Florida School Boards Association
Crisis, what crisis? Just a year after dire predictions that the state’s economy was in peril due to rising insurance costs, Florida businesses could see an average 9.3 percent reduction in workers’ compensation premiums in the coming year under a rate filing Insurance Commissioner David Altmaier will consider later this month. If approved, manufacturing businesses…
As Florida communities prepare to take in Puerto Ricans displaced by Hurricane Maria, five lawmakers are asking the state’s top education official to grant flexibility to public schools so they can accommodate additional students in the coming months. In a letter to state Education Commissioner Pam Stewart on Monday, the lawmakers formally asked the state…
Hurricane Irma could delay some Florida taxpayers’ voices from being heard. It’s an unavoidable case of timing. The powerful hurricane bore down on the state as cities, counties, school boards and other taxing bodies were scheduling two public hearings required by law before they can set property tax rates for the new fiscal year. Read…
If Florida schools let teenagers sleep in, the state would get a $9 billion economic boost over the next 15 years. That’s according to a new report from nonprofit research organization RAND Corporation, which found that moving school start times to 8:30 a.m. or later for middle and high schools would reduce the number of…
Have you missed fights over whether to increase the U.S. government’s borrowing limit? You might be getting a special treat soon. Many education advocates, however, likely aren’t so thrilled. The recurring squabble over raising the debt ceiling has roots in 2011 when, in exchange for increasing the borrowing limit, Congress imposed mandatory spending caps on…
They said it wouldn’t come close to being enough. Florida school district leaders fought during the 2017 legislative session for permission to increase their local tax rate for capital project funding, anticipating they would have to share with charter schools, knowing they had more projects than revenue, understanding the state’s portion had been low for…
Reshaping his leadership team for his final year in office, Senate President Joe Negron, R-Stuart, shook up the Senate power structure in a big way Tuesday as he stripped some veteran Republicans of key committee assignments and rewarded others with new, high-profile assignments. Read More
Gov. Rick Scott, expected to run for U.S. Senate next year, wants lawmakers to put on the 2018 ballot a proposed constitutional amendment that would make it harder for future legislators to raise taxes. Scott appeared Monday in the Central Florida community of Lake Mary to announce the proposal, which would require “supermajority” approval from…
Miami-Dade joined a growing number of school districts challenging the constitutionality of Florida’s sweeping new education law. At a School Board meeting on Wednesday, board members voted 8 to 1 to join litigation seeking to overturn portions of a bill some critics say was designed to boost the fortunes of the politically powerful charter school…
A study will go forward on the state’s redistribution of money from poorer to wealthier school districts in a funding formula a Volusia County critic called “backwards Robin Hood.” The formula has cost Seminole, Osceola and Lake schools tens of millions in local tax revenue being redirected to more affluent districts, including Orange and Miami-Dade.…