Three challengers have emerged to take on Congressman Jeff Miller, a Republican who was first elected in 2001. Miller represents the Panhandle's 1st Congressional District, which reaches from the Alabama border to Washington County. The district includes Pensacola and Fort Walton Beach.
The $1.4 million in raises for law-enforcement agents in the state's Fish and Wildlife division may smack of a political payoff to a friendly labor union, but other unions say there are bigger forces at work.
"Yeah, they were able to slip (the raise) in. Our people aren't happy," said Doug Martin of AFSCME Council 79, which represents 55,000 state workers.
But, he added, "The raise is legitimate when 25 percent of your employees are leaving."
No one has been more startled than this pollster that immigration has burst onto the scene as an issue more significant to most Americans than health care, financial bailouts and the economy.
So maybe I'm a better pollster than prognosticator. But I do have enough horse sense to trace the trajectory of a new issue once it gets to be headline news.
With Florida receiving $19.9 billion from the federal government through the stimulus passed by Congress last year, Gov. Charlie Crist established the Governors Office of Economic Recovery to coordinate the efforts.
But while the stimulus remains a point of controversy, the office itself has been flying under the radar -- and there are reasons for that.
Business groups say the Legislature's latest raid on the state Transportation Trust Fund will put a screeching halt to new road projects and throw 11,000 workers off the job.
To help balance the budget, lawmakers pulled $160 million from the Florida Department of Transportation's trust fund. But contractors say that's just a down payment on a bigger problem down the road.
"That equals $450 million in projects," said Bill Burleson of the Florida Transportation Builders Association. "There's a lot at stake here."
Its one of the best kept secrets of Floridas austere, $70.4 billion state budget.
Yet its also among the budget provisions most certain to become law this fractured election year.
A $1.4 million pay raise for the 720 law enforcement officers in the states Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission is tucked into the spending plan approved by lawmakers last month and expected to be sent to Gov. Charlie Crist as early as Thursday.
Business and tourism advocates see the new Walt Disney World Resort in Orlando that lets children sleep in the company of little mermaid Ariel and lion king Simba as a sign the region is making an economic recovery.
The 1,984-unit Art of Animation Resort, which Disney announced it was moving forward with Wednesday, is Disneys first new resort in roughly seven years, and it could boost area businesses and push others to consider investing in the hospitality industry.
The Republican National Committee selected Tampa on Wednesday to be the site of the Republican National Convention in 2012. Tampa beat out Phoenix and Salt Lake City to host the event.
The convention will be held the week of Aug. 27 in the St. Pete Times Forum, which seats more than 21,000 and is the home of the Tampa Bay Lightning hockey team.
