This was reported by the Miami Herald April 1:

BY STEVE BOUSQUET

TIMES/HERALD TALLAHASSEE BUREAU

TALLAHASSEE – The chief of the Florida Lottery waited eight months to follow legislative orders to seek new offers for the agency’s lucrative advertising work, then skirted a legislative order to seek competitive proposals.

All that time, Lottery Secretary Leo DiBenigno kept the existing advertising agency on the payroll on a month-to-month basis and paid the company more money for extra work.

A legislative committee grilled DiBenigno over his decisions for 90 minutes Tuesday. It was by far the most critical interrogation of any of Gov. Charlie Crist’s agency heads since he took office in 2007.

”This time, we did not get the results we wanted,” said Rep. Alan Hays, R-Umatilla, chairman of the House Government Operations Appropriations Committee.

Last year, the Legislature made clear it wanted the Lottery to find a new vendor for the $3.5 million set aside for advertising in place of Cooper DDB, a Miami firm hired in 2002 that employs former lottery secretary David Griffin as a lobbyist.

Click here to read the rest of the story.

By Ellyn Bogdanoff 

Republican state representative from Fort Lauderdale. 

Consensus is that this will be one of the most challenging 60 days that the Florida Legislature has ever faced. The difficulty that lies ahead seems insurmountable, but with challenging times comes great opportunity. 

We must have the political will to take on the old ways of government and systemically change the way we do business. It’s time to create a smarter state government that works effectively for all Floridians. Most importantly, your elected representatives have an obligation to clean up government’s house before we ask any more from any Floridian’s house. 

This legislative session, I am serving as the Chair of House Finance & Tax Council. It is my responsibility to lead the council members in their deliberations regarding state revenue issues. As we have begun to discuss these issues, it is distressing that the first thing many look to do to fill a budget shortfall is to raise taxes. That is the easy fix to our problems, albeit dangerous.

Florida receives the bulk of its taxes from sales tax revenue — a tax directly reflective of what the citizens of this state can afford. The state has less because the people have less. It seems counterintuitive to increase taxes during a recession, but nonetheless the outcry is there. 

I believe we need a different framework if we are going to successfully tackle the state’s expected $6 billion revenue shortfall. That’s why I have worked hard to find alternatives to simply raising taxes.

Click here to read the reset of the story.

NOTE: A debate reared up in a suburban Northeast Florida county where a citizen tried to question the county commission chairman about the campaign contributions he received from developers. The chairman refused to allow the citizen to continue his statement. Here is a report on a related issue from Tampabay.com.

By Mary Ellen Klas, Times/Herald Tallahassee Bureau 
In Print: Tuesday, March 31, 2009

TALLAHASSEE — No legislator is immune when it comes to the influence of the gambling industry in Florida.

All 160 members of the Florida Legislature have either accepted a campaign check from the industry or benefited from its contributions to their parties. In the 2006-08 election cycle alone, horse and dog tracks, jai alai frontons and the Seminole Indian Tribe gave nearly $5 million to legislators and political parties — more than double the $2.2 million gambling interests contributed to lawmakers in the previous election.

Some legislators have worked closely with the industry or have allies who do. And in every corner of the state, ailing parimutuels are promising something lawmakers are hungry for in this perilous economy: new jobs, if legislators give them new games.

To read the rest of the story, click here.

This story was reported in the Orlando Sentinel recently. It is a scenario that is undoubted played out in school districts around the state of Florida.

By Leslie Postal | Sentinel Staff Writer

Courtney Coker graduated from Florida State University in 2006 eager to start work as a music teacher. It wasn’t hard to turn her passion into a paycheck.

“It was teacher shortage, teacher shortage, teacher shortage,” Coker said. “I had no problem finding my first job. Everybody I knew found a job.”

Now, three years later, the band director at Blankner School in Orlando finds herself consumed with fear that her dream job will soon be gone. Like thousands of teachers across Florida, she worries the state’s financial crisis could push her into the ranks of the unemployed.

For the rest of the story, click here.

By Charlie Reese

Politicians are the only people in the world who create problems and then campaign against them.

Have you ever wondered, if both the Democrats and the Republicans are against deficits, WHY do we have deficits?

Have you ever wondered, if all the politicians are against inflation and high taxes, WHY do we have inflation and high taxes?

