State Feed: Florida

Florida: Family Research Council Gets Behind Personhood Amendment

AmandaKathryn — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 19:01:13 -0500

Personhood Florida received a major endorsement this week from the Family Research Council’s Tony Perkins. The announcement is significant for the Florida affiliate of Personhood USA, which wants to place a “fetal personhood” amendment on the Sunshine State’s 2014 ballot.

Personhood measures, which would define life as beginning at the moment of conception, have cropped up across the country — most notably in Mississippi, where a personhood amendment failed on the state’s November 2011 ballot but might soon receive legislative support.

Florida: Libertarians Support Medicinal Marijuana Referendum Vote

AmandaKathryn — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 18:57:31 -0500

Democratic Florida House Representative Jeff Clemens of Lake Worth has put forth a referendum he and many Floridians would like to see on the ballot this November for the rest of Florida to vote: should medicinal marijuana be available in our state?

The Libertarian Party of Florida apparently thinks so along with the majority of seniors and a growing number of doctors now “coming out of the closet” on the issue. The measure would allow marijuana to be prescribed to patients in need of its healing benefits

Florida: Osceola Voters may Decide Whether to Cut Commissioners' Pay

AmandaKathryn — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 17:29:34 -0500

Osceola County commissioners will face a significant pay cut if a citizen ballot initiative led by a group of former politicians succeeds.

County commissioners now make $71,755 a year, but backers of the initiative want their pay cut to about $39,000, aligning their salaries with the county’s median household income.

Florida: Casino measure won't make January ballot

Trevor Ford — Fri, 09 Dec 2011 16:44:31 -0500

Lee County has turned down a request by backers of a destination resort casino to place a gambling initiative on the Jan. 31 presidential primary ballot. In a letter to Champion Development, the company that wants to build a billion dollar hotel-shopping-entertainment complex at the Forum alongside I-75, County Attorney Michael Hunt said the deadline had passed to add a referendum.

Read the story from the News-Press

Florida: Tax amendment passes House

Mon, 02 May 2011 13:03:38 -0400

A proposed state constitutional amendment providing wide-ranging property tax relief has cleared the Florida House. The proposed ballot measure (HJR 381) that passed Monday faces an uncertain fate in the Senate where similar legislation is mired in committee. It would give a tax break to owners of property not covered by the existing Save Our Homes Amendment.

Read the story from The Miami Herald

Florida Voter Suppression Act Looming: Call Your Legislators

Staff — Mon, 02 May 2011 10:08:13 -0400

Anti-voter Florida legislators just won’t quit: Senate Bill 2086, which we told you about last week, is moving ever closer to becoming law. Another new version of the bill came out over the weekend containing the same restriction on the right to petition. If passed, Florida voters will have only half as much time to petition their government as they do now.

Take Action Florida: Stop The Legislature from Cutting Petitioning Time in Half

Staff — Mon, 25 Apr 2011 10:32:51 -0400

Florida has one of the youngest petition processes in the nation: citizens gained the right to petition constitutional amendments onto the state ballot in 1967. Florida legislators, like those in most states, don’t like the people having a say at the ballot box, and have worked hard in recent years to make voters’ rights as hard to exercise as possible.

FL Senator Dockery Stands Up for Voters

Staff — Tue, 22 Mar 2011 16:32:03 -0400

As members of the Florida Senate Rules Subcomittee voted in favor of stripping away state petition rights by placing severe burdens on signature collection, Senator Paula Dockery stood up for the people, saying:

“We’re making it easier for the Legislature and harder for citizens to amend their constitution,” Dockery said. “And I fundamentally disagree with that premise.”

Florida: New bill would restrict initiative rights

Tue, 22 Mar 2011 11:38:29 -0400

By a 7-5 vote, the committee approved a measure (SB 1504) limiting the ability of courts to knock constitutional amendments sponsored by the Legislature off the ballot, while also imposing new standards on citizen-initiative groups. That proposal would direct the Secretary of State to rewrite ballot summaries for legislative amendments if a court rules the language out of bounds; place new limits on who can gather petitions for citizen-initiative groups and bar petition gatherers from being paid according to the number of signatures they collect.

Read the story from the Herald Tribune

Florida: Miami-Dade Mayor recalled by huge majority

Wed, 16 Mar 2011 11:13:41 -0400

Voters swept Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Alvarez out of office by a stunning margin Tuesday, capping a dramatic collapse for a politician who was given increased authority by voters four years ago to clean up much-maligned county government but was ushered out in the largest recall of a local politician in U.S. history.

