By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
Tonight, Major League Baseball is holding the 80th All Star Game in St. Louis. With the recent success of the Tampa Bay Rays, the question could be asked – when will St. Petersburg host the All Star Game?
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Campaign finance reports are coming in for federal, state, and local offices. Reports are filed quarterly, covering the period three months prior – money raised from April 1 through June 30 of this year. With the election still more than a year away, campaign finance numbers show the relative strength of the candidates. In the race for the United States Senate, Republican Marco Rubio could be in trouble.
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By Jim Johnson
PoHo contributor and founder of The State of Sunshine
In case you missed it, Gov. Charlie Crist made a slight step this week that could help in his Senate race. Especially when you add it to a measure from the 2008 session.
This week, Crist signed the 2009-2010 budget for the State of Florida. Florida’s governor has line-item veto power, a tool many governors use to nix budget provisions with which they disagree. This year, Crist vetoed two items: the first veto restored state workers salaries to current levels, undoing the 2 percent pay cut passed by the Legislature.
The second veto, however, was a bit more important to Crist’s political future.
With a hat tip to Peter Schorsch at his blog, it appears the St. Petersburg Times local politics blog Bay Buzz had a post late Wednesday, about St. Petersburg mayoral candidate Paul Congemi and an incident at a KFC restaurant. The post was subsequently pulled from the blog (and restored after further reporting on Thursday). But thanks to Google Reader (and Google is forever) the original can be shared here.
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By Jim Johnson
PoHo contributor and founder of The State of Sunshine blog
Jack Shafer has an excellent piece on Slate.com about the real impact Americans will see when newspapers across the country stop.
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Many people expect an announcement that Florida Gov. Charlie Crist will say he’s running for the U.S. Senate on Tuesday, when the governor is set to announce his political future. To be sure, an open Senate seat does not come along very often … but this could be a major problem for Republicans.
The 2009 Legislative Session passed the 60-day mark on Friday, extended for one more week. The only thing left to do is pass the budget, with tobacco taxes and the Seminole Gaming compact — and the revenue they generate — included.
And so, the next thing for Florida politicos to discuss: Will Governor Charlie Crist run for re-election or for the United States Senate? And when?
So today on Twitter, there is a new #cristcountdown discussion.
What do you think? Post your tweet on Twitter:
RT @StateOfSunshine @jaketapper @markknoller #cristcoundown | Date and office
By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
Today is the 60th day of the 2009 Legislative session.
Ordinarily, today would be the last day of the session; however, the House and Senate have not passed a budget for the 2009-2010 Fiscal Year. Therefore, later today, both the House and Senate will vote to extend session into next week. Essentially, both houses have decided the only bill next week will be the budget, so today will be the last day of major policy votes.
The House and Senate are still meeting in Session today to consider passage of bills that have completed the committee process. Bills heard “on the Floor” are on first placed on a “Special Order Calendar” where they are read (for the second time), debated, and amended. Bills taken up on Special Order move to “3rd reading.” The Florida Constitution requires bills to be read three times before a chamber can pass the bill.
Here are the highlights from their Calendars:
By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
Today is the 59th day of the 2009 Legislative session.
The House and Senate are still meeting in Session today to consider passage of bills that have completed the committee process. Bills heard “on the Floor” are on first placed on a “Special Order Calendar” where they are read (for the second time), debated, and amended. Bills taken up on Special Order move to “3rd reading.” The Florida Constitution requires bills to be read three times before a chamber can pass the bill.
Here are the highlights from their Calendars:
By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
Today is the 58th day of the 2009 Legislative session.
The House and Senate are still meeting in Session today to consider passage of bills that have completed the committee process. Bills heard “on the Floor” are on first placed on a “Special Order Calendar” where they are read (for the second time), debated, and amended. Bills taken up on Special Order move to “3rd reading.” The Florida Constitution requires bills to be read three times before a chamber can pass the bill.
Here are the highlights from their Calendars:
By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
Today is the 57th day of the 2009 Legislative session.
Today is the deadline for having the state budget completed. The Florida Constitution requires the final budget be available to legislators and the public for 72 hours before they legislature can officially vote on it. With the 2009 Regular session scheduled to end on Friday, the budget must be “on the desk” before 11:59 tonight. Media reports have indicated that will not happen.
