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The Seminole Tribe of Florida is drawing a line in the sand over the continuation of the Seminole Gaming Compact.

The tribe sent a letter to Governor Rick Scott on Wednesday saying they believe they can still continue to deal cards but stop paying the state revenue.  The Compact gives the Seminoles exclusive rights to offer card games like black jack at their casinos, but the tribe claims the state violated those rights by allowing video card games at various locations around the state. The tribe’s attorney Barry Richard says both sides have plenty to lose.
“The tribe has paid the state a billion dollars in the first five years of the compact and there have been no, I mean no problems at all, it has been working very smoothly. For those people who don’t want to see a spread of gambling, the compact has been the best bulwark against the spread of gambling,” said Richard.

Both sides have 30 days to reach a resolution.  The state receives more than $200 million a year from the compact.

State Government spending watchdog Florida TaxWatch got beat to the punch this year in their annual budget veto recommendation list they call budget turkeys.

The organization put out their budget turkey list Thursday – even though the Governor already signed the budget and did his vetoes on Monday.  Turkeys are projects that didn’t get the proper vetting during legislative session. TaxWatch pointed out 167 million dollars worth of turkeys this year.

“The main goal of our report is not to have the Governor veto everything on it, Turkey Watch report is about identifying projects that didn’t go through the process, it’s for the taxpayer, it’s to help them show accountability, let them know what happened, so they can hold their legislators accountable,” said Kurt Wenner with Florida TaxWatch.

The Governor ended up vetoing nearly $500 million dollars worth of projects.

A ruling from the United States Supreme Court on the Affordable Care Act, otherwise known as Obamacare, keeps the plan in tact. As Matt Galka tells us, Florida had the most to lose if the ruling went the other way.

Six million Americans were at risk of losing federal subsidies for healthcare if the United States Supreme Court ruled that way Thursday.  In a 6-3 decision, justices upheld the Affordable Care Act subsidy program.

Obamacare supporters say that Florida lucked out because of the ruling. Florida had the most to lose.  1.3 million people in the state currently enrolled in the program could have been out of luck.  Damien Filer with Progress Florida says the state dodged a bullet.

“More than a million Floridians, more than anyone else in the country, would have potentially have lost their healthcare coverage that their families are depending upon,” he said.

But Sal Nuzzo with political think tank the James Madison Institute was disappointed in the decision. He says long term healthcare affordability problems will still plague the state.

“Florida will continue to face several challenges with respect to healthcare service delivery, we will face an impending doctor shortage, we will need to champion innovation in healthcare service delivery,” he said.

The Governor addressed the ruling at an event in St. Augustine.

“It’s a bad law. It’s made promises after promises. Remember it was supposed to reduce healthcare costs. Costs have gone up. Exchanges around the country are collapsing,” said Gov. Rick Scott (R-Florida)

The Florida legislature faced a healthcare funding crisis in 2015 which caused state Senators to push for Medicaid expansion using federal money. The effort failed. Had the court ruled the other way – no contingency plan would have been in place for the more than one million Floridians who would have had their healthcare taken away.

Florida’s Senate President released a statement supporting the decision, but used the ruling to continue pushing for Medicaid expansion in the state.

Florida Lt. Governor Carlos Lopez-Canter makes 124 thousand dollars a year, but as Mike Vasilinda tells us, a review of the Lt. Governor’s official schedule since being sworn in in January shows he has turned his full time job into a part time gig while he looks for new work.

“I Carlos Lopez-Cantera”

After taking the oath of Office on January 6th, Lt. Governor Lopez-Cantera’s schedule shows he didn’t work a full day for the rest of the month.

Overall, the official schedule shows the Lt.. Governor, represented her in blue, working 367 hours since January, while 40 hour a week employees, shown here in green, would have worked 968 Hours.

We asked Governor Rick Scott about the work ethic. Q: “it appears he has worked about four hours for every ten that’s been worked by an average Floridian. Is that acceptable to you?”

“Well, you can talk to the Lt. Governor about his work schedule, but I appreciate his hard work” says the Governor.

When Scott selected Lopez-Cantera for the number 2 job back in January 2014, he said it was in part because of the former State House members influence with the legislature.

“His legislative experience will make him very helpful” Scott said at the time.

