The Fine Print

Halftime of the 2012 session: Bills are dying

House Speaker Dean Cannon warned prior to the 2012 session that there was "limited bandwidth" to take up a lot of contentious issues during this critical election year.

If there's any observation to be made at the halfway point, Cannon wasn't kidding.

Cannon made his comment to emphasize that his focus was largely on the once-a-decade chore of redistricting and the annual job of passing a new state budget.

In reality, what that has meant is that in the usually-much more disciplined House there hasn't been a lot of direction from leadership about lots of other bills. (The clear exception appears to be bills that are a top priority of Gov. Rick Scott.)

But that has meant it's been a much more wide open process in the House - and it has resulted in many bills and proposals quickly falling to the wayside.

The Senate, which is always trickier to figure out, has been equally difficult to predict this year.

In that chamber you have the power shifting from Senate President Mike Haridopolos to incoming Senate President Don Gaetz, an ongoing leadership battle between potential future Senate presidents Sen. Jack Latvala and Sen. Andy Gardiner, and the tug-of-war over prison privatization that led Haridopolos to dump Sen. Mike Fasano as a committee chairman.

In short, if you believe the chit-chat of some lobbyists - and some House members - no one is really sure who's in charge over in the Senate.

Whatever the reasons the result is this: Regardless of party affiliation bills have had a rough time and have been shot down.

The Florida Legislature hit its halfway point this week and its worth noting the major pieces of legislation that appear dead - or close to dead:

Legislation to bring mega-casinos to Florida

A bill sought by the insurance industry to limit bad faith lawsuits

A measure pushed by the Department of Health to block doctors from prescribing drugs if they have been arrested

Any major constitutional amendments dealing with property taxes

A mandate that businesses use E-verify to check the legal status of newly-hired employees

Legislation that would subject drivers to a ticket if they are caught texting while driving

Several contentious environmental measures, including one meant to block local ordinances on fertilizer

There are a whole host of other bills whose future is very murky to predict and that includes legislation to collect sales taxes from online retailers, a bill to ban Internet cafes, and a push by the business community to lower unemployment compensation tax bills.

And to reinforce this message even further, consider this, as of Friday the total number of bills passed this session by both the House and Senate is five.

Yep, you read that right.

Out of nearly 2,000 bills and resolutions that have been filed so far this session, only five have passed both chambers.

There are 28 days left.

5 biggest questions of the 2012 session

Florida's GOP-controlled Legislature kicks off its annual session on Tuesday amid the backdrop of the looming Jan. 31 presidential primary, a governor still battling low poll numbers, and legislative leaders who so far have shown a desire to keep the agenda limited during a critical election year.

The two main jobs are redistricting and passing a budget, but even that's not guaranteed at this point.

Senate President Mike Haridopolos has talked about waiting until later in the year to pass a budget. And while there appears to be a push to pass redistricting plans quickly there remains a chance that legal challenges to the final product could force legislators into a special session at some later date to adopt different maps.

Here at this point are the 5 biggest questions of the session:

Will redistricting keep moving smoothly and quickly? In anticipation of potential legal challenges, the GOP-controlled Legislature has already begun to accelerate to a possible final vote on changes for both Congressional and legislative districts. The Senate is poised to vote out its maps within the first few days of the annual session.

So far the political rancor has been fairly minimal although that could change quickly. Some South Florida Republicans have already been complaining about the treatment of U.S. Rep. Allen West due to a proposed shift that could make his seat more competitive. The question is whether state legislators will heed the complaints and push onward - or will they engage in more tinkering which could spark even more infighting.

There hasn't been a loud chorus of threats of lawsuits or recriminations yet. But it's hard to believe that debate and arguments over redistricting won't heat up and bog down the process at some point.

Does the casino bill really have a chance of passing? There's no doubt that one of the more enticing storylines of the 2012 session is the fate of the mega-casino bill sponsored by Sen. Ellyn Bogdanoff and Rep. Eric Fresen.

In the last few weeks, the list of proponents and opponents has been growing (although Gov. Rick Scott has deliberately chosen to remain rather quiet about whether he would sign the bill).

