Republican lawmakers in the Florida Senate took turns firing shots at the state’s largest teachers union today during a committee hearing over whether the GOP-majority wants to approve a massive expansion of the school voucher program. (They do.)

Finance & Tax Chairman Thad Altman said expanding vouchers would help reduce class sizes, a priority of the Florida Education Association, which opposes vouchers. Sen. Rhonda Storms, R-Valrico, asked FEA lobbyist Lynda Russell to read a Harvard study often cited by voucher advocates “for your education and intellectual expansion.”

Sen. Mike Bennett, R-Sarasota, challenged the union’s assertion that parents top priorities were small class sizes, safe schools and less emphasis on the FCAT.

“They don’t want better teachers for their kids?” Bennett said.

The bill’s lone opponent on the committee, Sen. Charlie Justice, D-St. Petersburg, tried to reign it all in. “Everyone has had their shot at the teachers union,” he said. “Can we get back to the bill?”

But Storms said that FEA President Andy Ford “can take care of himself.” She used her laptop to pull up a copy a recent speech from Ford, who said the union saved millions for public schools during the 2009 session and “once again fought back the barbarians at the gate.”

“That’s us … We’re the barbarians,” an upset Storms said.

A Times/Herald analysis of IRS records shows Rubio’s spending “belies his image as an outsider riding a wave of anti-establishment fervor and gunning to knock off Gov. Charlie Crist for the Republican U.S. Senate nomination.” From the story:

• Rubio failed to disclose $34,000 in expenses — including $7,000 he paid himself — for one of the committees in 2003 and 2004, as required by state law.

• One committee paid relatives nearly $14,000 for what was incorrectly described to the IRS as “courier fees” and listed a nonexistent address for one of them. Another committee paid $5,700 to his wife, who was listed as the treasurer, much of it for “gas and meals.”

• He billed more than $51,000 in unidentified “travel expenses” to three different credit cards — nearly one-quarter of the committee’s entire haul. Charges are not required to be itemized, but other lawmakers detailed almost all of their committee expenses.

Denise Amber Lee’s six-minute 911 call that helped convict her killer is among the most notorious examples of 911 calls gone wrong, the calls that are now in House Speaker Larry Cretul’s crosshairs as he tries to create a public records exemptions for them.

Her husband Nathan Lee sent an e-mail to the sponsor of Cretul’s bill, House Government Accountability Policy Council Chairman Rob Schenk, pleading with the committee to shoot down the measure that would make 911 call recordings secret except for transcripts that could be available after 60 days. Lee also asked that his message be read at Schenk’s committee hearing the bill (PCB GAP 10-03) before it was voted on this morning.

Schenk made no reference to Lee’s message and did not read it before the measure passed by an 8-5 vote. And Cretul, who used a procedural maneuver to ensure the bill passed, never read it at all. He said he received it last night. Public records show that Cretul, his spokeswoman Jill Chamberlin and Schenk received it around 3:30 p.m. yesterday.

“I haven’t read the e-mail. I’m sure that he makes some excellent points,” Cretul, R-Ocala, said shortly before the House began session at 1 p.m.

Nathan Lee and his parents are pushing a separate 911 bill that would require uniform training standards for 911 dispatchers throughout the state. His wife was killed despite five 911 calls made in two counties, including one from a witness whose call was ignored.

Lee’s e-mail uses the botched handling of the eyewitness’ emergency call made on the day his wife was killed in 2008 to demonstrate why the calls should be available to the public.

“She provided the exact location of this event and even though there were, by all accounts, 4 police cars within a mile of this call, it was never dispatched. This call was, obviously, grossly mishandled and would have resulted in the saving of Denise’s life. Two days after this call, she was found in a grave, naked and with a single gunshot wound to the head. This call was hidden from the public and myself. And even hidden from the police department who was actively investigating the case and searching for my wife for two days. The subsequent internal affairs investigation shows the communication center and agency who took this crucial call were immediately aware that the call was about Denise. The call was suppressed. Had the eyewitness not contacted the North Port Police Department we may never have known about her call. And the prosecution would have lost the last eyewitness to see my wife alive,” Lee wrote.

Cretul said he supports the training and certification bill.

“But my whole interest in this issue has been watching what it also does to families and what it does to people that call in. They become suddenly out there for all the world to see,” Cretul said in an interview. “This is a very tough, very difficult issue. Very sensitive in all respects.”

