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Early Session for Weary Lawmakers
By R. Bruce Kershner
NUCA of Florida Director of Government Affairs
The Political Climate
With the holidays behind them, our elected officials will be heading back to Tallahassee for the 2016 Legislative Session. This year’s session will start earlier than usual, commencing on Tuesday, January 12. The 2015 Legislative Session ended in chaos when the House adjourned early leaving hundreds of pieces of legislation in limbo. Now lawmakers have an opportunity to kick off the 2016 session with a little more harmony. This is a big election year, and our elected officials, who spent far more time in Tallahassee in 2015 than they had planned, will be anxious to get back home and campaign, something they have been limited on given the amount of time spent in Tallahassee this past year. The leadership battle in the Senate is settled after Senator Jack Latvala (R-Clearwater) dropped out of the race giving Senator Joe Negron (R-Palm City) a clear path to victory. Still it remains to be seen how much will be accomplished during the 2016 Legislative Session. Only about 1,100 bills have been filed to date, well short of the 1,500 to 1,600 general bills annually filed the past few years. Some speculate that we will see even fewer bills passed this year…a number that has been trending down over the last few years.
When our lawmakers return in January, they will find four bills ready to vote on. One bill is the House’s water policy legislation, a huge 150-page proposal that would, among other things, rewrite rules for cleaning up springs and unify water policy in Central Florida. Two other bills address the Senate President’s chief priority: helping disabled children. One sets up a financial literacy program for the developmentally disabled which will provide job training and education on topics such as money management. A fourth bill ready for a vote in both houses would make it illegal to fire a gun in a residential area.
The budget will get plenty of air time as well. Governor Rick Scott has already submitted his $79.3 billion budget that would spend more on schools, cut taxes by $1 billion and eliminate nearly 1,000 more full-time jobs from the state workforce. The House and Senate will now begin development of their own budgets. How much of the Governor’s proposal will be accepted is anybody’s guess at this point.