A central Florida legislator wants the state to abandon “spring forward, fall back.” Orlando Democrat Sen. Darren Soto will again try to keep the sun shining later in the day year-round. Soto filed bill SB 74, which reintroduces the proposal to make daylight-saving time permanent in Florida.
In the 2013 session, Soto filed a similar bill — SB 734 — but the motion did not make it to a committee. Soto’s bill was dubbed the “Sunshine Protection Act.”
Soto admitted he wasn’t sure Florida could legally stay on daylight-saving time year round, when clocks move forward one hour in March until November when the clocks go back one hour to standard time.
SB 74 would require “each district school board to adjust school start times due to the year-round observance of daylight saving time; authorizing the Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services to study adjustments in standard agricultural practices due to the year-round observance of daylight saving time.”
The federal government doesn’t require any state or territory to change clocks during the year. A recent study by the U.S. Department of Transportation showed that Americans liked DST because “there is more light in the evenings / can do more in the evenings.’
If the bill passes, Florida will join Hawaii, Puerto Rico, the United States Virgin Islands, American Samoa, Guam and the Northern Marianas Islands for year-round observance of daylight saving time.
Most of Arizona follows year-round standard time. The exception is the Navajo Nation within the Grand Canyon State.
Republican U.S. Rep. Bill Posey, when he was a Florida state senator, proposed in 2008 that the state remain in standard time year-round. The Governmental Operations Committee supported the bill, but it never made it out of committee.