Read the entire text of Nathan Lee’s message after the jump.
(more…)

A bill that’s one of House Speaker Larry Cretul’s priorities that would make 911 call tapes secret is on the fast-track in his chamber but lacks a Senate sponsor.

Cretul is pushing the measure on behalf of Florida Farm Bureau President John Hoblick, whose 16-year-old son died from a lethal combination of alcohol and illegal prescription drugs. Hoblick, out of town when his son Jake died, heard his older son John’s 911 call on the news.

House staff and the bill sponsor Rep. Rob Schenk, R-Spring Hill, kept the Speaker’s blessing of the bill hush-hush until this week when Cretul told a St. Petersburg Times reporter that Hoblick asked him to do something about the 911 calls.

Cretul used a seldom-used procedural maneuver today to guarantee that the measure (PCB GAP 10-03) passed. He temporarily assigned one of his lieutenants, House Speaker Pro Tem Ron Reagan, R-Bradenton, to the committee. Cretul didn’t need the insurance, however; the Government Policy Accountability Council approved it with an 8-5 vote.

Despite the Speaker’s clout in the House, the bill lacks a Senate sponsor.

Sen. Garrett Richter had originally agreed to run a companion for Schenk. But an open government shell bill he had sponsored that could have been used for Schenk’s bill was designated to be heard in the Banking and Insurance Committee, which has nothing to do with the 911 calls, he said. Richter backed off the bill even before controversy surrounding it - some victims and First Amendment lawyers staunchly oppose it - began this week. The Naples Republican said he won’t sponsor the measure.

The Senate quietly approved a measure designed to clean up the Public Service Commission with a 39-1 vote this afternoon.

The bill (SB 1034) would make public all communications between the utilities the panel regulates and the commissioners or their advisory staff.

It would also bar commissioners or high-level staff from going to work or lobbying for the utilities for four years after they leave the PSC, double the current two-year limitation, aimed at stopping the “revolving door” between the commission and the utilities they make billion-dollar decisions about.

The bill will make certain that former commissioners and staff “will not be able to continue what they’ve done in the past and for a change our consumers will be represented,” the bill’s sponsor Sen. Mike Fasano, R-New Port Richey, argued.

The changes come from a 1992 grand jury report that lawmakers largely ignored designed to keep regulators and utility representatives at arm’s length.

This year’s proposal came about in the wake of reports that PSC staff and a Florida Power & Light Co. lawyer were swapping secret BlackBerry messages. Other details about questionable relationships between FPL and the commission were revealed during Juno Beach-based FPL’s proposed $1.2 billion rate hike hearing.

On the opening day of FPL’s rate increase hearing last year, Commissioner Nathan Skop revealed that the PSC’s lobbyist, Ryder Rudd, had attended a Kentucky Derby party at the Palm Beach Gardens home of FPL Vice President Ed Tancer. Rudd later quit.

Since then, the agency has struggled through investigations into BlackBerry messages exchanged between the PSC and an FPL attorney, a myriad of ethics complaints and allegations of interference from political leaders, including Gov. Charlie Crist, who threatened to not reappoint any commissioners who voted in favor of the rate hike.

The bill would also require that the commissioners behave more like judges by applying the canons of judicial conduct, including refraining from inappropriate political activity and avoiding the appearance of impropriety.

Public Service Chairwoman Nancy Argenziano is backing the proposed changes.

Recognizing Palm Beach County day today, PBC home-boy Sen. Dave Aronberg recited some facts about the state’s largest county before giving a shout-out to some county officials watching the Senate session from the East Gallery.

Aronberg, D-Greenacres, introduced PBC Commissioner Burt Aaronson as “The Godfather of Palm Beach County.”

Aaronson was first elected to the commission in 1992.

Aronberg’s intro may be considered a dubious distinction, considering that three of Aaronson’s former county commission colleagues are in prison for corruption charges.

With a slew of lawmakers, including Senate President Jeff Atwater, running for higher office this year, Senate Rules Chairman Alex Villalobos delivered a stern warning to members about using staff for campaign purposes.

Villalobos, who would have been in Atwater’s presidential shoes were it not for a coup staged by Atwater and his backers more than two years ago, sent a memo to the Senate’s 40 members outlining what their aides can - and mostly cannot - while on the clock.

