State Rep. Kevin Rader, D-Delray Beach, released this statement today:

“In response to The Palm Beach Post article today regarding my political plans, I want to set the record straight.

“I have been and will continue to be 100 percent committed to running for the State Senate in District 27. I love the people I have met during this campaign and I believe I will be the best at representing this diverse and dynamic district.

“While it is true that I have had a number of discussions with Democratic Party leaders related to simplifying and accommodating democratic primaries in the various races, it appears that these conversations have taken on a life of their own.

“Let me be clear: I am convinced more than ever that I will best serve the people of Florida as the Senator from the 27th District. I am in it to win it.”

Republican U.S. Senate candidate Marco Rubio, who voted against repealing a constitutional mandate for high-speed rail (the one then-Gov. Jeb Bush called a “$25 billion mistake”), issued a warning to state lawmakers considering a plan to convince the federal government to spend $2.5 billion to build a bullet train in the state.

“We should be wary of all the promises floating around Tallahassee about how this latest round of government spending will create lasting jobs and prosperity. Rail projects have merit as transportation and infrastructure policy. But selling SunRail as a jobs issue, as Charlie Crist has chosen to do, is a stretch. If the nearly $800 billion Obama-Crist stimulus plan didn’t create the jobs they promised, how can we believe a new train system is going to live up to its promises?

“In addition, I disagree with Governor Crist’s claim that he doesn’t care where the money comes from to pay for this project. I care a lot, because it’s coming from borrowed and printed money that is ultimately coming from my children and their generation.”

Florida voters eventually flip-flopped on the high-speed rail issue before anyone in Tallahassee, but its still worth noting that a handful of the Republicans drumming up support for the special session bill also voted earlier this decade to repeal the constitutional mandate for high speed rail. The special session bill would pay for commuter rail lines in an effort to convince the federal government to spend $2.5 billion building a bullet train in the state.

Some of those who supported the repeal were House Speaker Larry Cretul, Lt. Gov. Jeff Kottkamp, House budget Chairman David Rivera, House Economic Development & Community Affairs Council Chairman David Murzin and Senate Transportation Committee Chairman Andy Gardiner, who voted for the repeal four times.

See the votes here, here, here and here.

JUPITER — Gov. Charlie Crist briefly addressed a crowd of about 200 people at Temple Beth Am tonight, calling the relationship between Israel and the United States “special.”
Crist, a Methodist, told the crowd at Friday night’s Shabbat services about his 2007 trip to Israel to encourage trade with Florida.
During the trip, Crist said former Democratic Rep. Robert Wexler encouraged him to insert a note with a prayer at the Western Wall, a holy site in Jerusalem where prayers are traditionally placed. The note asked, “Dear God, please protect our Florida from storms and other difficulties.”
There was no hurricane that year.
“I thought, ‘this is good,’” Crist told the crowd.
In the two years since his trip, Crist has asked friends traveling to Israel to place similar notes at the wall.
And still no hurricanes.
“God is good,” Crist said to the crowd.
Crist also paused to remember the four people, including a 6-year-old girl, killed by gunman in Jupiter on Thanksgiving Day.
“We pray for those who have left us,” he said.
Crist’s address was part of the temple’s “community leaders forum,” a monthly series.
Next month, Congressman Alcee Hastings is scheduled to address the congregation about Israel and the Jewish community.

Iconic, pioneering and trailblazing were among the praise heaped on the late Paula Hawkins in statement’s on Florida’s first and only female U.S. senator’s death at age 82 today.

“Paula Hawkins’ pioneering spirit earned her the respect of Floridians, her fellow Senators and all who worked alongside her. History books will record her many firsts – first woman elected to statewide office, first female Florida Public Service Commissioner and first female United States Senator from Florida – and from the entire South.” – Gov. Charlie Crist.

