The Senate version of the prison privatization effort will get a second stop before a full floor vote that is expected to again have the state seeking to outsource 26 correctional facilities in Central and South Florida.

Senate President Mike Haridopolos, R-Merritt Island, announced Friday that the bill, SB 2038, will go to the Budget Committee on Wednesday if, as expected, the bill gets a favorable review from the Rules Committee on Monday.

Legislation to give incoming governors more influence at the state Judicial Nominating Commission could succeed where previous court reform measures have failed.

Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Shalimar, and Sen. David Simmons, R-Altamonte Springs, have introduced bills authorizing the governor, upon taking office, to replace the five members of the JNC appointed by his predecessor instead of having to wait for their staggered terms to expire.

The Florida Bar would continue to name four members to the panel.

Floridas unemployment rate for December stood at 9.9 percent, down from 10 percent in November and marking the first time the state has been below double digits since April 2009, according to the state Department of Economic Opportunity.

Gov. Rick Scott, in a conference call with reporters on Friday, said Floridas growth is the strongest since 2007; the result, he said, of a reduction in business regulations and streamlining government.

This proves the changes we're implementing, with the help of our friends in the Legislature, are working, Scott said.

While he may not have stayed in the Republican presidential race following accusations of marital impropriety and a series of gaffes, businessman Herman Cain shows no signs of heading to the political sidelines.

My mission is still to defeat Barack Obama and get the Republican nominee for the presidency elected, Cain wrote in an email to supporters sent out earlier in the month.

Following a last-minute amendment backers don't like but had no time to defeat, a measure restricting the price physicians can charge for repackaged prescription drugs passed its first Senate committee on Thursday.

The proposal, SB 668, caps fees doctors can charge on prescriptions filled in their offices for workers' compensation patients. The fee, $4.18 per prescription, is the same fee that pharmacies get paid for similar workers' comp orders.

After hearing from private prison operators and correctional officials Thursday, the House Appropriations Committee is considering a bill to readdress a plan to privatize 26 correctional facilities in Central and South Florida.

But the committee may not include a companion effort, as has been introduced in the Senate, that changes how future privatization efforts are handled by the state.

Committee Chairwoman Rep. Denise Grimsley, R-Sebring, said if a bill moves forward in the House, she expects a single bill aimed at reauthorizing the action approved last year.

On Sept. 21, 1976, as his car rounded Sheridan Circle on Embassy Row, former Chilean ambassador Orlando Letelier was assassinated by car bomb. Ronni Moffitt, a 25-year-old American women who worked with Letelier at the leftist Institute for Policy Studies, died with him.

Appearing at Florida's top tourist attraction on Thursday, President Obama ordered more U.S. visas issued more quickly to visitors from Brazil and China.

"We want to tell the world America is open for business," the president said at Disney World. "We want America to be the top tourist destination in the world."

Visa-processing backlogs in Brazil -- which sent the most international tourists to Florida last year -- were cited by the president as a stumbling block.

"We make it too hard for them," Obama said of tourists from Brazil, China and India.

The House has upped its call to complete the budget, without the need for a mid-session spring break, in the regular 60-day session.

But the prodding isn't expected to change the pace of the Senate's budget deliberations.

House Speaker Dean Cannon on Thursday posted a budget allocation package for the next fiscal year that matches Gov. Rick Scotts call for at least $1 billion in additional funding for education while challenging the Senate to confront a tough budget within the scheduled timeline.

Gov. Rick Scott repeated Thursday that he isnt interested in efforts by Democrats to end tax breaks for corporations that members of the minority party say cost the state $500 million a year in revenue.

Scott, speaking before the Florida Retail Federation at the Hotel Duval in Tallahassee, said the state needs to provide incentives to attract business.

Every dollar you take out of the private sector, thats hurting the economy, hurting business, Scott said.