After a series of workshops, Bogdanoff late last week filed a massive rewrite of the bill intended to try to win over critics and votes. The measure now includes a voter referendum option, including giving voters in local counties the option of deciding whether or not to let local dog and horse tracks add slot machines.

Usually high-profile legislative fights pitting deep-pocketed groups against each other result in nothing getting passed. One of the main axioms of the Florida Legislature is that it's 10 times easier to kill a bill than to pass a bill.

Right now many Capitol observers are anxious to see if the bill can actually make it out of its first committee and then actually get passed by the full Senate. The fact that the Florida House has shown no signs of seriously considering the bill has fed speculation that the legislation is doomed for this year.

Of course, sometimes major initiatives take more than one year (and when leadership changes). So part of the battle for this year may be just demonstrating to doubters that a fair number of legislators are willing to support the bill this time around. That could set the stage for its return in 2013.

What does Dean Cannon really want? The session is starting with a bit of uncertainty because Cannon has been reticent to discuss what he would like to see happen during his last session as House Speaker.

Cannon last year waited until the eve of session to let everyone know he wanted to pursue far-reaching changes to the judicial branch, including a proposal to break up the state Supreme Court into two separate branches. (In the end Cannon got a watered-down constitutional amendment that makes some changes but none as dramatic as he initially proposed.)

Heading into this session Cannon has basically insisted his main priorities are the budget and redistricting, or the two things that the state constitution requires the Legislature to do this year.

That gives Senate Republicans less leverage to use against Cannon in trying to get some of their priorities passed and makes it harder for dealmaking to occur. (And it's worth noting that Rep. Will Weatherford, R-Wesley Chapel and the incoming House Speaker has sponsored zero bills so far this year as well. So there's limited leverage against him as well.)

How serious is Gov. Rick Scott's budget veto threat? Last month Scott did a turnabout on school funding. In less than one year he has gone from advocating a 10 percent cut in funding for schools to pushing a $1 billion increase and threatening to veto the entire budget unless there is a "significant" increase.

Initially Scott would not say what a "significant" increase is. But in later interviews, he said he likes $1 billion.

Scott has said his push for more school funding came after spending months listening to Florida voters who have told him education is a top priority. It may have also something to do with that fact that some in Scott's inner circle think that education cuts may have contributed a big part to his lagging poll numbers. Some public polls have backed this up, pointing out that some of other Scott's initiatives, including drug testing welfare recipients is popular.

The governor, however, relied on deep budget cuts in hospitals and health care spending in order to free up the money needed to increase funding for schools while also filling a nearly $2 billion budget gap. Such deep cuts may prove to be a hard sell to GOP legislators who are getting lobbied heavily by hospital officials who warn that the cuts will lead to layoffs.

So legislators must decide to either find other cuts to meet Scott's school funding goals - or they must pare back the increase sought by the governor to something more manageable. A much less likely scenario is that legislative leaders could shrug off Scott's threat since Republicans hold a supermajority in both the House and Senate and override a veto.

One other solution, of course, is to hope for extra revenue. And that's one advantage of potentially waiting for voting on a budget. If the economy continues to slowly recover, there's a chance that it will be easier to meet Scott's goal and avoid a confrontation.

What issue not on everyone's radar screen now will blow up? This is a reoccuring question because nearly every year there is a legislative initiative that seemingly comes out of nowhere and dominates debate and headlines in the final days of the session.

Part of it is due to the fact that the rules allow legislators to change bills at a moment's notice. Past examples include controversial bills dealing with abortion and elections. There are also some bills lurking out there that could quickly dominate part of this year's narrative. Drug-testing for state employees and another stab at mandating E-Verify for employers are just two such measures.

With so much attention concentrated on redistricting, it's easy to imagine a scenario where attention quickly shifts to something else if redistricting passes as easily as legislative leaders expect. 

It seems that each session of the Florida Legislature is like a hurricane, with its path and intensity quite unlike the storm that preceded it.

 

 

 

Secession, robocalls, freedom: Day 1 after health care reform

Within 24 hours of health care reform passing in Washington D.C., we had here in Florida:

Attorney General Bill McCollum, the leading Republican candidate for governor, declare that he would file a lawsuit with nine other states as soon as Tuesday and that his decision had nothing to do with any political ambitions or attempts to place conservative critics of health care reform.