Atwater, R-North Palm Beach, is leaving office early to run statewide for chief financial officer. Senate Democratic Leader Al Lawson, forced out because of term limits, is running for Congress, along with Democratic state Sens. Frederica Wilson of Miami, Charlie Justice of St. Petersburg and Palm Beach County’s own Ted Deutch of Boca Raton. Senate Majority Leader Alex Diaz de la Portilla, R-Miami, is also expected to run for Congress.

And Sens. Dave Aronberg of Greenacres and Dan Gelber of Miami Beach are running statewide in a Democratic primary for attorney general.

Senate staff can’t use annual leave or comp time to work on campaigns, nor can they work on a campaign during their lunch hour, Villalobos wrote.

They can volunteer after hours, that means outside the hours of 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.

But aides can’t take a paying job with a campaign unless they get permission from Atwater and take leave-without-pay first.

“A Senator who uses staff paid by the Senate to work on his or her campaign while ‘on duty’ may be liable for theft,” Villalobos wrote. If the employee earned more than $5,000 or more as a state worker, the crime is a felony.

And the staffer who works on the campaign could also be liable for theft.

Oh, and no using state equipment like telephones or computers for campaign stuff. That’s a misdemeanor.

The Senate considered some sweeping changes to Public Service Commission, the panel that oversees billions of dollars in utility rates, without voting on it.

The measure (SB 1034), which Senate President Jeff Atwater previously said he wanted passed out of the chamber today, is on the fast-track in the Senate but isn’t moving so quickly in the House.

The proposal, backed by five-member Public Service Commission and Public Counsel J.R. Kelly (who represents consumers), is aimed at injecting new ethical standards into the maligned regulatory agency entangled in secret messages swapped between staff and a Florida Power & Light Co. lawyer. That and other questionable actions did not break any Florida laws, a number of investigations found.

The changes, proposed by longtime PSC critic Sen. Mike Fasano, would require that all written and oral communications between commissioners and their aides, called ex parte communications, be put in the public record and placed online where everyone can see them.

“We had staff and commissioners that were communicating with multi-billion dollar utility companies and we didn’t know anything about it. Absolutely nothing. Now when anybody has access to them, we’re going to know within 72 hours after their transmission,” Fasano, R-New Port Richey, said.

The measure would also bar commissioners and their aides from going to work or lobbying for the utilities they regulate for four years, which would be twice the current restriction.

Senate Democratic Leader Al Lawson tried but failed to keep the limitation to two years, arguing that the restrictions surpass those of even lawmakers who control the state budget and who are barred from lobbying for just two years.

The bill would affect all the electric, water and gas companies that are regulated by the commission. Under the proposal, a company could be fined one-tenth of one percent of its annual operating revenue for violating the restrictions.

The Senate could vote out the measure as early as tomorrow.

The 60-day 2010 legislative session began with the usual pageantry as Senators, their families, Gov. Charlie Crist and the Florida Cabinet and the Florida Supreme Court crowded into the Senate chambers for Senate President Jeff Atwater’s opening day speech.

The chamber was filled with opening-day flowers, one of the only exemptions in the gift ban law barring lawmakers from accepting presents of any kind, including food.

Among the guests attending this morning: Linda King, widow of the late Sen. Jim King, the Jacksonville Republican who died earlier in July after a bout with pancreatic cancer and who once served as Senate President.

The Senate dedicated a committee room to King and read a resolution honoring the veteran lawmaker who was instrumental in getting end-of-life legislation passed.

Stay tuned for audio of Atwater’s remarks and other opening day treats, including the House’s session kick-off, winding up with Crist’s 6 p.m. state-of-the-state address.

After taking billions of dollars in federal economic stimulus money to balance the state budget last year, Senate President Jeff Atwater and House Speaker Larry Cretul along with other GOP lawmakers are demanding that the federal government balance its budget to put an end to the escalating federal deficit now surpassing $12 trillion.

“Unless something is done with Washington’s irresponsible fiscal behavior, Florida’s economy will drown in debt,” Atwater, R-North Palm Beach, said at a press conference this morning.

Atwater and his cadre want the feds to balance the nation’s budget as Florida lawmakers are constitutionally required to do in the Sunshine State.

But that didn’t stop the legislature under Atwater and Cretul from accepting at least $12 billion in federal stimulus money - more than $3 billion used to balance this year’s Florida budget and nearly another $6 billion plugged into next year’s. That money helped add to the nation’s rising debt.

“It’s a gaping inconsistency to take that money happily to fill giant holes in our budget and then turn around and criticize the very people who gave you the cash,” said Rep. Keith Fitzgerald, D-Sarasota.

