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Lenny Curry, Rick Scott Score Points, Minimum Wage Challenge Democrats Can't Find the Endzone

October 5, 2015 - 2:30pm

Welcome to The Dean’s List — an Ed Dean-style look at who Florida’s political achievers were (and weren’t) in the last seven days. What you see here is strictly my opinion, not necessarily the editor’s or the rest of the staff at Sunshine State News.

THOSE WHO MADE THE LIST

Jacksonville Mayor Lenny Curry. Insisting his first budget proposal is a step in the right direction, Curry is keeping his eye on the ball. After beating Alvin Brown in May, Curry said he wants to take the city’s finances in a different direction. He recently told the Economic Roundtable of Jacksonville that the Fire and Police Pension Fund liabilities are a huge risk and Jacksonville could end up like Detroit if this isn’t managed well.  Points to Curry for showing the foresight to tackle the issue -- but he still has to sell it to the City Council. 

Gov. Rick Scott. Recently, House Speaker Steve Crisafulli, R-Merrit Island, launched a committee to explore how to reduce the costs of health-care and get increased transparency. Now the speaker has Scott behind his push. Scott says if Florida hospitals want funding, they need to be more transparent, insisting taxpayers have a right to know how their dollars are being spent. The latest plan from the governor would have hospitals publish their prices online. Hear, hear. 

Florida Rep. Heather Fitzenhagen, R-Ft. Myers. The Fort Myers Republican is looking to cut commercial lease taxes. Fitzenhagen has a bill to reduce the tax on commercial leases from 6 percent to 5 percent. The business community insists cutting the tax will spur more economic activity and bring jobs to Florida, which is the only state in the country that still taxes commercial real-estate leases. Sen. Dorothy  Hukill, R-Port Orange, has a similar bill in the Senate. 

Florida Rep. Carlos Trujillo, R-Miami. Trujillo wants to reform an outdated 80-year-old regulation that ensures food and other goods can’t be sold in the same facility as liquor. The Miami Republican has filed a bill to reverse that law and allow consumers to buy groceries and liquor in the same store. Companies like Target and Walmart insist the current law is an inconvenience to their customers and hurts their sales. 

THOSE WHO DIDN’T MAKE THE LIST

Democrats Backing the “Minimum Wage Challenge.” Almost twenty legislators tried to spend the last week living on the current minimum wage of $8.04 as they argued it should be $15 an hour. The legislators wanted some publicity for their efforts but they would have been better off spending their time trying to live like  small business owners by managing payroll and paying for business costs. After all, almost doubling the minimum wage will hurt a lot of small business owners and put some out of business. 

Volusia County Council Chairman Jason Davis. The Volusia County chairman is currently making $51,190. Even though he’s running for re-election, Davis now supports a charter amendment that would raise his yearly pay to $85,000. He says the current salary isn’t enough for all he does. At least Davis had the guts to back a pay raise before he faced the voters so he can explain why he should get a far larger raise than most of his constituents will ever see. 

The Santa Rosa County Commission. If you are driving through this Panhandle county, you might want to think twice before getting gas. The County Commission just doubled the gas tax from 6 cents to 12 cents per gallon. Supporters of the tax increase claim that the county is justified because neighboring Okaloosa County has the same gas tax rate.

Circuit Judge Kim Shepard. This circuit judge from Kissimmee is accused of violating the Florida Constitution and could face possible fines from the state Supreme Court. According to an investigative committee from the Florida Judicial Qualifications Commission, when Shepard ran and won her race in 2014, she used a direct mail piece in her campaign that had deceptive and misleading campaign material, depicting an endorsement from the Orlando Sentinel. But that endorsement came from another time, when Shepard ran and lost her re-election bid for the Florida House in 1994. Shepard is also accused of violating six separate canons of judicial ethics.

Ed Dean, a senior editor with Sunshine State News whose talk show can be heard on radio stations in Jacksonville, Tampa Bay, Daytona Beach, Orlando, the Space Coast, the Treasure Coast and South Florida from West Palm Beach to Miami. It can also be heard in parts of Georgia, South Carolina and North Carolina. You can reach at ed@sunshinestatenews.com. Follow him on Twitter: @eddeanradio.

Comments

"Minimum wage" is for ENTRY LEVEL employment,...FOR entry level education, for entry level ability, for entry level committment, for entry level social skills: Once you have successfully negotiated THOSE "hurdles", it is time to look for your next "step up" job and salary (You would not have been satisfied in that minimum wage job any longer the anyway....And IF you WERE, then that's where you rightfully belong....SORRY, 'TRUTH' hurts !

Love that demonizing headline -->"Democrats Can't Find the Endzone" . . . . . . of course, no mention that most of the GOP have clearly found the SleazeZone . . . . . . . . . . PATHETIC . . . .

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