The Legislature sent its first bill of the year to Gov. Rick Scott Wednesday, when the House joined the Senate in passing the hotly contested SB 736, a measure basing teacher pay on performance and assessments instead of seniority and tenure.

Flanked by legislative leaders at a press conference after the vote was taken, Scott praised the passage of the bill. This will help attract and retain the best teachers, said Scott, adding that it was part of his plan to increase jobs in the Sunshine State.

Up briefly, a website on which Gov. Rick Scott hailed the work of tea party activists has been taken down by the Republican Party of Florida.

"The site was launched prematurely without final content and legal review from the party," said RPOF spokesman Trey Stapleton.

"We have been coordinating with the governor and he agreed with Chairman [Dave Bitner's] decision to pull the site until the review process is complete."

A bill cracking down on staged-accident scams breezed through a House subcommittee Wednesday, and a fleet of similar reforms is revving up.

House Bill 967 cleared the Insurance and Banking Subcommittee on a 13-2 bipartisan vote after just 45 minutes of discussion. It now heads to the Civil Justice Subcommittee.

The measure, along with companion Senate Bill 1694, cracks down on what insurers call "rampant" fraud involving the state's Personal Insurance Protection (no-fault) program.

While newspaper editorial boards and some GOP leaders bang the drum for a state prescription-drug monitoring system, a zero-cost and seemingly more effective alternative is quietly proceeding through the House.

A proposed bill by the Health and Human Services Committee would attack the "pill mill" problem by banning physicians from dispensing controlled substances at their offices or clinics.

Restricting the dispensing of controlled substances to established pharmacies, the bill (PCB HHSC 11-03) would:

Florida has become known for prescription drug abuse. According to the DEA, of the 50 practitioners who dispensed the most oxycodone in the country in 2008-09, 49 of them were in Florida, making Florida a destination for drug traffickers and addicts. Some Florida practitioners are prescribing and dispensing lethal amounts of controlled substances without providing any real medical care.