Gov. Rick Scott called for $7.4 million for three new state homes for veterans. One of the homes will be in St. Lucie County while the Cabinet needs to decide on the location for the other two.

Jacksonville Mayor Alvin Brown, the first Democrat to win a mayoral race in that city since Ed Austin in 1991, is in serious trouble according to a poll of likely voters released on Monday. St. Pete Polls took a poll for Saint PetersBlog showing former Republican Party of Florida (RPOF) Chairman Lenny Curry in good shape against Brown.

Longtime Alachua County educator Hershel Lyons was named as K-12 public schools chancellor by Education Commissioner Pam Stewart on Monday.

School Choice Week starts in Monday with more than 1,400 events across Florida, part of almost 11,100 events across the nation. Jacksonville leads the Sunshine State with 227 events followed by Miami with 174 and Orlando with 90. When it comes to providing parents with a diverse array of K-12 education options for their children, Florida is a national leader, said Andrew Campanella, president of National School Choice Week. Parents in Florida have more educational choices for their children than in many other states.

The Florida Association of Professional Lobbyists (FAPL) announced in a press statement Sunday the results of its election of officers for 2015-2016. Officers elected are as follows:

Gov. Rick Scott, R-Fla., announced that the state unemployment rate dropped to 5.6 percent in December as the state added 11,500 jobs. When Scott took office at the start of 2011, the state unemployment rate stood at 11.1 percent.

From his perch as chairman of the U.S. House Veterans Affairs Committee, U.S. Rep. Jeff Miller, R-Fla., is calling to give the secretary of Veterans Affairs more power to discipline incompetent senior executive service (SES) employees. Miller introduced a bill giving the VA secretary more flexibility in disciplining underperfoming SES employees, including reducing pensions, reducing time on forced paid administrative leave, reforming appraisals for bonus and adding more transparency.

U.S. Rep. Ander Crenshaw, R-Fla., the chairman of the U.S. House Appropriations Subcommittee on Financial Services and General Government, doubled down on his support of the FairTax proposal on Thursday. Across Northeast Florida and the nation, citizens are spending billions of dollars and hours navigating a complex tax code time and money that could be better spent growing our economy and creating jobs, Crenhaw said on Thursday. Putting a FairTax in place solves that issue and deserves immediate consideration by Congress.

U.S. Rep. Vern Buchanan, R-Fla., one of the senior members sitting on the U.S. House Ways and Means Trade Subcommittee, wrote President Barack Obama on Thursday, vowing to work with the White House on free trade agreements. Buchanan supports the Trade Promotion Authority (TPA) and the Trans-Pacific Partnership "In your State of the Union address you expressed a willingness to work with Congress on expanding international trade opportunities that will help grow the U.S. economy and create American jobs. Offer accepted, Buchanan wrote.

No, sorry ... cool your jets, Charlie isn't standing trial. But the former Republican governor-turned-independent-turned-Democratic governor-candidate showed up at the Pinellas County Justice Center this morning for jury duty.

The trial to determine whether U.S. Rep. Alan Grayson's wife committed bigamy at the time of their marriage is being held up on account of breast implants. Court documents filed this week said Lolita Grayson had been complaining of chest pain and went to the emergency room where they broke the news she'd have to go through emergency surgery to remove her leaking breast implants. The court date was originally scheduled for Thursday but has now been moved to March. Grayson's surgery was scheduled for Monday.

Government watchdog group Integrity Florida today called on federal authorities to investigate potential violations of the civil rights conspiracy statute by state government officials in Florida.

After Blaise Ingoglia unseated Rick Scott's hand-picked Leslie Dougher as the Republican Party of Florida's newest chair, three prominent party staffers resigned from their positions.

The American Federation for Children, which calls itself the nations voice for educational choice, released the following statement from executive counsel Kevin P. Chavous in response to President Obama's State of the Union address:

One of the highlight's of President Barack Obama's State of the Union address Tuesday will be a $500 tax credit for families with two earners -- a plan the White House says will benefit 24 million couples by covering "additional costs" in the average American household. The problem is, however, that the $500 tax credit won't go very far. White House administration officials have said the tax credit will benefit families earning up to $210,000, a number four times as much as the typical middle class income of $52,000.