In a case involving questions about First Amendment rights and allegations of malice, a prominent South Florida environmentalist has gone to the state Supreme Court in a battle stemming from her opposition to a project that included limerock mining. 

Attorneys for Maggy Hurchalla filed a notice that she will ask the Supreme Court to overturn a 4th District Court of Appeal ruling that upheld a $4.4 million verdict against her, according to documents posted Friday on the Supreme Court website. 

As Hurricane Dorian threatened to cause massive damage to Florida’s East Coast in early September, residents --- and electric utilities --- prepared for the worst.

As residents emptied store shelves of supplies or evacuated their communities, utilities lined up thousands of workers to be ready to deal with downed power lines and destroyed equipment.

As it turned out, Florida got lucky. Dorian stayed far enough off the coast that it largely spared the state from damage.

Florida is a prime example of the widespread acceptance of the herb not so long ago vilified in the propaganda movie “Reefer Madness.”

Since voters legalized medical marijuana in 2016, Florida is home to more than 266,000 patients whose doctors have authorized them to consume pot in one form or another to treat a variety of ailments.

Florida lawmakers will return to the Capitol on Monday to start holding committee meetings in advance of the 2020 legislative session.

The meetings are the start of six months of legislative work scheduled to culminate March 13 with the frenzied end to the 2020 session. Lawmakers then will spill out of Tallahassee, with many turning their attention to next year’s election campaigns.

But first things first. Lawmakers during the coming week will dig into the state budget, getting presentations about Florida’s financial picture and agency spending requests.

In little more than four months, Florida lawmakers will start the whirlwind of the 2020 legislative session.

But, according to the old cliché, all politics is local. And that means lawmakers during the next several weeks will spend numerous hours in county delegation meetings listening to local officials and constituents discuss priorities of their communities.

A few county delegations have already met as they prepare for the Jan. 14 start of the session. But the pace will pick up during the coming week, with delegation meetings scheduled each day across the state.

State Agriculture Commissioner Nikki Fried is expected to be in Tampa during the coming week to help host the Florida Energy & Climate Summit.

Fried’s office touted the multi-day event as the first state-level conference to address climate change since 2008, and representatives of a wide range of groups, companies and government agencies were expected to take part.

Senate President Bill Galvano’s vision of new and expanded toll roads in the western side of the state will get an introduction Tuesday when task forces looking at the three proposed routes take part in a “kickoff” event.

The Florida Department of Transportation’s “Multi-use Corridors of Regional Economic Significance,” or M-CORES, task forces will ultimately make recommendations about the toll-road proposals, which were a top priority of Galvano, R-Bradenton, during this year’s legislative session.

Barring a late legal reprieve, Gary Ray Bowles is slated Thursday to become the second Death Row inmate executed since Gov. Ron DeSantis took office in January.

In both cases, DeSantis has targeted men convicted of committing multiple murders.

In May, the state put to death Bobby Joe Long, who was sentenced to death in the May 1984 murder of Michelle Simms after picking her up on Kennedy Boulevard in Tampa. In 1985. Long also pleaded guilty to seven additional first-degree murder charges and numerous charges for sexual batteries and kidnappings in the Tampa Bay region.

Follow the money.

A cliché? Sure. But in the world of Florida government and politics, it’s also a pretty good rule to follow.

That will be on display during the coming week when state political candidates and committees face a deadline for disclosing July financial information and lobbyists have to provide details about their compensation in the year’s second quarter.

Combined, the reports will show tens of millions of dollars flowing through the political system, often in large chunks from deep-pocketed donors.

After months of denying he did anything wrong, Scott Maddox, a former chairman of the Florida Democratic Party and veteran Tallahassee politico, will appear before a federal judge during the coming week and is expected to plead guilty to corruption-related charges.