"No politics involved in this whatsover,'' said McCollum during a press conference held on Monday morning. It is all about the fact that the bill is bad and unconstitutional, he said.

About six hours later, McCollum's campaign sent out a press release attacking Chief Financial Officer Alex Sink that stated "while she provides lip service on addressing the serious challenges facing our state, Alex Sink refuses to stand with the small businessmen and small businesswomen who will be harmed by the higher taxes and government mandates this legislation will bring."

The release further states: "Fortunately, Attorney Bill McCollum is leading the charge to challenge the Democrats’ unconstitutional health care plan – showing the true leadership we need for Florida’s future.”

The attack on Sink came because after months and months of refusing to say whether or not she supported Obamacare she finally put out a statement that said she was in favor of the bill headed to the president, sort of.

"Though it is certainly not perfect, these long-overdue reforms are better than Washington continuing to do nothing to improve America's health care system.'' said Sink, the main Democratic rival to McCollum for governor.

While Sink and McCollum weighed in, the Florida Legislature jumped right into the fray as well, passing not one, but two bills out of legislative committees. One bill urges McCollum to sue, while the other would put a constitutional amendment on the 2010 ballot that would say Floridians are not obligated to follow any mandates to participate in any health care systems.

"It is our duty to step up and reassert the rights of Floridians, in this case protecting our citizen’s rights and freedoms to make appropriate decisions as it relates to their own health care,”said Rep. Scott Plakon.

State House Democrats, in a bit of clever wordplay, announced that now was not the time to "secede" and that Republicans were having an outrageous display of partisanship and ignoring the fact that nearly 25 percent of adult Floridians were uninsured.

Former House Speaker Marco Rubio said he would launch a petition to repeal health care reform and chided his U.S. Senate rival Gov. Charlie Crist for not being strong enough on the issue. Crist's campaign pointed that he did in fact support repealing the measure. And if that wasn't enough, there was the release from the Rubio campaign that stated the road to health care reform started with the "Crist-Obama stimulus."

Lastly, the re-election campaign of U.S. Rep. Allen Boyd did robocalls to voters in the 2nd Congressional District trying to explain why he changed his vote from a no to a yes on health care reform.

His call touted the legislation as a way to stand up to insurance companies, while offering a tax credit to middle class families and help out with the deficit.

"For too long insurance companies have had too much power to determine patient coverage and care, premiums are out of control, and health care costs threaten our nation's fiscal future,'' Boyd declared in the phone call.

Health care reform he promised would "put a stop to insurance companies who deny care or cancel coverage when you get sick care."

He added that "I'm confident that with these reforms we will begin to control health care costs for our families and our country, reserve the right to choose your doctor and stop many of the abuses of the big insurance companies."

House could scuttle a Jeb Bush legacy

A key component of Gov. Jeb Bush’s One Florida Initiative could be eliminated under a proposal that has been suggested by a House budget panel. But the move is already drawing fire from some legislators and the NAACP.

Rep. Alan Hays, R-Umatilla and chairman of the House budget committee that wants to eliminate the Office of Supplier Diversity and hand over some of its work to another part of state government, says that the current office isn't doing it's job.

 He cites a decline in minority spending levels in state government over the last few years. The office was set up by Bush at the time he ended the use of racial preferences in state contracts.

Bush, while not commenting directly about the cut, told the Florida Tribune that "supplier diversity takes work."

Read more about this and some other state budget-related news here.

A lesson in how things really work in Tallahassee.

It took Peggy Lee six hours to drive from her home to Englewood to testify before the Florida Legislature about the need to provide more money to 911 systems.

But Lee -- the mother-in-law of murder victim Denise Lee -- learned in a matter of minutes how things really work in Tallahassee.

 

Lee got roughly 1 minute to talk to legislators on Wednesday. Lobbyists for and against a proposed bill on 911 funding got anywhere from 5 minutes to 20 minutes.

 

Roughly 30 seconds after Lee spoke, a House committee delayed action on the bill she testified on. A move was made to bring the bill back up later, but there was confusion over House rules, ultimately leading to a decision to shut the meeting down.

