The Florida House has announced that the Sunday night budget meeting between Senate Budget Committee Chairman J.D. Alexander, R-Lake Wales, and House Appropriations Chair Rep. Denise Grimsley, R-Sebring, has been pushed back an hour, to 7 p.m. Editor's note: the House has revised the delay until 8 p.m.

As legislators enter the final week on the calendar for the regular 60-day session, the budget chiefs have narrowed the areas they need to smooth out to education and health and human services. Senate Budget Committee Chairman J.D. Alexander, R-Lake Wales, and House Appropriations Chair Rep. Denise Grimsley, R-Sebring, are scheduled to meet again at 6 p.m. Sunday in 212 Knott Building.

Florida Gov. Rick Scott named Virginia Hipp Johns to the Suwannee River Water Management District governing board and Fred N. Roberts Jr. to the governing board of the St. Johns River Water Management District. Johns, 57, of Alachua, is the president of John Hipp Construction. Roberts, 33, of Ocala, is an attorney with Klein and Klein Law Firm. Both appointments require confirmation by the Florida Senate.

A nearly four-hour morning Senate Budget Committee delayed some of the weekends state budget talks on Saturday. However, Senate Budget Committee Chairman J.D. Alexander, R-Lake Wales, said he views all outstanding issues as imminently solvable. The Budget Committee chairs began meeting again to go over the latest offers from each chamber. The budget chiefs worked until around 11 p.m. Friday going over criminal justice, agriculture and general government offers. Up next will be education and health and human services.

The Senate Budget Committee voted to support a bill Saturday morning that could reduce how much private insurers -- and in turn their customers -- must immediately pay to cover costs that the dangerously large Citizens Property Insurance Corp. cant handle after a storm. Sen. Steve Oelrich, R-Gainesville, the sponsor of the bill, said the widely supported SB 1346 is designed to keep private companies solvent after a storm and is aimed at attracting more insurance companies into the Florida market.

The U.S. Justice Department wants to take Florida to trial over two voting laws. In court papers filed late Friday night, Florida officials opposed the move and noted that the federal court hearing the case in the District of Columbia wants sufficient time to issue a decision before the August primaries, the Associated Press reported.

Judge Carl J. Barbier of the Federal District Court in New Orleans issued an order late Friday night to award victims of the BP oil spill $7.8 billion in damages.

In his weekly address, Gov. Rick Scott thanked the Florida House for approving on Friday HB 119, which is aimed at reducing fraud in the personal injury protection auto insurance.

The furor over Rush Limbaugh's "sluts" and "free sex" rant over contraception is chipping away at his advertising base. Bowing to pressure from feminists and other groups, several sponsors have stopped airing what Limbaugh has heretofore affectionately called "obscene profit center breaks" on his show. Among the dropouts: Sleep Train and Sleep Number mattresses, Legal Zoom and Quicken Loans. ProFlowers had more than 2,600 comments on its website from posters demanding that they, too, pull their ads.

The "progressive" speech police are after Rush Limbaugh again. The nation's No. 1 radio talker angered feminist groups this week when he mocked Georgetown law student Sandra Fluke for wanting "free sex." That was Limbaugh's shorthand characterization of Fluke's congressional testimony appealing for free contraception benefits at her Catholic university.

George Firestone, a former state legislator who served as Florida's secretary of state from 1979 to 1987, died Friday, according to an obituary in the Miami Herald. He was 80. House Speaker Dean Cannon, R-Winter Park, held a moment of silence for Firestone at the end of the regular session on Friday. The House Democratic Party released the following statement from House Democratic Party Leader Ron Saunders, R-Key West:

The Senate has again delayed efforts to reform Citizens Property Insurance, pushing any debate on Gov. Rick Scotts call for reform and reduction of the state-backed provider to the final week of the regular session. Sen. Garrett Richter, R-Naples, the sponsor of SB 578, said he expects the bill will come up Monday, with a number of amendmemts.

House Speaker Dean Cannon, R-Winter Park, is backing an amendment by Rep. Mike Horner, R-Kissimmee, expected to come up in the wide-ranging transportation bill that would remove Orange County Mayor Teresa Jacobs from the Orlando-Orange County Expressway Authority.

Hardly surprising that senior Barack Obama campaign adviser David Axelrod wears his heart on his sleeve where Charlie Crist is concerned. The Obama camp wants the fallen former Republican governor back in the president's warm embrace. While he was in Gainesville Wednesday night, Axelrod told the Tampa Times this:

Negotiations over hospital funding, along with some other health and human services issues, may need to be resolved later today by the chairs of the House and Senate budgets. Otherwise, Sen. J.D. Alexander, R-Lake Wales, and his budget counterpart in the House, Rep. Denise Grimsley, R-Sebring, said the budget talks between the chambers have been making progress that should be easier to resolve this weekend.