However, the House and Senate are still meeting in Session today to consider passage of bills that have completed the committee process. Bills heard “on the Floor” are on first placed on a “Special Order Calendar” where they are read (for the second time), debated, and amended. Bills taken up on Special Order move to “3rd reading.” The Florida Constitution requires bills to be read three times before a chamber can pass the bill.
Here are the highlights from their Calendars:
By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
Today is the 56th day of the 2009 Legislative session.
The last week of the 2009 Regular Legislative Session has arrived. The House and Senate are meeting in Session today to consider passage of bills that have completed the committee process. Bills heard “on the Floor” are on first placed on a “Special Order Calendar” where they are read (for the second time), debated, and amended. Bills taken up on Special Order move to “3rd reading.” The Florida Constitution requires bills to be read three times before a chamber can pass the bill.
Here are the highlights from their Calendars:
By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
Today is the 52nd day of the 2009 Legislative session.
The House and Senate are meeting in Session today to consider passage of bills that have completed the committee process. Bills heard “on the Floor” are on first placed on a “Special Order Calendar” where they are read (for the second time), debated, and amended. Bills taken up on Special Order move to “3rd reading.” The Florida Constitution requires bills to be read three times before a chamber can pass the bill.
Here are the highlights from their Calendars:
By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
Today is the 51st day of the 2009 Legislative session.
The House and Senate are meeting in Session today to consider passage of bills that have completed the committee process. Bills heard “on the Floor” are on first placed on a “Special Order Calendar” where they are read (for the second time), debated, and amended. Bills taken up on Special Order move to “3rd reading.” The Florida Constitution requires bills to be read three times before a chamber can pass the bill.
Here are the highlights from their Calendars:
By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
Today is the 50th day of the 2009 Legislative session.
The House and Senate are meeting in Session today to consider passage of bills that have completed the committee process. Bills heard “on the Floor” are on first placed on a “Special Order Calendar” where they are read (for the second time), debated, and amended. Bills taken up on Special Order move to “3rd reading.” The Florida Constitution requires bills to be read three times before a chamber can pass the bill.
Here are the highlights from their Calendars:
By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
Today is the 49th day of the 2009 Legislative session.
The budget conferences are not meeting yet, even with 11 days remaining in session. House and Senate leadership are having trouble agreeing on the amount of total revenue the budget will contain — the Seminole Tribe Compact, tobacco tax, stimulus funds, and other policy decisions have a significant impact on the total revenue. Until the leadership can agree on these policy issues, the budget is hanging in limbo. The Florida Constitution requires the appropriations act be on the desks of legislators 72 hours before it is finally passed. This means if they want to vote on the budget before 5 p.m. one week from Friday, the budget must be on the desks by 5 p.m. next Tuesday. It takes about a day to print the budget, so the leadership and conference committees have until Monday to agree or there won’t be a budget passed during this session.
Also today is the the last scheduled policy committee meetings in either chamber for the 2009 Legislative Session. The remaining committees, if any, will be the rules and calendar committees responsible for setting the Special Order Calendars for each chamber.
Here are the remaining highlights from today’s agendas:
By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
Today is the 48th day of the 2009 Legislative session.
The House and Senate passed their versions of the budget last week, and will start meeting this week in a conference committee to iron out the differences. Conference committee meetings for Monday have been cancelled. Here are the remaining highlights:
By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
Today is the 46th day of the 2009 Legislative session.
The Senate passed it’s version of the budget yesterday and has a light agenda, the House will debate the budget today:
By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
Today is the 45th day of the 2009 Legislative session.
The House and Senate will debate their versions of the budget today and likely pass them tomorrow. Here are some highlights:
By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
Today is the 44th day of the 2009 Legislative session.
Today is a busy day in the Legislature, with more highlights in the Senate than the House:
By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
Today is the 43rd day of the 2009 Legislative session.
An interesting look at public policy today. The House will debate it’s version of a telecommunications overhaul, while the Senate version is on life support. Here are the highlights from today’s agendas:
By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
Today is the 42nd day of the 2009 Legislative session.
This is Budget Week in the Florida Legislature, as both chambers will pass their respective budgets later this week. Here are the highlights for today:
By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
Although today is the 37th day of the 2009 Legislative Session, the Florida Legislature will not meet the rest of the week.
By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
Today is the 36th day of the 2009 Legislative session.
Today is a busy day in Tallahassee. The Senate will end its week today, and the House may as well – both houses will take a break for the Passover and Easter holidays. Here are a few interesting items:
By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
Today is the 35th day of the 2009 Legislative session.