“Florida lost a true trailblazer today with the passing of Senator Paula Hawkins. Senator Hawkins was a champion for women and children, and a consumer advocate. I join with her family, friends and every Floridian to mourn her loss and celebrate her legacy.” – Chief Financial Officer Alex Sink:

“I have enormous respect for Senator Paula Hawkins, who will forever be remembered as an outstanding public servant, and determined consumer advocate. My wife Ingrid and I were proud to call her a lifelong friend,
and she will be greatly missed. Our thoughts and prayers are with her friends and family in their time of loss.” – Attorney General Bill McCollum:

“She was a real trail blazer. She conducted herself with grace and class and a statesman-like quality that all of us would do well to emulate.” – House Speaker-Designate, R-Orlando.

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Service Employees International Union (SEIU) Florida members today announced their endorsement of State Sen. Ted Deutch, D-Boca Raton, for the District 19 congressional seat vacated by Robert Wexler.
 
“As our next member of Congress, Ted Deutch will fight for Florida’s working families by promoting greater access to health care, improving our public schools and supporting fairness in the workplace,” said Betsy Marville, a nurse in West Palm Beach and SEIU Healthcare Florida’s Executive Vice President.  “We look forward to helping ensure his victory in February’s primary and his electoral triumph in April,” she added.

Seven candidates are running to replace U.S. Rep. Robert Wexler, D-Boca Raton, in an early-2010 special election. The field of candidates was set at noon today with three Republicans, two Democrats and one no-party candidate qualifying for ballot spots and frequent filer Josue Larose making a write-in bid.

(more…)

ORLANDO (AP) — Paula Hawkins, the feisty, self-described “housewife from Maitland” who in 1980 became the first woman elected to a full Senate term without a family political connection, died Friday. She was 82.

Hawkins had been in poor health recently, having suffered a stroke and a fall, said U.S. Rep. John Mica, a close friend. She died at Florida Hospital in Orlando surrounded by her family, he said.

During her single six-year term in the U.S. Senate, the Republican positioned herself as a media-savvy champion of children and working mothers and an enemy of drug dealers. She lost her bid for a second term in 1986 to then-Gov. Bob Graham in a race that pitted two of Florida’s most popular politicians.

Hawkins entered public office at a time when doors that previously had been closed to women were being opened. Ideologically, she never considered herself a feminist, but she championed equal opportunities for women.

(more…)

Lawmakers in the House are debating the 49-page proposal that would pave the way for a $2.2 billion Central Florida commuter rail system, create a statewide rail authority and keep Tri-Rail rolling.

GOP House leaders – who have been heated critics of President Barack Obama’s stimulus spending – say they’re doing all that to increase Florida’s chances of getting a slice of the $8 billion in federal stimulus funds for high-speed rail projects being doled out in January. The state’s applied for four projects totaling about $3.7 billion.

After 20 years of Tri-Rail’s operating in the red, why the rush to bail out the South Florida commuter line – the state’s only existing one – now?

Because U.S. Department of Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood said so.

“There’s a commitment at the federal level to get into the passenger rail business like it never has before,” LaHood told SunRail supporters in Orlando in October. “But, the only way it will pay off is if the State Legislature gets its act together.”
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If you missed it yesterday, House Rep. Doc Renuart, R-Ponte Vedra Beach, took a shot at Designated House Democratic Leader Ron Saunders, who, along with about one-third of the chamber, is skipping the first two days of special session to attend the National Black Caucus of State Legislators annual conference in Fort Lauderdale.

Saunders, who is white, said he was attending the conference because black voters account for about 4 percent of his Monroe County district. Renuart pointed out that 40 percent of Saunders’ district is Republican and invited the Key West Democrat to join the Republican caucus.

Saunders responds today: “I’d definitely join. But they vote for too many tax increases and fee increases. I’m too conservative to join the Republican caucus.”

Several Democrats say state Rep. Kevin Rader, D-Delray Beach, has decided to drop his 2010 bid for the state Senate seat of Sen. and attorney general candidate Dave Aronberg, D-Greenacres.

Rader didn’t return calls late Thursday and this morning.

At a Florida Alliance for Retired Americans meeting in West Palm Beach this morning, Alliance President Tony Fransetta and Senate hopeful Peter Burkert said Rader is dropping out of the race for Aronberg’s seat and will instead seek the seat of Sen. Ted Deutch, D-Boca Raton, who’s running in a special congressional election to replace retiring Democratic U.S. Rep. Robert Wexler.

