Florida's Latest News

Gov. DeSantis signs into law extended COVID-19 protections for health care providers

Gov. Ron DeSantis on Thursday signed into law nine bills, including a highly sought-after bill that extends protections from COVID-19 liability lawsuits for nursing homes, hospitals, and doctors.

SB 7014 was passed earlier this month with many Democrats voting against the measure.

The current law that shields businesses and health care providers from COVID-19-related lawsuits was one of the first measures passed by the Legislature during the 2021 Session. The law makes clear that to successfully sue a health care provider regarding COVID-19, the plaintiff must prove gross negligence or intentional misconduct.

While general businesses were provided indefinite immunity liability protections, health care providers were afforded such protection only through March 2022. The bill signed by DeSantis extends protections for health care providers until June 1, 2023.

Florida Republicans’ voting plan leaves few satisfied

Gov. Ron DeSantis and Republican lawmakers say they have a plan to secure Florida’s elections: regular cleaning of the voter rolls, creating an election security force and tougher penalties for election-related crimes.

But Republican lawmakers are finding they’re satisfying few people with their contentious elections proposal, a top DeSantis priority as he beats back calls from the right to audit Florida’s 2020 election.

Democrats have said the legislation will cause voter suppression. Elections supervisors called an earlier version of the bill a “recipe for disaster.” And lawmakers are getting an earful from those on the right who believe there was widespread fraud in the 2020 election.

“This bill has to go much further than it’s going,” said Raj Doraisamy, a co-founder of Defend Florida, a group that has been going door to door trying to verify the identities of voters over the last year and a half.

Manatee County community leaders ponder ideas on how to manage a growing population

Manatee County's population grew to about 399,700, according to the 2020 census, representing an overall growth rate of close to 33%.

Managing the influx of new people and how to best serve longtime residents was the topic of discussion Thursday at the Manatee Tiger Bay Club.

County Commissioner George Kruse was one of the panelists at the event. He called growth inevitable and said Manatee County should focus less on sprawl and more on building up urban areas like Bradenton.

"In the end, are we growing our community in a way that is beneficial and sustainable for the long-term viability of Manatee County?” he asked. “Do we want to continue staying up in average age or do we want to start providing the community amenities, the mentoring, and the smaller urban units the young professionals desire and by extension, that the employers we want to attract here are going to look for in a workforce?”

E-Scooters work so well in St. Petersburg, the city wants to extend their hours

The shared scooter pilot program had a lot of skeptics when it was launched in October 2020.

The council’s chairperson, Gina Driscoll, was a firm no. Council member Ed Montanari had a stack of scooter complaints. But 15 months later, St. Petersburg’s implementation of shared scooters — especially the “well-thought-out” parking corrals — is now a model for cities nationwide.

Between two operators — Veo’s standing scooters and Razor’s seated scooters — there are 975 authorized scooters. They gave 372,569 rides over 438,533 miles for a total of 5 million minutes of use. There is a high percentage of parking compliance, and of only eight crashes with injuries or possible injuries, two occurred during dark hours. Razor has only reported nine missing scooters.

“We’ve really set a new standard for scooters by being careful,” Driscoll said. “I started out as a firm no. I kept an open mind and finally came around.”