Sen. Joe Negron, R-Stuart, is sponsoring a joint resolution that, if passed by two-thirds of the Florida legislature, would have the state joining 19 other states asking Congress to convene an amendments convention to propose a constitutional amendment requiring the balanced budget and limit federal lawmakers’ ability to pass mandated spending down to the states.

But Florida lawmakers have done the same thing to local governments over the past decade, forcing them to take up a large share of education spending by passing down mandates and making counties pick up the tab for other items.

Congress would have to call the amendments convention if 34 states make the request. Passage of the constitutional amendment would require ratification by three-fourths, or 38, of the states.

Senate Majority Leader Alex Diaz de la Portilla, term-limited out of office this year, is considering a run for Congress.

U.S. Rep. Lincoln Diaz-Balart said today that he will not seek re-election this year. His brother Mario, a U.S. Representative from a neighboring district, plans to run for Lincoln’s seat.

That opens up Mario Diaz-Balart’s seat, which he won with just 52 percent in his last election against Democrat Joe Garcia.

Diaz de la Portilla says he’ll be the frontrunner in that race the day he enters and he’s already calling potential contributors who he said are ready to back him.

“I’ve got a proven track record as actually making good policy not just political hack work like others have,” Diaz de la Portilla said today. “As majority leader, I’ve proven my ability to reach across the aisle and deal with many, many democrats.”

DLP’s older brother Miguel is running to replace him in the state Senate and their younger brother Renier sits on the Miami-Dade County School Board.

DLP has served in the state legislature for 16 years, starting as a state representative in 1994.

“I have had the honor and privilege of serving my community as a state
senator and I am seriously considering the opportunity to continue to
fight for the people of Florida on a national level in the United
State Congress. I will make my final decision soon after thoughtful
and deliberate consideration,” Diaz de la Portilla, R-Miami, said in a statement.

With more than 1 million Floridians out of work, Florida taxpayers are footing the bill for the salaries for out-of-state workers.

This time, it’s Florida Lottery vendor GTECH’s workers in Texas that are the beneficiaries. GTECH’s call center is located in Austin and that’s where calls regarding the Lottery’s on-line tickets and other products are answered.

And lawmakers don’t even know how many jobs are at stake in Texas because the private contractors hired by the state to handle call lines won’t give up their number of employees or where they’re located, according to legislative analyst Emily Leventhal.

Sen. Ted Deutch, a Boca Raton Democrat who sits on the committee, asked Leventhal how many of the 16 private call centers were located outside Florida.

Only GTECH’s, she told him.

“And do you know how many people the state of Florida is paying to work in Austin, Texas?” Deutch asked.

“I do not,” Leventhal replied.

“I think that would be worthwhile information for this committee,” Deutch said.

An incensed Senate budget chief J.D. Alexander agreed.

“If they take the cash or check they can tell us what we want to know,” said Alexander, R-Lake Wales.

Last year, the Department of Children and Families got in hot water because the agency’s food stamp contractor, JP Morgan Chase, routed questions about food stamp services to a call center based in India. The vendor stopped sending the calls overseas and instead sent them to Ohio and Illinois.

The head of the state’s tourism agency also earned the wrath of lawmakers last year when lawmakers found out that calls to Visit Florida were being answered in Missouri. The agency later canceled the contract.

Foreclosures could be sped up if lawmakers give the court system about $9.8 million in an era when they’re looking to cut criminal and civil justice spending by up to $500 million this year.

Judge Belvin Perry of the Ninth Judicial Circuit and chairman of the state court system trial court budget committee, told a Senate committee this morning that the courts could set up an “economic default recovery” division staffed by senior judges and hourly workers to serve as case managers until the backlog of foreclosures now clogging the judicial branch is managed.

The new division could be broken up into three tracts for homesteaded, abandoned or commercial properties.

The $9.8 million for the new division would come from the court’s trust fund made up of court filing fees.

Lawmakers increased the foreclosure filing fees last year and they went from $295 to up to $1,900, depending on the value of the mortgage.

“This is a way to take the money that they’ve paid in filing fees to give them the services that they paid for.
About 80 percent of our trust fund is generated by the filing fees in mortgage foreclosures and they’ve gotten absolutely no additional services as a result in the increase in fees,” Perry said.