Monday is a light day in the House, but a bit busier in the Senate. Here are a few bills worthy of interest:
By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
Today is the 32nd day of the 2009 Legislative session.
Another light Friday in Tallahassee:
By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
Today is the 31st day of the 2009 Legislative session.
As another week starts winding down, the Legislature is winding through proposed legislation. Here are some bills on agendas today:
By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
Today is the 30th day of the 2009 Legislative session.
The 2009 Legislative Session is half-way over. There is something to be said when the “hump” day is also April Fools’ Day. Here are the highlights for today:
By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
Today is the 29th day of the 2009 Legislative session.
It is a busy Tuesday in Tallahassee. Legislators will be debating a range of bills, from the controversial to the mundane. Here are a few of them:
By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
Today is the 28th day of the 2009 Legislative session.
Only the House has a couple of meetings scheduled for today. Here are the quick highlights:
By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
Today is the 25th day of the 2009 Legislative session.
A typical Friday, with just a handful of House committees meeting. Here are a few items on agendas today:
By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
Today is the 24th day of the 2009 Legislative session.
Although there are quite a few committees meeting, the number of interesting agenda items is a bit more limited. Here are the highlights:
By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
Today is the 23rd day of the 2009 Legislative session.
Wednesday is a very busy day in the Florida Legislature… Here are highlights from the Florida House:
By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
Today is the 23rd day of the 2009 Legislative session.
Wednesday is a very busy day in the Florida Legislature… Here are highlights from the Florida Senate:
By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
Today is the 22nd day of the 2009 Legislative session.
Interesting happenings on both sides of the Capitol today. Here are a few highlights:
By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
Yesterday was the 21st day of the 2009 Legislative session.
It’s only week four of nine, so Monday’s are still light. Members were still traveling back to Tallahassee. Here are a couple of bills on agendas yesterday:
By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
Today is the 18th day of the 2009 Legislative session.
Just one committee is meeting on Friday.
By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
Today is the 17th day of the 2009 Legislative session.
The agendas for the House and Senate Thursday contain a number of bills, only a few are worth noting here:
By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
Today is the 16th day of the 2009 Legislative session.
While it is a busy day in both houses, only a few bills are noteworthy:
By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
Today is the 15th day of the 2009 Legislative session.
Tuesday is a busy day in the Florida Legislature, with committees hearing a large number of bills on their agendas. Here are some of them:
By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
Given a recent Pew report indicating a public losing ties to the newspaper industry, what does it mean when a large media company considers a web-only version of a newspaper that has printed since the 1850’s?
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By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
Today is the 14th day of the 2009 Legislative session.
Monday is another light day in the Legislature. Many of the Joint Committees scheduled to meet today have opted not to meet. Here are the few highlights:
By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
What would you do if the Tampa Tribune or St. Petersburg Times (or both) folded?
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Today is the 11th day of the 2009 Legislative session.
Well, it is Friday, March 13th. Perhaps the legislature is triskadecaphobic — neither chamber is meeting. But then, they may be looking to avoid bad news from the Revenue Estimating Conference.
By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
Today is the 10th day of the 2009 Legislative session.
A financial day for the Legislature, with budget meetings all over the place. Some of the highlights:
Today is the 9th day of the 2009 Legislative session.
Another jam-packed day in the Florida Legislature. Some interesting bills will be heard:
Okay. I goofed. Y’all read it. I proclaimed Hillsborough County Commissioner Ken Hagan’s to-be-vacated seat would be appointed. Allow me to clean the egg off my face.
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By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
Today is the 8th day of the 2009 Legislative session.
There are quite a few interesting bills being heard in House and Senate Committees:
Today is the 7th day of the 2009 Legislative session.
Members of both houses are returning from their first weekend back in the district. Monday is a light day. Here are the highlights:
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Florida House of Representatives |
The House and Senate are meeting in their joint committees.
The Florida Legislative Committee on Intergovernmental Relations will hear presentations from the Florida Association of Counties, Florida League of Cities, the Florida School Boards Association, and the Florida Government Finance Officers Association.
Today is the 4th day of the 2009 Legislative session.
This is the end of the first week of session. Friday’s this early are usually light, with most members heading home in the afternoon.
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Florida House of Representatives |
The House Criminal and Civil Justice Policy Council will hear House Bill 79 by Rep. John Legg, which adds additional protection for those certain kinds of restraining orders.
Today is the 3rd day of the 2009 Legislative session.
Both chambers have meetings of their appropriations committees.