 

"We just feel very frustrated," Lee said. "I guess that's just how it works."

 

Read more here at the Sarasota Herald-Tribune.

Sweeping anti-abortion bill filed in House

Here's some interesting information from the Feb. 17 edition of the Daily Wrap-Up put out by the Florida Tribune:

Rep. Charles Van Zant, R-Keystone Heights, filed a sweeping anti-abortion bill on Wednesday that bans all abortion in the state of Florida unless two doctors determine that the life of the mother is in jeopardy. The measure -- HB 1097 -- says that any attempt to induce an abortion is a first-degree felony. The legislation would also outlaw any facility or business that performs abortion.

Van Zant's bill includes a lengthy introduction that questions past U.S. Supreme Court rulings that legalized abortion in the first trimester and asserts that the Florida Legislature has the power to ignore them, stating that "The Legislature finds that the Constitution of the United States does not vest in the United States Supreme Court the power to determine moral questions on behalf of the citizens of any state without their consent. Further the Legislature finds that the justices of the United States Supreme Court are not qualified to determine, establish, or define the moral values of the people of the United States and specifically for the people of Florida." 

Some additional information: Van Zant's measure also states "The Legislature of the people of the state of Florida finds that all life comes from the Creator and begins at conception" and that the principles outlined in Roe v. Wade are "repugnant to the principles expressed in the United States Constitution."

It's not clear how far this legislation will go especially since its legality will likely be questioned. Last year the Legislature did not spend much time on abortion. A measure that would have required an ultrasound prior to an abortion never got heard in the Florida Senate because there were not the votes to pass it out of its first committee stop. Because the Senate was unable to move the bill the House only moved a companion measure through just one committee.

(UPDATE: House Speaker Larry Cretul, R-Ocala, on Thursday said that Van Zant is very "passionate" about abortion and that he wants a "public discussion" about the issue. Cretul would not say if the bill would ultimately get debated by the Florida House. But he said that he talked to Van Zant about it and told him "to work your bill and see what happens.")

Top Democratic Party fundraiser got help to pay off 200k fine

File this in the got missed at the time, but still interesting category.

Jeff Ryan, a top fundraiser for the Florida Democratic Party, used donations funneled through a political organization run by a Tallahassee attorney to pay off a $209,000 state elections fine.

Ryan got hit with the fine because he was chairman of an outfit called Florida House Victory, which was set up by then Rep. Chris Smith, D-Fort Lauderdale, to raise money independently of the state party during a time when legislative leaders were at odds with then party chairman Scott Maddox. (Sound familiar?)

The Florida Elections Commission in 2007 ruled that the fundraising committee - which was eventually shut down - accept campaign contributions above the legal limits. Instead of fighting the charges, which Democrats said were due to technical mistakes made when the paperwork was filed, Ryan agreed to pay a fine of $209,000.

But state election records show that $209,000 was paid to a trust account maintained by well-known Tallahassee ethics and elections attorney Mark Herron to pay off the fine. The money came out of a committee of continuous existence also run by Herron called Mark-PAC.

Donations came into the CCE from the Florida PBA, HCA, Hartman & Tyner, Palm Beach County Kennel Club and Jacksonville Greyhound Racing in late 2007 and 2008 - or at the same time that two payments to Herron's trust account were made.

When asked about it on Sunday, Herron said since Ryan was not a candidate the arrangement was legal. Herron also said that donors were told ahead of time what the money was being used for.

So why this bring up now? Some Republicans remain convinced that their fundraising woes get a lot more press coverage than ones involving Democrats. And this one listed above has been included in the list of those items missed. But Ryan's fine did get reported at the time even if it didn't get reported in all newspapers. What's new is how the fine was handled.

House inks $105k contract to study managed care in Florida

Here's an item provided courtesy of independent journalist Christine Jordan Sexton:

A consulting group that lists WellCare Health Plans in Tampa as one of its clients has signed a $105,000 contract with the Florida House to conduct a study on Florida’s managed care delivery system including its penetration in the market and whether providers participate in the system.