Perry said that a proposal floating in the legislature that would allow mortgage lenders or banks to foreclose on properties without going through the courts probably won’t have any impact on the cases clogging the courts now.

That’s because current mortgages - more than 500,000 in the foreclosure pipeline already - are based upon contract law and must be dealt with in the courts.

Mortgages would have to be written as trusts for foreclosures to avoid being processed by the courts, he said.

“I think it would be difficult to do,” Perry said.

A race for an open Panhandle state Senate seat may stymie success of a jobs package.

State Rep. Dave Murzin, House Economic Development and Community Affairs committee chairman, took a swipe at the Senate’s jobs package sponsored by Sen. Don Gaetz.

Murzin, a Panhandle Republican who is running for a Senate seat neighboring Gaetz’s district, was asked about the Gaetz proposal at an Associated Industries of Florida event in Tallahassee yesterday.

“It’s a great package. If I had a $150 million it might be some good ideas. But quite frankly I don’t have $150 million. I think I stopped counting at about $150 million,” Murzin, R-Pensacola, told the crowd of business lobbyists.

Gaetz’ bill includes a $1,000 tax break for businesses that hire an out of work Floridian and a variety of other corporate tax breaks or incentives to induce them to put the unemployed back on the job and to get them off Medicaid and other state benefits.

Murzin said his package will be more realistic.

“So yeah, we’ll take a look at some stuff but quite frankly we’ll roll out a jobs package, an economic incentives package, an economy package that actually works, doesn’t necessarily cost a lot of money because …an economic package that Floridians can afford,” Murzin said. “I’m not really into it for the is still trying to figure out exactly how much it will cost and how much it could save).headlines. I’m actually into it to put Floridians back to work.”

Gaetz, who is backing Murzin’s opponent Rep. Greg Evers in the Senate race, expressed tongue-in-cheek surprise at Murzin’s inability to come up with the money to pay for the package. (Gaetz says his staff

“Well, Rep. Murzin is welcome to his opinions. I wish him well this session. And in his future. I wish him well in everything except his aspirations to be a senator. In all other cases I wish him well,” Gaetz, R-Destin, said.

Food loaf. It’s what inmates hope isn’t for dinner.

As if prison food isn’t bad enough already, naughty inmates are fed a mystery “meat” called “food loaf.”

What exactly the loaf is made up of and what prisoners do to warrant the punishing meal isn’t clear either.

“Food loaf” is also known as called “meal management loaf,” “nutri-loaf” or “behavioral loaf in prison circles. In some prisons the concoction is made up of all of the day’s food put into a blender with some oats thrown in and baked into a loaf.

It is given in some prisons to unruly inmates who throw their food trays at correctional officers and was served in the past to Florida inmates with no utensils.

Currently, inmates in Vermont are suing prison officials over the use of the food loaf and which some states have banned.

Sen. Arthenia Joyner, D-Tampa, asked Department of Corrections Chief of Staff Richard Prudhom at this morning’s Criminal and Civil Justice Appropriations meeting morning to give her, in writing, the caloric value of the mystery package and the department policy on offenses that result in the loaf.

Prudhom said he will report back.

The state spends $2.33 a day for three meals and a snack on the 100,000 prisoners behind bars.

A presentation on the state’s meager tax collections was cut short this morning when a fire alarm was tripped in the Florida Senate Office Building.

Altman

“This is the appropriate backdrop for your presentation,” committee Chairman Thad Altman, R-Viera, said. “It’s fitting very nicely.”

But after several minutes of the alarm blaring, Capitol security cleared out the room. Altman thanked the few remaining audience members. “These are the hard core,” he said.

Legislative leaders-in-waiting Sen. Don Gaetz and Rep. Will Weatherford are heading up a GOP initiative to water down constitutional class size limits approved by voters.

Gaetz, R-Destin, and Weatherford, R-Wesley Chapel, sponsored a constitutional amendment lawmakers are expected to put on the ballot this year that would undo some of the class size restrictions voters approved in 2002.

Floridians have already spent $16 billion to shrink class sizes but plummeting property tax collections - which pay for public schools - have sent lawmakers scrambling to foot the $22 billion-a-year tab for education.

Gaetz and Weatherford, who are expected to lead their chambers in 2012, will reveal details of their proposal at a press conference tomorrow morning.

Gov. Charlie Crist, who is running for U.S. Senate, recently said that he supports undoing the class size restrictions, which have been been introduced gradually and which school officials say costs too much and doesn’t benefit student achievement.