But in April of this year, as House and Senate relations were melting down, Lopez-Cantera was nowhere to be found. In April, he was on the job just 40 percent of the time.

The resulting Special session cost taxpayers at least a million dollars,, so we asked the Governor Q:”Could that have been avoided if he’d been on the job?”

“I appreciate what Carlos has done.”

Lopez-Cantera’s schedule has is already fodder for Florida Democratic Party Spokesman Max Steel  “He’s shown up for work four times this month. I think most people would get fired if they were doing that” says Steele.

When Governor Bob graham was asked about his future plans, he would always say the best resume for the job you want is the job you are doing.

The Lt. Governor is expected to announce a run for the US Senate in July. Others have used time spent campaigning for the next job against would be candidates.

In 2006, Democratic gubernatorial candidate Jim Davis was lampooned with an empty chair.“Jim Davis. If he doesn’t show up for work now, why should we elect him Governor?”

It’s a charge to which Lopez Cantera has left himself vulnerable.

Lopez Cantera continues to collect his ten thousand dollar a month salary, putting his hourly wage in June at about 1300 dollars an hour. Requests to speak with the Lt. Governor by phone went unanswered.

Forty two sex offenders who failed to register when they moved have been arrested in a month and a half operation from one end of the state to the other. FDLE Agent Seth Montogomery says Operation Summer Heat was intended to send a message to offenders who failed to re-register when they moved.

“These are offenders who have proven by the criminal acts they have already committed that they have the capacity to carry out violent acts on the public. So its important that we know where they are, the public knows where they are, and our registry accurately reflects that” says Montogomery.

The U-S Marshall’s office and local law enforcement cooperated in the operation.

An abortion waiting period bill signed by the Governor is being challenged in court. As Matt Galka tells us, opponents of the bill say the state is unconstitutionally burdening women.

A 24 hour abortion waiting period bill passed by the legislature and signed by the Governor earlier this month isn’t being enforced yet. Opponents of the legislation tried to stop the law Wednesday before it takes effect.

The American Civil Liberties Union, representing a Gainesville clinic, says the law infringes on a woman’s constitutional right to privacy and creates an unnecessary burden.

“The state believes you would benefit by taking another day for you to think this over. We don’t do this for any other medical procedure, this is about the state wanting to dissuade women from getting abortions,” said ACLU Reproductive Freedom Project Attorney Renee Paradis.

Attorneys for the state disagree.  They say lawmakers have a right to protect interests of an unborn child.

“I don’t think there was anything, as we pointed out, that the legislature did that they didn’t have every right to do on behalf, as we say, the vulnerable class of pregnant women and also on behalf of the fetuses,” said State Special Counsel Blaine Winship.

The new law is set to go into effect next week on July 1^st.

“Women are calling up the clinic, the clinics are saying we’re not sure, as of July 1^st it may be that you’re going to have to make two trips to the clinic, so I think there are a lot of women who are really uncertain how it will effect their lives,” said Paradis.

The Governor’s stance didn’t waiver earlier this week.

“I signed the law because I believe in it and I’m absolutely pro-life,” said Gov. Rick Scott.

Plaintiffs assume the looming law will ultimately be settled in the state’s Supreme Court. The Tallahassee judge presiding over the case said that he expects to make a ruling on an injunction soon.

Governor Rick Scott today signed what is a now 76.1 billion dollar budget, insuring the state keeps operating after July first, but as Mike Vasilinda tells us, he cut almost half a billion in spending authorized by lawmakers.

No end of the state was safe from the Governor’s veto pen.

“I went through the budget saying…asking what’s a statewide priority” Governro Rick Scott told reporters.

Scott cut a million to rebuild the Escambia jail after an explosion. 750 thousand was cut from Hillsborough and Lee County efforts to keep the mentally ill out of jail. A project to help the homeless in Jacksonville lost 97 thousand. And Barney Bishop represents a prison reentry company that saw two projects totaling 750 thousand cut.

“It didn’t help, but these projects aren’t going to go away because of these vetoes” says Bishop.

The question is whether some of the cuts were political payback. 600 thousand fro training persons with disabilities died. Senate President Andy Gardiner has a son with Down Syndrome and he opposed Scott on health care expansion. Scott was asked point blank if he was getting even.

