Politics
Kim Kendall leads Florida lawmakers supporting Greg Steube aerospace modernization effort
State Rep. Kim Kendall led more than a dozen Florida Representatives to lobby the federal government on modernizing Florida’s air and space system.
The St. Augustine Republican rallied lawmakers to sign onto a bipartisan letter led by U.S. Rep. Greg Steube to Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy and Federal Aviation Administrator Bryan Bedford calling for the creation of an Airspace Coordination Team (ACT).
That newly created team would look at improvements to radar and other air traffic infrastructure. The high number of space launches in Florida creates urgency to the matter, the letter reads.
Kendall, a former Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) air traffic controller, said Florida lawmakers also have an interest in the matter.
“Florida must act now as a unified front if we want to ensure we stay at the cutting edge of air and space innovation,” Kendall said.
“This is yet another opportunity for Florida to take the lead and become even more of a force to be reckoned with, not just here at home but around the world. My fellow freshman House members and I had a productive and rewarding time during our trip to Washington, and we are so grateful to all the public officials and industry leaders we met with for taking the time to speak to us and hear about our passion for Florida’s aerospace industry.”
The letter’s recommendations include certification of the FAA’s Space Data Integrator as operational and the establishment of defined overlay mapping. These steps would enable military, FAA and commercial space companies to expand and operate at full or near capacity.
The letter carries the signatures of Florida House Speaker-designate Mike Redondo and state Reps. Yvette Benarroch, Omar Blanco, Bill Conerly, Anne Gerwig, Sam Greco, Kendall, Jennifer Kincart Jonsson, Monique Miller, Danny Nix, Vanessa Oliver, Michael Owen, Bill Partington, Judson Sapp and Meg Weinberger. All are Republicans elected to the House in 2024.
Steube notably gathered a bipartisan group of lawmakers from Florida to sign onto the letter.
“From Cape Canaveral to the Suncoast, Florida is the cornerstone of America’s vibrant aerospace sector,” said Steube, a Sarasota Republican.
“As the world continues to push past the boundaries of earth, it is critical that we preserve Florida’s leadership role in the global space race. I am honored to join the Florida delegation in calling for Secretary Duffy and FAA Administrator Bedford to improve the efficiency and security of air and space travel by modernizing their respective agencies.”
Republican U.S. Sen. Ashley Moody signed the letter. So too did Republican U.S. Reps. Aaron Bean, Gus Bilirakis, Vern Buchanan, Kat Cammack, Mario Díaz-Balart, Byron Donalds, Neal Dunn, Randy Fine, Scott Franklin, Carlos A. Gimenez, Mike Haridopolos, Laurel Lee, Anna Paulina Luna, Brian Mast, Cory Mills, Jimmy Patronis, John Rutherford, María Elvira Salazar and Daniel Webster.
Democratic U.S. Reps. Jared Moskowitz, Darren Soto and Debbie Wasserman Schultz also signed.
Space Coast lawmakers in particular saw value in taking action.
“Florida’s Space Coast is the heart of America’s space and aerospace industry,” said Haridopolos, whose district includes Kennedy Space Center.
“To sustain that success, we must modernize our systems and strengthen coordination to protect our airspace. As launches grow more frequent, our technology and infrastructure must evolve to meet the pace. Creating an Airspace Coordination Team will make Florida’s skies safer, our launches more efficient, and our economy stronger. Florida should lead the world in how we manage airspace, streamline operations, and ensure safety.”
Kendall and the other lawmakers traveled to Washington for meetings with the State Department, Space Force, Transportation, Secretary of the Navy and NASA, as well as leaders of the private company SpaceX. The lawmakers also met with members of Congress.
The policy expansion is retroactive through November 2024.
The House is expanding its paid parental leave policy when employees have a baby or adopt a child, House Speaker Daniel Perez announced.
The policy takes effect immediately and applies retroactively for parents who took leave from Nov. 19, 2024, onward.
Going forward, full-time salaried employees will get up to seven consecutive weeks of paid parental leave for maternity leave after childbirth.
The House will also offer mothers and fathers paid care and bonding leave for up to two weeks within one year after a child’s birth or adoption. The care and bonding leave “may be granted on an intermittent basis” and can’t be taken during the 60-day Legislative Session. It requires supervisor approval as well, Perez’s memo said.
It’s an expansion from the current policy, which Perez explained in the memo.
“As has been the policy of the House, an employee who is the father or mother of a natural born or adopted child will continue to be granted parental leave for a period not to exceed three months total,” Perez’s memo said.
“The employee may include in the request for parental leave one or all of the following types of leave: (new) paid parental leave when allowable; up to 240 hours of accrued sick leave; annual leave; compensatory leave; personal holiday; and leave without pay.”
To help retroactively, the House Office of Administration and Professional Development will be contacting employees to talk about their situations.
The majority of Americans don’t get paid time off for childbirth, according to a 2019 Kaiser Foundation study.
A few major employers in Florida are offering the benefit to new parents.
Publix, for instance, began offering full- and part-time employees paid parental leave in 2022.
“We frequently review our benefits to continually offer a comprehensive package to our associates,” Publix spokesperson Maria Brous told Florida Politics at the time the policy was unveiled.
Politics
Ben Albritton on the future of property tax proposals in the Senate: ‘We’re still measuring’
With eight proposals on eliminating or cutting property taxes moving through the House and Gov. Ron DeSantis maintaining that none go far enough, many are looking more and more to the Senate for signs of what, if any, change could be coming.
As he’s done in months past, Senate President Ben Albritton is advocating for a cautious, unhurried approach.
“Honest to goodness, we’re still measuring,” Albritton told reporters Monday. “We’ve looked at the House proposals, and every one of those has a certain amount of cost to it and a certain amount of impact to Floridians.”
Albritton said that while the Senate is committed to delivering financial relief to Floridians in the form of property tax cuts or rollbacks, he and others in the chamber are cognizant that many core services at the local level stand to be adversely affected if it’s done carelessly.
“Every Floridian … depends on the fact that if they call 911, somebody comes to their place, somebody comes to help them,” he said. “We’ve got to be thoughtful about that.”
Asked whether the Governor has unilateral authority to redistribute funds derived from well-to-do counties like Miami-Dade, Broward, Palm Beach and Orange to 29 fiscally constrained, mostly rural counties — as DeSantis has proposed doing — Albritton’s answer was more definitive: “No.”
“The Florida Legislature (is) given the power to appropriate. The Governor is certainly the chief executive. He has the ability to veto or be supportive. He has, I would say, the ability and the opportunity to be able to share perspective in his budget request and when he lays out the budget,” he said.
“The opportunity to backfill lies in the Legislature.”
On the idea of cash-strapped counties asking the state for funding annually that they’d otherwise generate locally, Albritton said it’s “certainly a concern.”
“Do I love the idea? Of course not,” he said. “But I (believe) affordability is a challenge, and providing some relief in the property tax space is a great way to do that, and especially for (homesteaded) Floridians … that’s great.”
Albritton pushed back on the idea that eliminating property taxes would lead to a “gold rush” of wealthy transplants to the Sunshine State, stressing that he is “optimistic” about the prospect despite its potentially negative effects.
“But it’s not that simple,” he said. “And that’s one of the things that I’m finding in that here again: Don’t take down a fence until you know why it was put up.”
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