Florida GOP Raises $7.7 Million in Homestretch; Maryland Firm 'Gets to Work' on Inaugural
The Florida Republican Party raised $7.7 million the last two months of 2010, including the homestretch of an election season in which the GOP claimed the governor's office, swept the Cabinet and made gains in the state House, Senate and in the congressional delegation.
According to reports filed Monday, the state party's biggest homestretch contributor was the Republican Governors Association, which poured $1.7 million into the state party. The biggest private contributor was Jacksonville-based Blue Cross/Blue Shield, with the insurer donating $525,000 to the GOP. The $7.7 million collected was dwarfed by the $31.6 million raised by the party in the two months following the August primary which set the field for the general election. Spending by the party in December included $602,076 paid to Hargrove, Inc., the Maryland event-planning company which helped organize Gov. Rick Scott's inaugural. Scott campaign adviser Donna Arduin, budget director for former Gov. Jeb Bush, also drew $70,000 in consulting fees from the party since late October, reports show. The Florida Democratic Party report was not available late Monday.
Smith to Speak to House Dems
Fresh from his election as chairman, Florida Democratic Party boss Rod Smith plans to speak to the House Democratic caucus during a Tuesday luncheon session. Smith succeeds former chair Karen Thurman who announced her retirement shortly after the November election, which saw Democrats absorb wide-ranging defeats, including the loss of five seats in the state House. Republicans now have an 81-39 seat majority in the House, and a 28-12 majority in the Senate. "It's mostly greeting members," House Democratic spokesman Mark Hollis said of Smith's appearance. "Following his election, I think he wants to reassure our caucus that what's going on in the Legislature is something that is a priority for the party."
Bennett Doubts Future of Arizona-Style Immigraton Bill
The Senate sponsor of legislation aimed at making it easier for Florida to weed out illegal immigrants told a newspaper Monday that he doubts an Arizona-style law will pass this year. Sen. Mike Bennett, the sponsor of the bill (SB 136), also acknowledged he has concerns with his own bill, because it might allow for racial profiling. I might not even vote for it myself, Bennett, R-Bradenton, told the Miami Herald. There probably will not be an Arizona-immigration-style bill that passes the Florida Senate," he said. Bennetts comments came as the Senate began looking at the issue in a special committee meeting on Monday, designed, according to leaders, to begin learning about the issue.
Lawsuit: Minimum Wage Should Be $7.31, Not $7.25
Advocates for low-wage workers sued Florida on Monday, saying that minimum-wage workers should have gotten a 6-cent raise this year. Florida increased its minimum wage in 2004, and pegged annual increases to inflation. The National Employment Law Project and Florida Legal Services said in a lawsuit filed Monday in circuit court in Leon County, on behalf of four minimum-wage workers and three organzations, that the state wrongly decreased the minimum wage calculation in 2010 to account for economic deflation, which they contend is prohibited by a 2004 Florida Supreme Court opinion. Nobody in Florida noticed the drop in minimum wage to $7.06 an hour because it coincided with a federal increase in the minimum wage that was higher -- $7.25 per hour. But in starting at the state miminum of $7.06, this years increase took the state wage to $7.16, moot because it would be lower than the federal minimum, the plaintiffs said. But that calculation is wrong, they allege, saying it should have started at the higher amount and gone to $7.31. That means minimum-wage workers are due 6 cents more an hour, the plaintiffs said. The suit named the Agency for Workforce Innovation as the defendant. An AWI spokesman said the agency is reviewing the lawsuit.