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Florida House of Representatives |
The House appropriations committees will be meeting Thursday.
The Finance and Tax Committee will continue discussion and taking testimony on exemptions to Florida’s Sales and Use tax. The committee reviewed a portion of the list on Wednesday (here is a report from the Palm Beach Post’s Post On Politics blog.) [We'll have more on this topic later in session.]
Today is the 2nd day of the 2009 Legislative session.
Here are the highlights from the agendas for each side of the Capitol:
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Florida House of Representatives |
The House of Representatives will hold committee meetings on Wednesday. Here are some of the interesting items on committee agendas:
The Select Committee on Seminole Indian Compact Review will meet in the morning to hear an analysis of the compact Governor Charlie Crist signed with the Seminole Indians, subsequently voided by the Florida Supreme Court, by Eugene Christiansen of Christiansen Capital Advisors. Committee staff will make a presentation on other state compacts.
Today is the 1st day of the 2009 Legislative session.
Governor Charlie Crist will give the State of the State Speech at 6 pm. It will be broadcast live on the Florida Channel.
Here is a look at how each side of the Capitol will get started:
By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
UPDATE: I have a correction to post here. Turns out I am the late one to find out what everyone else knew already: It will be elected not appointed. The correction is posted here.
By Jim Johnson
PoHo Contributor
Jim Johnson is the creator of The State of Sunshine blog.
Last month, I wrote a post here on Political Whore about US Airways flight 1549, which landed in the Hudson river with all aboard safe. The first images where not from a major news organization or a photojournalist, they were from a bystander and were disseminated via Twitter. It eventually prompted a response earlier this month from Michael Hussey at Pushing Rope with an interesting discussion about news. Read the rest of this entry »
By Jim Johnson
PoHo contributor
With a hat-tip to Mariella Smith, who posted a note on Facebook, it seems Hillsborough County Commissioner Ken Hagan has decided after all to run for outgoing County Commissioner Jim Norman’s seat. This could trigger Governor Crist to appoint a replacement to fill the remainder of his term. Read the rest of this entry »
By Jim Johnson
PoHo contributor
There will be another Republican hole in the United States Senate. Read the rest of this entry »
Watching the Florida Channel tonight, the Florida House Republican Conference took the bold step to formally replace former Speaker Ray Sansom as the leader of the House of Representatives. Read the rest of this entry »
First, any prognostication made this far in advance has to be taken with a grain of salt. So, keep that in mind as you read what I am about to say: Kendrick Meek will lose his bid for the U.S. Senate.
Now, there will be quite a few people up in arms about this. I’m sorry. Maybe this will make them work harder to prove me wrong. One of those things where knowing the future could change the future… but I digress.
There are quite a few reasons why I think he will lose, and none are related to the color of his skin. Read the rest of this entry »
The Republicans are one Senate seat away from complete irrelevance in Washington, D.C. One.
Mel Martinez has decided not to run for re-election, and former Republican Gov. Jeb Bush has taken a pass. What’s a Grand Old Party to do?
In an interesting turn of events, it seems State Rep. Seth McKeel likely won’t be running for Congress. McKeel was among those publicly considering running for Congressman Adam Putnam’s seat when (if?) Congressman Putnam announces his bid for Commissioner of Agriculture.
At least one person looking at the race and a handful of business community members say the McKeels, who recently had their second child, have already decided that Seth will stay in the Legislature where he is posed to become a rising star.
Jim Johnson is a regular contributor to PoHo and founder of The State of Sunshine:
Thirty-five years ago last August, the Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. stood on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in front of a quarter of a million people and gave one of the most memorable speeches in American History. (My post from 2007 has the full text and an audio clip.) This speech was given when a large part of America still did not believe all men are created equal.
Tomorrow, in front of 10 or 20 times as many people, Barak Obama will be sworn in as the 44th president of the United States, the first American of African descent to be elected to the highest post in the land. Many have called this the culmination of King’s Dream. Perhaps, another way to describe this momentous occasion is that our nation has reached the other side of the mountain.
I say this because King gave another speech in April 1968 in Memphis, the day before he was assassinated, in which he said:
Jim Johnson is the founder of The State of Sunshine blog and joins PoHo as a regular contributor with this post:
One of the interesting changes happening to media will be how news is brought to the rest of us.
I’m sure many were watching televsion coverage of yesterday’s crash of USAir Flight 1549 in the Hudson River in New York City. But even TV was not the fastest coverage.