U.S. Rep. Kendrick Meek, a Democrat is also running for the U.S. Senate seat Crist seeks, was the force behind the class size amendment in 2002 while he was in the state Senate.

He isn’t backing down from the limits, which are set to go into full effect by the end of this year.

“Eight years later, Tallahassee officials have not relented in trying to water down hard-fought class size limits while refusing to tackle the special interest bidding that is alive and well in the state capital, ” said Kendrick Meek, who served as Chairman of Florida’s Coalition to Reduce Class Size in 2002.

“Florida families cannot be shortchanged. They simply ask that their children not be packed into overcrowded classrooms. Instead of focusing on misguided priorities, Florida needs a long-term perspective to secure a better future for our children. Implementing the class size limits without delay is critical so our teachers can teach in classrooms where our students can learn. Moreover, it is important to note that our state needs to invest now in its human capital in order to reverse the tide of joblessness for tomorrow’s workers,” Meek said in press release.

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Gov. Charlie Crist’s proposed $500 million boost to education spending based on an unlikely gambling agreement is unrealistic, Senate President Jeff Atwater said this morning.

“The numbers that I would see at this moment that were included in that release did seem to be a bit optimistic,” Atwater, R-North Palm Beach, said at a meeting of reporters and editors.

Crist’s $22.7 billion public education budget, released Monday, relies on about $433 million from the Seminole Tribe of Florida now sitting in the bank as part of a deal with the state allowing certain types of gambling at the tribe’s casinos.

But the legislature has refused to sign off on a deal inked by Crist and the tribe and early indications show that an agreement this year remains in doubt.

“We worked hard on a gaming compact and we’re not done but to just plug in the numbers that I saw was rather optimistic,” Atwater, who is running for chief financial officer said.

First, the good news: Florida’s economic woes have hit bottom, the legislature’s chief economist Amy Baker told the Senate yesterday.

Now, the bad news: The state’s unemployment rate is expected to climb to 12 percent as early as Friday when the most recent job numbers are released, Baker said.

And more bad news for lawmakers as they struggle to craft a budget with up to $3.3 billion - about 4 percent - less than they had for this year’s $66.5 billion spending plan.

Although the national recession is over, Florida’s not going to show an economic recovery for at least another year, Baker and University of Florida economist David Denslow told the Ways and Means Committee, which about 30 of the 40-member chamber attended after Senate President Jeff Atwater asked them to sit in.

“We think we’ve hit bottom and we’re going to hover around the bottom for a wile before we start picking up,” Baker said.

The economy will start picking up next spring, she said, but even with normal growth rates, the recovery is coming off a very low base level so the turn-around will be very slow.

It will be three years “before you’re going to be out of the hole on a lot of measures,” Baker said.

Read the story here.

On the other side of the fourth floor rotunda, House Democrats wrote a letter to GOP leaders saying they don’t like their approach in determining what the state’s critical needs are.

They want to look not only at expenditures but at revenues as well. (Translation: higher taxes?)

But that’s not likely to happen on the Senate side.

Atwater, R-North Palm Beach, told his members yesterday he “won’t extract another dollar” from Floridians.

Senate President Jeff Atwater kicked off a meeting detailing the state and the country’s dire economic condition with a stern, no-new-taxes speech as lawmakers prepare another belt-tightening budget.

Atwater contradicted questions about how to close what could be up to a $3 billion spending gap this year, saying the premise was incorrect.

Florida will not spend more than what it brings in, Atwater, R-North Palm Beach, said.

“The people of Florida do not have one more dime to send us. So let me be clear. When it comes to constructing a state budget to meet the critical needs of the people in this state, I am not starting in a hole. I am starting from scratch,” said Atwater, who is running for chief financial officer. “We will not extract one more dollar from the small business owner of the state or from any Floridian’s wallet to accomplish the task.”

Atwater delivered his campaign-sounding remarks to a Ways and Means Committee meeting that he asked each of the Senate’s 40 members to attend. Most of them showed up.

“We should not allow the shrieking cacophony of special interests to drown out this simple fact. We have faced up to and made the difficult decisions. What we have not done and what we will not do is leave our sons and our daughters and future generations of Floridians with an intolerable burden of taxes and debt,” Atwater said, drawing the applause of the GOP members in attendance.

The committee is now hearing from university of Florida economist David Denslow and will hear from the legislature’s economist Amy Baker later.