Tamara Lush - page 10

As polling places opened Monday in some of Florida’s biggest counties, Gov. Rick Scott said early voting would be crucial to winning. Residents in Miami-Dade, Broward, Orange, Pinellas and Duval can vote in-person. Other counties will open early voting sites on Oct. 23 and Oct. 25. The ballot includes the governor’s race and Amendment 2, which asks voters to consider legalizing marijuana for medicinal purposes. The general election will be Nov. 4. Democratic candidate for governor Charlie Crist and his…

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Step inside All Children’s Hospital and you’re greeted with three things: hand sanitizer, tissues and masks decorated with little cartoon Band-Aids with legs, feet and smiles. “Dirt Squirt Alert!” a sign says. “Stop the spread of germs that make you and others sick!” A sign at the check-in counter calls on people to immediately tell the triage nurse if anyone in the family has a cough, fever and/or runny nose and has been to the Middle East, part of a…

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The Florida governor’s race was spinning wildly on Thursday, almost as fast as that electric fan former Gov. Charlie Crist insists on bringing along to campaign appearances. The resulting dust-up provoked the rarest of pleasures — an unscripted moment in a campaign season made for TV. Gov. Rick Scott waited seven minutes, an eternity on live television, before appearing onstage for Wednesday night’s debate, all because Crist insisted on having his portable pal plugged in below his lectern. The finger-pointing…

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The tourists stream to Florida in their cars, intent on a week at Disney or a sugar-sand seashore or a nonstop party on South Beach. Road weary and thirsty, they pull over at one of the state’s five official welcome centers. They walk inside, and then they look up. “The best start under the sun,” reads a big sign. “FLORIDA ORANGE JUICE.” Behind a counter, a woman sits with a stack of paper cups. “Welcome to Florida,” she says with…

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Voters in a heavily Republican southwest Florida district are selecting a replacement for U.S. Rep. Trey Radel, who resigned in January after pleading guilty to cocaine possession. Republican Curt Clawson, a former CEO of an aluminum wheel company, is a heavy favorite to defeat Democrat April Freeman and Libertarian Ray Netherwood in Tuesday’s vote. Republicans make up about 45 percent of the registered voters in the district, with Democrats accounting for 27 percent. In the 2012 presidential election, Mitt Romney…

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Federal agriculture officials are allocating millions of dollars toward research to solve problems caused by the devastating citrus greening bacteria. United States Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack told The Associated Press in a statement Thursday that $25 million in funding comes from the 2014 Farm Bill. Another $6.5 million will be sent to projects through a group formed to combat greening. The disease affects Florida’s $9 billion citrus industry, with growers seeing problems this season. The orange crop is approaching its…

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State officials who have been blocked in their attempts to inspect federal Veterans Affairs hospitals in Florida filed a lawsuit Thursday aimed at giving them such access as they seek to confirm allegations of substandard care. The state Agency for Health Care Administration filed suit in a federal court in Tampa, on the same day that Acting federal VA Secretary Sloan Gibson announced the agency will release nationwide data on patient wait times next week. Gibson made the announcement Thursday…

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