House Speaker Larry Cretul signed a $105,000 contract with The Pacific Health Policy Group to analyze Florida’s Medicaid managed care program and produce an overview of the current program, including a financial overview and a study of the care, monitoring and oversight.  The report is due by Feb. 5.

According to its website Pacific Health Policy Group has worked with the Arizona Health Care Cost Containment System and Arizona Long Term Care System as clients. Arizona has implemented a large scale mandatory managed care program for the general Medicaid population as well as a managed long term care system for the aged, physically and developmentally disabled populations.

The Pacific Health Policy Group also also lists WellCare Health Plans as a client. The WellCare group of companies, Staywell  and  Healthease, are the largest Medicaid HMOs in the state.

The fate of the Medicaid program has been a source of discussion among legislators in the last few weeks with some lawmakers suggesting that one to save the state money would be to shift more patients from the traditional fee-for-service system into managed care organizations.

House Democrats appear ready to ratchet it up a notch

It's not been a big secret that Democrats and Republicans don't get along well in the Florida House.

But the prospect of a tough budget year - as well as the prospect of an angry electorate in the 2010 election cycle - has prompted the Democrats to take an even harder line during the upcoming session.

That tension has already spilled out in the last few days with Democrats taking shots at the Republicans during some of the budget hearings.

And it could get even worse. Some Democrats have decided that it makes little sense to cooperate with Republicans since they believe many of their ideas - and their bills - won't get much of a hearing from the majority party. And it's not like Republicans can use the budget as a way to create leverage since legislative leaders have all but made it clear that legislators will be cutting it.

Rep. Ron Saunders, D-Key West and a veteran legislator who once served in the House when Democrats were in the majority, said this week he is advising fellow Democrats to think about whether or not they want to file certain bills.

Why? Because House rules make it clear that a member can't offer an amendment on the House floor if there is a stand-alone bill on the same subject that has failed to pass through a single committee.

"If the bill is not going to be heard in committee, we'll at least get a chance to have it heard on the floor," said Saunders in explaining his strategy.

On Thursday, Democrats threw down another salvo. House Democratic Leader Franklin Sands, D-Weston and Saunders sent a letter to House Speaker Larry Cretul, R-Ocala, telling him that the current process outlined to deal with the budget is "fundamentally flawed." Democrats are referring to a decision by the House to ask members to list their top priorities - and their lowest priorities - as a prelude to possible budget cuts.

The letter states that Democrats "cannot participate in a futile exercise of identifying cuts" and suggested instead that the House have joint meetings between both its budget panel and the Finance and Tax Council for a more "productive" dialogue about the budget process.

So what does that mean? It means that Democrats won't be filling out forms that show what programs they like, and what programs they think could be cut. That means the only cuts that will get discussed are those proposed by Republicans.

You can expect the Republicans to criticize Democrats as obstructionists and unwilling to work together to find a solution to the state's fiscal woes. For now, consider this just Act 1.

(UPDATE -- Rep. David Rivera, R-Miami and chairman of the House budget panel, delivered his own letter to Democrats on Thursday afternoon where he blasted what he called their "obsession with raising taxes on Floridians during these tough economic times." He criticized them for refusing to engage in the budget exercise, calling it an "abdication of responsibility.")

House Republicans ask Florida senators to vote no on health care reform

Republicans in the Florida House, citing concerns that Medicaid costs are “unsustainable,” will ask the state’s two U.S senators to vote against health reform legislation pending in Congress.
 
House Majority Leader Adam Hasner asked Republicans to sign letters to Sens. George LeMieux and Bill Nelson during a late Tuesday afternoon briefing, where Republicans were warned about the ongoing surge in Medicaid enrollment and costs. Medicaid is the state and federal health care program that covers low-income families, the elderly and the disabled. 

House budget staff showed projections that Medicaid could increase from a 26 percent share of the state’s overall budget to as much as 36 percent in the next decade if trends from the past 12 years continue.

“What we are seeing here is unsustainable for the state,’’ said Rep. Denise Grimsley, R-Lake Placid, a registered nurse who is in charge of the House budget committee on health care spending. 

The 10-percent increase over a decade assumes that underlying medical costs, a driver in the Medicaid program, aren’t addressed. More here.