It's About Florida

The Federal Centers for Medicaid and Medicare Services signed off on the first part of a plan that will steer Florida on a path toward Medicaid managed care. This will impact thousands of Florida’s seniors in long term care. Under managed care, the state will be split into several different regions, and health insurance companies will compete in those regions for customers. As the state awaits approval of a full statewide transition we discuss all the changes you can expect in this first phase with our panel of experts.

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Florida remains a hub of human trafficking, and one area the state is working to crack down on the practice is in massage parlors. The Florida legislature began the effort last year with a bill requiring operators and employees of massage parlors to have valid government-issued IDs. Now a bill has been introduced that would limit the number of hours such places can be open. Today we speak with Dr. Terry Coonan, Director of the FSU Human Rights Center, and Democratic State Representative Dave Kerner, who has sponsored the massage parlor bill.

After a failed re-election bid to run Indiana’s school system, Florida’s state Board of Education unanimously picks Tony Bennett to oversee Florida’s public schools and colleges. With only a few weeks on the job, Bennett talks about his career in education, his election defeat in Indiana, school safety concerns with the gun control debate and his vision for Florida’s educational future.

Host: Trimmel Gomes

Guest: Florida Education Commissioner, Tony Bennett