Florida House Insurance and Banking Subcommittee (IBS) members heard good news about the state insurer of last resort on Tuesday, and recent legislative reforms have shored it up.

Citizens CEO Tim Cerio said that depopulation of the insurer may be down to desired levels by 2027, saying Florida Office of Insurance Regulation Commissioner Michael Yaworsky thinks 700,000 may be the correct number, while he hopes “it’s in the fives or maybe low sixes.”

“I think we will see whatever that number is in the next two years. Knock on wood,” Cerio said, unwittingly using an infamous Gov. Ron DeSantis phrase of hope that no storms would hit while he ran for President.

Citizens closed 2024 with slightly more than 936,000 policies in force, down from more than 1.4 million policies at the peak in 2023.

Gov. Ron DeSantis has warned about Citizens’ bloat in the past. He previously noted that Citizens was “unfortunately undercapitalized” and that the company could go “belly up” if it had to weather a significant storm. But Cerio’s comments suggest that the company only has so far to shrink.

Cerio noted that in 2018, Citizens had just 427,000 policies, but that was “artificially low” given the shakiness of some private companies.

He also noted Citizens has to shoulder more dangerous properties than a private insurer might and charges “actuarially unsound” rates in much of the state (with Miami-Dade an exception), given its role in the marketplace, as private companies are not “coming in to take the riskiest of the risky.” That said, actuarial soundness gets closer all the time.

Mangrove Property Insurance Co. is the latest company to enter the market, approved by OIR last week. In recent months, ASI Select Insurance Corp., Trident Reciprocal Exchange, Ovation Home Insurance Exchange, Manatee Insurance Exchange, Condo Owners Reciprocal Exchange, Orange Insurance Exchange, Orion180 Select Insurance Company, Orion180 Insurance Company, Mainsail Insurance Company, and Tailrow Insurance Exchange have also entered the market.

Despite the realities of the marketplace, prudent policy has also had benefits for those in the private market.

“We would have had an assessment this year but for the reforms,” Cerio said, referring to laws (HB 1A and SB 2A) passed in 2022 that bolstered the reinsurance market and decreased the window of time for homeowners to file claims against policies. Citizens customers must also move to a private carrier if they receive an offer within 20% above the Citizens rate.

Cerio noted that the reforms have also cut legal costs, saving Florida from an “insurance spiral.”

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Less than two years after he was named special agent in charge of the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s Miami field office, Jeffrey Veltri is out of a job.

He was among roughly a dozen top FBI officials who, as part of an effort by President Donald Trump to rid the government of unloyal actors, were told to either resign, retire or face termination.

Veltri chose to step down of his own accord, the Miami Herald reported, “citing sources familiar with his departure.”

Veltri, 50, lives in Parkland and is a registered member of the Independent Party, state records show. The 18-year veteran of the agency took over the FBI’s Miami office in March 2023, seven months after federal agents raided Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in search of improperly held classified documents.

The FBI has not explained the reasoning for Veltri’s ouster. Late last week, acting FBI Director Brian Driscoll said that acting U.S. Deputy Attorney General Emil Bove, Trump’s former defense attorney, instructed him to remove eight senior executives within the agency and turn over the names of every FBI employee involved in the Jan. 6 riot investigation.

Trump pardoned nearly all of the 1,600 people charged in connection with the riot, including dozens with criminal records that included rape, child abuse and domestic violence, and people who attacked officers at the U.S. Capitol.

Bove’s order came by memo. It included four top FBI managers and two field chiefs, including Veltri and David Sundberg in Washington, D.C.

Joyce Vance, a former U.S. Attorney, told NBC News the firings are illegal.

“Career federal employees can be fired for conduct or performance issues, not because they failed to demonstrate political loyalty to the current incumbent of the White House,” she told the outlet. “Trump ignored controlling law and regulations to do this, and unless the Supreme Court changes their interpretation, any firing of permanent members of the civil service should not stand.”

Vance’s comments did not address what recourse federal employees who left voluntarily would have.

Veltri, who served as an Assistant Public Defender in Broward County before joining the FBI more than 20 years ago, oversaw a field office of more than 400 special agents. Recent cases the office led included Trump’s handling of classified documents, the attempted assassination of the President in September and a murder-for-hire plot by developer Sergio Pino.

Justin Fleck, who recently celebrated 18 months with the FBI, has taken over the Miami office as acting special agent in charge. He’s already updated his LinkedIn profile, which shows he worked for seven years as a deputy and detective at the Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Office before joining the FBI in early 2007.

Fleck has spent the preponderance of his FBI career in South Florida, where he previously served as the Miami office’s deputy special agent in charge.

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Initial demand for Florida’s K-12 scholarships has set a new record.

Step Up For Students, the nonprofit organization that administers 98% of the state’s scholarships, opened applications for the 2025-26 school year at 9 a.m. Saturday.

By the end of the weekend, more than 120,000 students had applied.

That’s the most demand Florida’s scholarship programs have ever seen in their first two days after opening applications.

— Nearly 63,400 students (51,861 renewal and 11,533 new) applied for scholarships that help pay private school tuition. Families can use any leftover money for tutoring, curriculum, or other supplemental learning.

— Nearly 33,900 students (28,608 renewal and 5,270 new)  applied for Unique Abilities scholarships that allow students with special needs to customize their education.

— Nearly 25,700 students (20,572 renewal and 5,081 new) applied for Personalized Education Program scholarships, which help families direct the education of children who do not attend school full time.

Step Up For Students CEO Gretchen Schoenhaar said the organization’s team and systems were ready for the surge of interest. Step Up’s technology systems had zero downtime. Of the families who called for assistance, 84% reported being “very satisfied” with the support they received, and nine out of 10 said their inquiry was resolved on the first call.

“The unprecedented volume of applications on our opening weekend highlights the value Florida families place on the opportunity to choose the best possible education for their children,” Schoenhaar said. “Our teams are prepared to meet the growing demand for scholarships and support families every step of the way. Our seamless execution proves it is possible to expand education opportunities at scale.”

This year, more than 500,000 students use the state’s K-12 scholarship programs to access learning options of their choice. That makes Florida the national leader in education options. If these students were counted as a single school district, it would be the largest in the state and third largest in the country.

Step Up is focused on supporting that growth. So far this year, SUFS has paid nearly 2 million quarterly invoices to schools in 4.4 business days on average and more than 1 million reimbursements in 4.2 business days on average. By the end of the year, we expect to double the number of reimbursements and process a total of 2 million MyScholarShop e-commerce transactions.

Current scholarship families have until April 30 to renew their scholarships for the next school year. All families who want a PEP scholarship must also apply by April 30.

Private School and Unique Abilities Scholarship applications will be available through Nov. 15 for families who want a new scholarship or current students who do not renew their scholarship by April 30.

Applications and more details are available here.

We will update the numbers in this post each week on Monday until applications close.

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Travis Pillow is Step Up For Students’ senior director of thought leadership and growth. He lives in Sanford with his wife and two children. A former Tallahassee statehouse reporter, he most recently worked at the Center on Reinventing Public Education, a research organization at Arizona State University, where he studied community-led learning innovation and school systems’ responses to the COVID-19 pandemic. He can be reached at [email protected].

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