The Florida Senate isn't wasting time.

Senators this week tackled perhaps the most controversial issue of the legislative session, overwhelmingly approving plans to redraw boundaries for Senate and congressional districts. At the same time, Senate President Mike Haridopolos moved quickly to revive a controversial proposal that would privatize prisons across the southern half of the state.

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.

State lawmakers kicked off an election-year, budget-cutting, once-a-decade-political-remapping session this week as Gov. Rick Scott called for further tax cuts and $1 billion more for education while assuring Floridians that good times are returning.

Ushered into a January session in a constitutionally mandated effort to draw new political boundaries in time for the 2012 elections, legislative leaders took little time to caution voters of potentially painful cuts as they work to craft a budget that may fall up to $2 billon short of last year.

Citing noise and chanting earlier in the day, the Senate Sergeant at Arms on Tuesday denied Senate viewing gallery access to a group loosely defined as Occupy Tallahassee.

The decision by Sergeant at Arms Don Severance caused a flurry of activity in the afternoon as a group occupied a space just outside the Senate press gallery for a few hours after the session adjourned for the day.

Florida would join a group of 41 other states that have already standardized requirements and application procedures for life insurance, long-term disability coverage and other insurance products, under a measure filed Tuesday and backed by industry representatives and state regulators.

Continued low interest rates and a more confident consumer drove existing home sales up in November by 11 percent over last year, according to figures released by Florida Realtors.

Meanwhile, the median price for an existing home remained relatively flat, a continuation of a trend that Realtors say is a good sign that better days are ahead for an industry that could use a little good news.

Months after lawmakers approved a measure to overrule cities and counties with get-tough gun laws, a Palm Beach County lawmaker on Tuesday introduced a bill to begin restoring some limits on where residents can carry guns.

Saying she hopes to at least generate debate, Rep. Lori Berman, D-Delray Beach, filed a proposal (HB 1087) to bar handguns from child care centers and government buildings.

Barrel racing and card playing will continue in Gretna while opponents try to shut the track down in court, an appeals court ruled Tuesday, rejecting a request to close the doors immediately while the underlying challenge moves forward.

A day after hearing arguments, a three-judge panel of the 1st District Court of Appeal denied a request by a group led by the Florida Quarter Horse Racing Association and the American Quarter Horse Association to shut down the newly opened track that has been offering pari-mutuel wagering and card games since Dec 1.