The Board of Governors has said they want to slow the train on legislation that would wipe away their authority.
A Senate committee discussed a resolution (SJR 2308) Wednesday and took the opportunity to give BOG Chancellor Mark Rosenberg a tongue lashing.
Sen. Larcenia Bullard, D-Miami, got the train running by ripping into Rosenberg for not paying her any visits.
"I saw you in my office a couple of days ago, and in the hallway. I've seen you in airports, but I just must ask who are the Board of Governors?" Bullard said. "I don't know who they are. … Why do you think we need 17 people who have no relationship with the Legislature?"
Rosenberg responded, "Madame senator, you were one of the first legislators I visited when I was appointed. I've visited you repeatedly and I'm disappointed that you're asking me this question now."
Bullard backpedaled some on her visiting comments saying, "In all due respect to you as an individual it's been so long I've forgotten when you visited, but I do want to say that when you did stop by you didn't say what the Board of Governors, what you really do. You were there to introduce yourself."
Senator Alex Diaz de la Portilla, R-Miami supported Bullard saying, "To be very frank with you Dr. Rosenberg, I think the answer you gave Senator Bullard was disrespectful." He later explained there needs to be more accountability.
If the BOG sees a light at the end of the tunnel, they better be careful, it could be a train.

Global compensation, a bill to automatically compensate the wrongfully incarcerated, will likely find favor with many legislators this session, but what version will survive may depend on how "clean" lawmakers want the bill to be.
In Rep. Ellyn Bogdanoff's "global" compensation bill, (HB1025) a provision dubbed "clean hands," would deny anyone automatic compensation if he or she had prior felony convictions other than the crime they were proven innocent of, or if they committed crimes while in prison.
That differs form State Senator Arthenia Joyner's global bill,(SB756) which has a provision that only denies compensation only if a person has committed a violent crime in the past, such as murder or rape.
After kicking off regular session on Tuesday, Senate President Ken Pruitt said he wants the committees to hash out the provisions first before he decides which one he favors.

Bright Future scholars won't have their lights dimmed by the Board of Governors, which recently announced it will not target the program this coming legislative session.
In a recent statement, the BOG said, "Chancellor Mark B. Rosenberg announced today that he has removed reform of Bright Futures from the Board of Governors agenda for the coming legislative session.

"After consulting with members of the Legislature, Board of Governors chair Carolyn Roberts and I have determined that our efforts this year should focus on our top priorities – securing adequate support in an environment of budget cuts and stopping the brain drain from Florida's universities," Rosenberg said.

With university budgets strained, there has been talk of cutting back on the popular scholarship, but legislators won't have it.

Already, Senate President Ken Pruitt responded to the BOG decision.

In a statement, Pruitt said, "Florida's parents and students have spoken, and I am grateful their voices were heard."

The drum beat for compensation of the wrongfully convicted will get louder next week, once the legislative session begins.
The Innocence Project of Florida will have a rally at the old Capitol on Tuesday, March 4, from noon to 1 p.m. Wilton Dedge, who received $2 million in 2005 for being incarcerated for crimes he didn't commit, will be there. So will Alan Crotzer, who will ask lawmakers for a second time to compensate him, $1.25 million, for spending 24 years in prison for crimes DNA evidence prove he didn't commit.
This session legislators will also consider a "global" bill that will automatically compensate the wrongfully convicted, without them having to politely ask lawmakers for compensation.

A legislative path may have been cleared for Alan Crotzer to receive compensation for his wrongful conviction in 1981.
Senate President Ken Pruitt recently said he will support a compensation bill for Crotzer and will make it a priority for the Senate.
Last year, the House agreed to pay Crotzer $1.25 million for the nearly 25 years he spent in prison for rapes, kidnappings and robberies he did not commit. In 2006, he was freed after DNA evidence proved he was innocent.
Though the House passed the bill, the Senate leadership refused to bring it to a floor for a vote. Now that Pruitt supports the bill, it has a better chance of passing.

Florida State University President T.K. Wetherell has laid out his funding plan for higher education, one that would bring money by the truck load every year, but it could be losing steam.
Wetherell's plan would bypass the Legislature and go right to voters, but it has one hurdle: The Florida Taxation and Budget Reform Commission.
In January, Wetherell explained at a general faculty meeting that the funding shortfall for higher education could be solved by the state picking up the tab on the required local effort on property taxes for local schools and investing some of that money into higher education.

The required local effort which requires counties to contribute to school funding is mandated by the Legislature each year. It's paid by everyone in Florida who owns property, and is about 30 percent of every tax bill, Wetherell said. It would cost the state about $8 billion to replace.

"We're suggesting that the state buy that local required effort out," Wetherell said. "Our suggestion is that you buy that out with a broader tax base."

That broader tax base could include removing some tax exemptions, the president suggested.

The option isn't gaining enough traction on the commission, but Wetherell said the fact that the idea is still alive is good.

"They haven't killed it," Wetherell said. "If it doesn't make it, we'll do more cuts."

It was to be a showdown of facts and science devoid of politics. Either it would have cleared the name of embattled medical examiner Dr. Charles Siebert, or shown that his critics were right.
Now, it looks as though that battle will never take place.
Siebert stepped down as medical examiner for District 14 on Dec. 28, the day before the Florida Medical Examiners Commission met and decided not to rehire the man they had fired last summer.
Siebert was let go after a probable-cause panel report found he had violated state law. The report said Siebert didn't do all he claimed he'd done in his autopsy of Martin Lee Anderson. The Panama City teen died Jan. 6, 2006, a day after he was hit and restrained by drill instructors at the Bay County boot camp, an incident captured on videotape.
State Attorney Steve Meadows rehired him on an interim basis until a permanent replacement was found. A local search committee named Siebert as that replacement, after other candidates withdrew their names.
Siebert had challenged their decision not to renew his contract and was scheduled to have a Division of Administrative Hearing on Jan. 15, where he could argue his case. The hearing was originally scheduled for October 24, but was pushed back. Siebert has said the delay gave lawyers time to regroup after the boot camp trial which ended Oct. 12, and cleared all defendants in the case. Verdicts he said helped prove his case, that Anderson died from sickle-cell trait, and was not suffocated as another medical examiner concluded.
Florida Department of Law Enforcement spokeswoman Kristen Perezluha said the department has put in a request to cancel the Jan. 15, hearing. Not only did Siebert quit, but he's taken another job in New Jersey.