Life and politics from the Sunshine State's best city

Author

Michael Moline - page 28

Michael Moline has 306 articles published.

Michael Moline is a former assistant managing editor of The National Law Journal and managing editor of the San Francisco Daily Journal. Previously, he reported on politics and the courts in Tallahassee for United Press International. He is a graduate of Florida State University, where he served as editor of the Florida Flambeau. His family’s roots in Jackson County date back many generations.

House panel homes in on attorney fees for workers’ compensation fix

in Statewide by

The chairman of a key House subcommittee said Wednesday that legislation to address rising worker’s compensation premiums will include curbs on attorney fees, “the biggest driver of the premiums.” Danny Burgess, chairman of the Insurance & Banking Subcommittee, spoke following a hearing into a raft of possible solutions to escalating worker’s compensation premiums. Also on Wednesday, the 1st District Court of Appeal scheduled oral argument for Feb. 22 in a challenge to a 14.5 percent rate increase that began to take effect…

Keep Reading

You might be interested in

House budget panel weighs raids on trust funds, Visit Florida’s future

in Statewide by

A House budget panel debated sweeping money from housing, transportation and economic development trust funds to meet spending cuts imposed by House leaders. The House Transportation & Tourism Appropriations Subcommittee also entertained a suggestion that Visit Florida, the state’s tourism promotion arm, operate on local tourism taxes, instead of state general revenues. Rep. Mike La Rosa, a St. Cloud Republican, came up with the idea as a way out of the contretemps between Gov. Rick Scott and House Speaker Richard Corcoran over the wisdom of spending…

Keep Reading

House members’ project bills would add $708 million to state budget

in Statewide/Top Headlines by

House members had filed 319 bills seeking money for local projects as the deadline for such legislation fell Monday. They would cost more than $708 million if enacted. Under rules approved when Richard Corcoran assumed the speakership, members must file a specific bill describing each project they hope to insert into the state budget. The idea is to get away from secretive logrolling late during sessions. According to House Rule 5.14, in order for a project to be included in the House budget, it…

Keep Reading

A cordial House reception for Scott’s budget, despite off-stage rancor

in Statewide by

The House Appropriations Committee gave a respectful reception Tuesday to Gov. Rick Scott’s $83.5 billion state budget Tuesday, with chairman Carlos Trujillo praising the spending plan as “conservative.” “It’s a very fair budget,” Trujillo told reporters following the meeting. “It was balanced. Some different priorities than we’ve expressed here in the House. But, overall, I think it was very fair, very reasonable, and very well put together.” Of proposed legislation that would spike Enterprise Florida and Visit Florida — two of Scott’s top priorities — Trujillo…

Keep Reading

You might be interested in

Rick Scott accuses House leadership of playing politics on economic development

in Statewide by

Gov. Rick Scott accused House leaders Tuesday of political posturing on Florida’s economic- and tourism-development programs. “It’s pretty clear. If you don’t care about people’s jobs, you must be caring about something else,” Scott told reporters following a Cabinet meeting. “What else can it be? How can anybody say, ‘We don’t want to help a poor family get a job?’ How can anybody say, ‘Oh, this investment where we get a significant return, we don’t want to do that?’ ” Scott said. “The only…

Keep Reading

Senate panel begins work on human trafficking problem

in Statewide by

A Senate committee got a preview of what a coordinated statewide campaign against human trafficking might look at Monday, when a prosecutor detailed Miami’s “victim-centered” attack on the scourge. Esther Jacobo, who runs the program for State Attorney Katherine Fernandez Rundle, said prosecutors, support staff, victim specialists, and investigators within the office and other Miami-Dade police departments certainly prosecute traffickers. But they also identify services gaps that make it more difficult to deliver children and young women and men from human…

Keep Reading

You might be interested in

Insurance office, NCCI refute Sunshine Law claims in workers’ comp appeal

in Statewide by

The Office of Insurance Regulation and an organization that proposes workers’ compensation premium rates have filed legal briefs refuting arguments that they calculated Florida’s recent 14.5 percent rate hike in violation of the Sunshine Law. James Fee, a Miami workers’ compensation attorney fighting the increase, and a group of press and press-freedom organizations, had argued in their own briefs that the National Council on Compensation Insurance, or NCCI, was obliged to open its internal deliberations to public scrutiny, but failed to do…

Keep Reading

You might be interested in

1 … 26 27 28 29 30 … 44
Go to Top