Read the strory from The Miami Herald

Big Spending Miami-Dade Mayor Booted by Landslide in Recall Election

Staff — Wed, 16 Mar 2011 10:57:19 -0400

It’s the greatest municipal recall in US history, and the most significant recall election since California voters ousted former governor Gray Davis in 2003. An astounding 88 percent of voters said Tuesday that they wanted to recall Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Alvarez from office. According to the New York Times, voters were angry that the Republican mayor of America’s ninth most populous county raised taxes and increased the salaries of his aids at the height of the recession.

Florida: Poll points towards recall

Mon, 07 Mar 2011 14:54:15 -0500

A recall may be on the horizon for a pair of Miami-Dade officials. A Miami Herald poll suggests that the majority of voters want the county’s mayor and one of its commissioners recalled. According to the poll, 67 percent of voters surveyed want Mayor Carlos Alvarez recalled, 18 percent say he should keep his job, while 15 percent are undecided.

Read the story from WSVN 7

Florida: Some think ballot initiative only way to renewable energy

Mon, 28 Feb 2011 14:32:59 -0500

Florida, a Peninsula dubbed the Sunshine State, a state known for its agriculture along with its lengthy growing season, does not have a stated commitment to renewable energy. A state known for its low taxes and therefore an ideal place for corporations and startups to locate is not even in the game with regard to clean tech innovation and deployment which are the jobs and economy of the 21st century.

Read the story from The Gainesville Sun

Florida: Group using court to get measure on ballot

Mon, 07 Feb 2011 17:41:42 -0500

The group trying to prevent private development on the Ocean Strand property with a ballot initiative is taking their fight to a judge. The group, Keep Your Boca Beaches Public, has been collecting signatures to get an initiative on the ballot for the March municipal election that would prevent private development of city or Beach and Parks District property between the Intracoastal and the Atlantic Ocean.

Read the story from the Sun Sentinel

Florida: Beach initiative will still collect signatures

Tue, 18 Jan 2011 12:42:53 -0500

Members of Keep Your Boca Beaches Public, the group seeking to bar private development at Ocean Strand have hit a snag with their proposed ballot initiatives. The measures are intended to bar private development on city and greater Boca Raton Parks District land between the Intracoastal and the beach, but Boca Raton’s city attorney says the question is unconstitutional because the language would ask the city to regulate the parks district.

Read the story from the Sun Sentinel

Miami Mayor Will Face Recall

Staff — Wed, 22 Dec 2010 11:58:41 -0500

We blogged previously about the petition signature campaign in Miami, Florida to recall Carloa Alvarez, the city’s mayor. The signatures are now collected, counted and approved:

Setting the stage for a recall election of Miami-Dade County Mayor Carlos Alvarez, Clerk of Courts Harvey Ruvin announced Tuesday that the necessary signatures have been legally collected to require a vote.

Florida: Miami mayor will face recall election

Wed, 22 Dec 2010 11:44:15 -0500

Mayor Carlos Alvarez of Miami-Dade County faces a recall after opponents gathered enough signatures to force an election. The drive came after the county raised the property-tax rate to balance its budget. The county commission must call an election in 45 to 90 days, Harvey Ruvin, clerk of courts, said Tuesday.

Read the story from The New York Times

Another Example of Citizens Using Their Petition Rights When Government Fails to Act

Staff — Tue, 14 Dec 2010 14:29:07 -0500

Citizens in Tampa Bay, Florida want to crack down on the homeless panhandling. The city council apparently has yet to act, so the citizens are gathering signatures to put the measure on the ballot:

Florida: Citizens will push petition for panhandling crackdown if council doesn't act

Tue, 14 Dec 2010 11:45:48 -0500

Last month during a discussion regarding a possible ordinance cracking down on the homeless in Hillsborough County, Tampa resident Spencer Kass, the president of the Virginia Park Neighborhood Association, said that if the Tampa City Council didn’t want to pass such a law, city residents would demand it in the form of a ballot initiative.

Read the story from The Daily Loaf

Miami Recall Effort Could Get Interesting

Staff — Mon, 08 Nov 2010 13:57:21 -0500

An effort to recall the mayor of Miami looks like it will go to court as the subject of the recall effort attempts to block the petition on a technicality: