A new report from the LeRoy Collins Institute and government watchdog group Integrity Florida shows several counties have adopted ethics policies that are stricter than required by state law. As Jessica Palombo reports, the research could help local and state governments come up with more uniform ethics guidelines.
Florida Governor Rick Scott has issued the state’s 28 colleges a challenge—create four-year degree programs that’ll cost students just 10-thousand dollars to complete. It’s a move Scott says will lower the cost of education and let more kids graduate with degree and the chance of a job. But Regan McCarthy reports others call it a “gimmick,” saying it could hurt the quality of education those students receive.
The State of Florida agency that handles discrimination cases is coming under fire. Tom Flanigan reports the lawyers who argue cases before the Florida Commission on Human Relations charge the agency is doing a terrible job and should be abolished.
The jobs of about the three-thousand correctional employees’ jobs hang in the balance as a Leon Circuit Judge decides whether the state can privatize its prison health care services. As Sascha Cordner reports, the judge must rule on whether a Legislative Budget panel overstepped its authority by approving the plan, even after several attempts to privatize had been struck down by the courts.
Some teenage offenders are getting a second chance in Port St. Lucie. As Jill Roberts from member station WQCS reports, they still have to go before a jury of their peers, and be sentenced, but they avoid any criminal record as long as they complete that sentence
At any given time there are about 800 children up for adoption in Florida. Those are kids whose parents have had their parental rights terminated by a judge. And it’s those kids, that the state has a hard time trying to place. Lynn Hatter reports the Department of Children and Families and other groups are working hard to find them forever homes.