You and I don’t propose a federal budget.  The president does. Read the rest of this entry »

• Toxic-asset plan well received
• Economic data show some improvement
• Corporate profits slump in fourth quarter
• Japanese exports plunge 49%

Stocks ended the week higher as several reports raised hopes that the economy may be turning a corner, and investors responded enthusiastically to the White House’s plan to clean banks’ balance sheets. The success of the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s seven-year note auction also buoyed sentiment, convincing investors that the Treasury could still raise money at reasonable rates. During the week, the Dow Jones Industrial Average firmly entered so-called bull market territory, gaining more than 20% since its March 9 low.

U.S. economic news

Toxic-asset plan buoys markets
U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner detailed the Obama administration’s Public-Private Investment Program, a plan intended to clean toxic assets from banks’ balance sheets. The two-part program aims to boost purchases of bad loans and real-estate related securities and will use up to $100 billion of bank rescue funds from the Treasury as well as financial guarantees from the U.S. Federal Reserve Board and Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC). Read the rest of this entry »

The bluegrass band New Found Road entertained the crowd of more than 1,000.

(This is the text of the speech given by Board of Trustees president Angus Hastings during the annual Clay Electric meeting March 26 in Keystone Heights, Florida.)

As president of Clay Electric’s board of trustees, I have an urgent matter to discuss with you.

 

I see that many of you are using those fans we handed out as you went through the voting area. If you haven’t done so, read the message on the fan.

 

Congress is considering cap-and-trade legislation that will force all of us to pay a lot more for electricity. For some of you, that will mean a choice between running your air conditioning – or cooling yourself with a hand fan. 

You know how hard we’ve worked to keep your power affordable. For quite some time, we’ve offered some of the lowest electric rates in the state. All of that can be undone by Congress. But it doesn’t have to happen if we tell Congress what we think of their plans.

 

Read the rest of this entry »

This article was posted on TBO.Com

By Gary Pinnell | Highlands Today

Published: March 22, 2009

SEBRING – Should some items be taxed, and others not?

The Florida House of Representatives studied that issue last week to decide whether to levy sales taxes on rent, sports tickets, gym admissions, toll road charges, and hundreds of other goods.

If the exemptions were removed on drugs and groceries, for instance, the state of Florida could collect $4 billion in sales taxes. The state will be more than $6 billion in the hole for fiscal year 2009-10, so the move could fill 60 percent of the budget problem.

But not everyone agrees.

To read the rest of this story, go to: Legislature May Eliminate Sales Tax Exemptions

Dear Friends,

Today I was pleased to stand alongside Florida business leaders in a grassroots effort to help Floridians save money. Together we unveiled the Florida Backyard Card, a money-saving incentive for Floridians to spend their money wisely and locally.

Through the Florida Backyard Card, hundreds of businesses across Florida are offering incentives for their customers with benefits reaching beyond discounts and values.

The State of Florida is pleased to join the coalition of businesses rewarding customers through the Florida Backyard Card. With support from the Florida Lottery, the Backyard Card will be available at lottery retailers across the state. In addition, VISIT FLORIDA is managing www.FloridaBackyardCard.com, where consumers can download a card and search for the best deals in their backyard.

At www.FloridaBackyardCard.com, Floridians can enter their zip code and search for participating businesses to save on apparel, restaurants, groceries, home improvement, vacation rentals and many more goods and services.

When Floridians spend with local businesses, their dollars go to employee wages, building rent, utilities and state and local taxes which support schools and emergency services. Every purchase impacts our economy. In fact, 75 percent of Florida’s gross domestic product comes from consumer spending.

I am personally urging Floridians to go out today and get a backyard card from Florida lottery retailers across the state or online atwww.FloridaBackyardCard.com.

I already have mine and plan to use it well to help boost our economy.

Thank you and may God bless our beautiful state.

By LAMAR THAMES

Whether you like his ideas or not, you have to admire the way Clay County School Board Chairman Charlie Van Zant Jr. thinks outside the box in trying to come up with methods to cut expenses for the cash-strapped system.

Earlier this year, Van Zant broached the subject of a four-day school schedule. I think he knew he wouldn’t get much support for the unpopular idea but he put it out there anyway. 

Now, Van Zant wants to hear from the public about another idea he has: a longer school day that would result in fewer teaching days in the school calendar year.

Van Zant says there are two bills in the Legislature that would make it possible to change the actual numbers of days taught, thus possibly saving money. Scenarios running from adding 20 to 40 to 60 extra minutes a day could shorten the mandated 180-school year by X number of days if the Legislature passes versions of the two bills. Read the rest of this entry »