Burkert said Rader told him two days ago of his plans.

If in fact Rader pursues Deutch’s Senate seat, it could create internal Democratic tumult. Several big-name Dems, including Wexler and County Commissioner Burt Aaronson, have endorsed state Rep. Maria Sachs, D-Delray Beach, for Deutch’s Senate seat if Deutch wins an April 13 special congressional election.

“I’ve urged him (Rader) to stay in his House seat,” Aaronson said this morning.

Republican Gov. Charlie Crist at a Thursday afternoon press conference urging lawmakers to approve a bill that will help the state receive $2.5 billion in stimulus money for a high-speed rail project:

“Anybody who wants to help us, we’re more than eager to accept it and to make sure that we put people before politics.”

Crist, later that night, at a Republican Party fundraiser in Escambia County:

“What I see happening in Washington troubles and disturbs me.”

It took 37 days, but GOP state House hopeful Pat Rooney Jr. on Thursday was able to lock down the endorsement of his younger brother, Republican U.S. Rep. Tom Rooney of Tequesta.

Tom Rooney released a statement that praises his brother’s business and charity work and says he is “flattered that my older brother is looking to follow in my footsteps by entering public service.”

Pat Rooney, one of three Republicans running for the northern Palm Beach County seat of term-limited Rep. Carl Domino, R-Jupiter, has also received the backing of former Palm Beach Gardens Councilman Hal Valeche. Valeche, a Republican, was considering running for the seat.

Valeche ran against Tom Rooney and former state Rep. Gayle Harrell in a 2008 GOP primary for Congress. In that campaign, social conservative Valeche tangled with the Rooney family over gambling issues. Pat Rooney Jr. is president of the Palm Beach Kennel Club dog track.

State Sen. Ted Deutch, D-Boca Raton, praised President Obama’s Afghanistan strategy as “thoughtful” during a Voters Coalition debate Thursday while his rival in a special Democratic congressional primary, Ben Graber, declared himself “against the escalation in Afghanistan” and opposed to “militarism” in general.

It was the most significant policy difference between the Dems vying to replace retiring U.S. Rep. Robert Wexler, D-Boca Raton. Both voiced support for a government-run public option as part of health care reform.

Three Republicans running in the special election were supportive of Obama’s call for 30,000 more troops. GOP candidates Ed Lynch, Joe Budd and Curt Price also took similar positions against tax hikes, gun control and a public option.

Gov. Charlie Crist on whether he thinks the special session bill will pass: “Voting against this, I think, would be absolutely catastrophic. Indefensible.”

Crist said his “motivation” for supporting the bill was the 11.2 percent unemployment rate and an estimated 14,000 new or saved railroad-related jobs that could come from the bill.

So a month after Crist released a campaign ad last month criticizing federal spending, saying “Enough is enough”, is he acknowledging that more government spending is a solution to the unemployment rate?

“It certainly can be a solution as it relates to high speed rail in our state,” Crist said.

Transcript of the first three questions from Crist’s press conference this afternoon after the jump.

(more…)

Sen. Ronda Storms complained repeatedly about the rushed special session schedule and what she said is not enough time in a three-hour committee meeting held today to vet a 49-page bill dealing with a variety of rail issues.

She said she’s spent more time shopping for a computer than was devoted to the bill during the three-hour “workshop.”

“As a professional I want the chair to know that I object to the lack of time that we’ve been given,” Storms, R-Valrico, began her line of questions.

Storms likened the omnibus package to the federal bank bail-out package that was pushed through, she said, at the 11th hour and failed to result in the economic boost it promised.

She then launched into an attack on bill sponsor Sen. Jeremy Ring’s contention that the 15,000 who use Tri-Rail every day – two thirds of whom take it to work – will lose their jobs without the Tri-Rail fix included in the measure.

“Suddenly they’ll just be flopping around out there without transportation? That does not speak to me,” Storms said.

Storms prefaced each of her questions with gripes about the rushed scheduled slammed up against the Christmas holidays.

Transportation Committee Chairman and SunRail supporter Andy Gardiner had enough.

