the legislation would cost the state thousands of jobs and gut the roof top solar industry. The investor owned utilities were also behind a 2016 constitutional amendments that also would have put solar producers at a disadvantage. Voters turned it down. 

Florida’s investor owned utilities want lawmakers to restructure what they are required to pay roof top solar homeowners who sell excess power back to the companies. Currently the utilities are required to pay retail for the power. They are asking lawmakers to make the payments equal to what it costs the utilities to generate a kilowatt hour, claiming customers with rooftop solar are being subsidized by those without solar. But George Cavros of the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy told lawmakers that despite asking for hundreds of millions in higher rates, solar was never mentioned.

“The state’s big three monopoly utilities last yea requested rate increases from the Public Service Commission.  Not one utility, not one utility identified last revenue Fromm roof top solar customers as a reason for the rate request. Not one.”

Sponsor Lawrence McCure of Lakeland calls the current payments unfair, but says he is working on a compromise that will satisfy solar installers.

“This is in real time a mandate to take it in whether they need it or not.” McClure said afterward.  “So, we take that all into consideration. I pledged to committee members, my colleagues, and everyone in the industry, we’re going to work on it.”

Solar installation companies said the legislation would cost the state thousands of jobs and gut the roof top solar industry. The investor owned utilities were also behind a 2016 constitutional amendments that also would have put solar producers at a disadvantage. Voters turned it down.