A bill limiting the authority of the Florida Public Service Commission to regulate basic land line telephone service breezed through its first Senate committee Monday.

Under Senate Bill 1524, the PSC would no longer be able to regulate prices for land line phone services, but would still act as an arbiter for disputes between companies or wholesale service providers.

"Thisdeals with the deregulation of the last vestige of regulated phone service in the state of Florida," said Sen. David Simmons, R-Maitland, who is sponsoring the bill.

Florida Republican U.S. Rep. Bill Posey is once again pushing for legislation to cut taxes on Social Security benefits and ending the mandatory IRA withdrawals required for 70-year-olds. Posey called for ending Social Security payroll taxes on recipients.

House Speaker Dean Cannon, R-Winter Park, released the first round of budget allocations to the various appropriations committees on Monday.

The Florida Legislature will be called to make difficult choices for the FY 2011-12 budget, insisted Cannon in a memo sent out to House members on Monday. The Revenue Estimating Conference has determined the gap between anticipated revenues and needs to be within a range of $2.9 billion to $4.6 billion. On Friday, the REC revised their General Revenue estimate downward by $215.8 million.