“Sen. Storms, I’ve heard the comment. We’re familiar with your position on this. The summary of this bill was sent out on Monday. This is a workshop…there is time over the weekend to review this,” Gardiner, R-Orlando. “I’ve heard ya. And I understand that. But please understand this is just the first opportunity.”

The Senate is expected to vote on the bill on Tuesday.

As the House committee opened its hearing this afternoon on state passenger rail issues, Democrats peppered Rep. Gary Aubuchon, a Cape Coral Republican running the rail bill, about the money dedicated to Tri-Rail.

The bill dedicates up to $15 million per year from the state’s gas tax collections to pay for shortages in the maintenance or operation of the Mangonia Park to Miami Airport line. The bill says the money will be available until 2014. After that, the same amount will be included in the Florida Transportation Department’s five-year work plan, Aubuchon said.

“Until future legislatures change that amount, we in the state will be obligated for up to $15 million,” Aubuchon said.

While the bill is not expected to be very controversial in the House, Rep. Tom Grady, R-Naples, told The Palm Beach Post, that he is still undecided. Among his concerns: subsidizing Tri-Rail.

“Tri-Rail is a miserable failure,” Grady said. “With 15,000 per day in the largest metro area of Florida, you have to wonder whether we’re throwing good money after bad to continue to fund that. On the other hand, it’s there. And I don’t think we just walk away from it.

“Is there a way to greater encourage use? Is there a way to have some connectivity to the rail system so that people can really take advantage of it? I don’t know the answer to that. … But I think it’s essential in order to make that viable down the road.

(more…)

Senate President Jeff Atwater and his GOP lieutenants insist that the rail proposal now being considered in a special session that opened today has nothing to do with a controversial Central Florida commuter line known as “SunRail.”

That’s probably a wise maneuver since Senators twice failed to pass measures that would have allowed the state Department of Transportation to move forward with a deal paying CSX Inc. $641 million for 61 miles of track to start the commuter line and allow CSX to continue to run freight on the line for $1 a year.

Yet the first committee to take up the 49-page bill in a workshop this morning spent nearly the entire three hours discussing the SunRail project that the measure is supposedly not about.

And Tri-Rail got a fair amount of attention, too.

Sen. Paula Dockery, who’s hoping to ride a victory in the death of the SunRail deal earlier this year to the governor’s mansion, led the charge against SunRail with some simple questions about Tri-Rail.

The proposal will give up to a $15 million helping hand to Tri-Rail that, like every other public transit system in the country, loses money every year.

And it will bring thousands of jobs, said Sen. Jeremy Ring, the bill’s sponsor.

“How many jobs were created when Tri-Rail went into existence 20 years ago,” Dockery asked Ring.

Ring said that the 20-year-old commuter line has 330 employees.
(more…)

Forget the connecting-flight hassles or treadwear worries. You can experience the excitement of a Tallahassee special legislative session in your rumpus room or on your laptop thanks to Palm Beach County government Channel 20. Channel 20 is providing gavel-to-gavel coverage of the special legislative session on rail issues that began today. It’s available on most local cable systems or at pbcgov.com

UPDATE: Crist is stuck in Tampa today because of weather. He was scheduled to hold a press conference in the Capitol this morning about the special session with Florida Transportation Secretary Stephanie Kopelousos, Agency for Workforce Innovation Secretary Cynthia Lorenzo and Florida Chamber of Commerce President Mark Wilson. It has been postponed.

Originally posted Dec 2, 12:06 p.m.:
Crist’s pre-session prep: Senate fundraiser, but no TaxWatch forum

Republican Gov. Charlie Crist is not attending a Florida TaxWatch forum in Palm Beach at 12:30 p.m. today because, his campaign spokeswoman said, he’s busy preparing for the special session on railroad issues scheduled to start Thursday in Tallahassee.

Here’s his Wednesday schedule:

10 a.m.: Meeting with Chief of Staff Shane Strum

10:35: Meeting with Michael Yaworksy, director of appointments

11:05 a.m. to 3:30 p.m.: work and call time

4:30 p.m.: Tampa Tribune editorial board meeting

5:50 p.m.: U.S. Senate fundraiser in Tampa
(via St. Pete Times)