The chief of the state's insurer of last resort made his case Monday before a Senate committee, and after nearly two hours of questioning, he secured the panel's favorable vote to move forward for Senate confirmation.

The Land Report magazine compiles an annual list of America's 100 largest landowners, and five are in Florida, reports Florida Trend in its April issue.As one of the country's largest states, there's a whole lot of land to own. Who are Florida's top landowners?

The Florida chapter of the Campaign to Fix the Debt, a nonpartisan group that aims to put the country on a sustainable economic path by tackling the federal debt, will join with the national Concord Coalition to address Floridians at Eckerd College in St. Petersburg on Tuesday. The 7 p.m. event, which will be moderated by Rob Lorei, managing editor of Florida This Week on PBS, is open to the public and will feature the following presenters:

Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., said in an Easter morning statement that he won't be rushed to agree on immigration reform, in spite of the reports that the entire bipartisan group of eight senators are good to go with their legislative proposal. Rubio headlines his statement, "No final agreement on immigration legislation yet."

Gov. Rick Scott has appointed Frederick Rick Barber and Mitchel A. Hutchcraft to the governing board of the South Florida Water Management District. The governor also reappointed Kevin P. Powers, who was previously appointed by Charlie Crist.

Friday night's NCAA March Madness showdown between two Florida teams -- the University of Florida and Florida Gulf Coast University -- will have at least one conflicted fan in the crowd: Florida's top chief, Gov. Rick Scott. The governor is in Dallas with his family for the game between the No. 3-seed Gators and the No. 15-seed Eagles. The winner heads to the Elite 8. FGCU is the first 15-seed to ever make it to this round: the Sweet 16.

Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush will be headlining the Hispanic Leadership Network's 2013 Miami Conference, Family Reuni. The bilingual, two-day conference is set to take place at the Biltmore Hotel in Coral Gables, Fla., on April 18-19.

The Florida Senate released its annual budget proposal for fiscal year 2013-2014 on Friday, putting $2.9 billion in reserves.

The fourth annual School Choice Day is coming to the Florida Capitol. The Florida Alliance for Choices in Education and the Florida Coalition for Public School Options Friday announced the all day event for teachers, parents and students to join together in Tallahassee in support of parental school choice for their children.

In more good economic news for the state of Florida this week, the Florida Department of Economic Opportunity revealed Friday that the state's unemployment in February hit its lowest mark since October 2008, falling 0.2 percent from January to 7.7 percent.

With President Barack Obama in town Friday to talk jobs and infrastructure investment at the Port of Miami, Florida Gov. Rick Scott took the president's trip to South Florida as an opportunity to ask for a reimbursement for the state's port investment.

Dave Mica, executive director of the Florida Petroleum Council, gets a nod from Sunshine State News for Best Picture of the Day after tweeting, "Cinderella is ..."

New emissions standards announced by the Obama administration Friday will add a fee of up to 9 cents per gallon of gasoline.

The following was written and submitted by freelance reporter/videographer Dave Heller: Florida is moving to prevent some mentally ill people from buying guns. A House committee passed a bill Thursday that would ban gun purchases by anyone who has been committed to a mental institution. Currently, theres a loophole in state law that allows mentally ill people to voluntarily commit themselves to a mental health treatment facility and then be able to buy a gun when they check out.

President Barack Obama, the ever-present campaigner, took his push for immigration reform to the Hispanic audiences of Telemundo and Univison Thursday night.He told the target audience that immigration reform would be coming "soon," in a clear move to bolster his legacy.