“Absolutely not. If you look at the budget, I went through it trying to find what was the best thing for our state” says Scott.

But 8 million for a trails project…a favorite of th Senate President is out.

Scott vetoed a downtown campus for the University of Central Florida, but left one in tampa for the University of South Florida. Andy Gardiner, the Senate President, is in central Florida.

Also gone was 15 million for a University of Central Florida downtown campus, but a nearly identical project in downtown tampa survived. The Difference says Scott was the process “It’s simple. One went through the Board of Governors process and one did not says Scott.”

The people who fight forest fires for the state each lost a 2 thousand dollar pay raise.

And so the list goes on for 85 pages.

In a release, the Senate President said the vetoes would result in “dreams being destroyed. As for the Governor, the Andy Gardiner said “his clear disregard for the public policy merits of many legislative initiatives underscores that today’s veto list is more about politics than sound fiscal policy,”

Environmentalists say Florida voters approved Amendment One under the condition that record funding would be put towards land buying and protection. As Matt Galka tell us, they’re now suing the legislature because they believe it didn’t pan out that way.

The Florida legislature is staring a lawsuit in the face from three environmentalist groups unhappy about how Amendment One funds were handled.  Florida Wildlife Federation President Manley Fuller is part of the group suing.

“We’d like to see judicial direction about what is the proper expenditure of Amendment 1 dollars and what’s not appropriate,” said Fuller.

Voters mandated the legislature use around $700 million dollars of tax money to go towards conservation.  Environmentalists wanted at least $300 million to go into a land acquisition trust fund.  They wound up with $89 million.

The lawsuit wouldn’t change any budget allocations for this year. The group is hoping for more directions in the future.  The Governor stood by what the state is doing for the environment.

“$880 million dollars for water quality in the Everglades. Investing in the Kissimmee River, I think it’s the third year record funding for our springs, we’re doing the right thing for our environment,” said Gov. Rick Scott (R-Florida) when asked about the lawsuit.

The lawsuit alleges that $300 million of the Amendment One dollars is going toward backfilling state agency costs.

The Governor vetoed a number of water and sewer projects from the state budget Monday. The group filing the lawsuit says that even though some of the moves were good, it doesn’t change the core of their complaint.

The Humane Society of the United States is making a last minute push to try and stop a proposed bear hunt in Florida. 90,000 petitions against the proposed hunt were delivered to the Governor’s office.  The Humane Society says they’re not convinced the bear population can sustain a hunting season – which was outlawed in 1994.

“We do not believe that to have bears in the future of Florida that every year we can eliminate 20 percent of the population. That’s what they want to do, eliminate 20 percent of the population, every year, of a population that’s barely recovered and, we say, not recovered enough,” said Laura Bevan.

The state’s Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission is scheduled to vote on the plan Wednesday. If approved, a bear hunting season could begin in October.

The governor spent Monday on a tax cut victory tour. as Matt Galka tells us, part of the plan eliminated what gun supporters called a tax on the 2nd amendment.

J.D. Johnson with the Talon gun range about 20 minutes away from Florida’s Capitol says he has about 1500 membership accounts.

“Our gold membership, which is our highest membership, is about 300 bucks a year,” he said.

All of those people were charged sales tax on their membership, but that’s about to change.  The legislature passed a tax cut package repealing the extra charge on gun club memberships. It will save member’s at the Talon Gun club around $22 bucks.

“We really didn’t agree with the sales tax in the first place, we questioned it in the first place.  And the Department of Revenue basically said “no, it’s taxable,” so we charged tax on it. We don’t get to make those rules up,” said Johnson.

The NRA has had the tax in its sights for about five years.

Former National Rifle Association president Marion Hammer says the Department of Revenue was violating the constitution by collecting the tax.

“Only the legislature can regulate guns and ammunition in any way, and certainly taxing gun clubs is a regulation,” she said.

The break promises to save Floridians around $1 million bucks out of the $427 million dollar tax cut package.   While the cut passed easily out of the legislature, there was some concern from Democrats that instead of cutting the fee, the money could be better spent in other areas of the budget.

The NRA hopes the Department of Revenue will begin the process of returning the taxes they collected on memberships in the past.

The Confederate battle flag flew on the grounds of the new Capitol in Tallahasse until 2001. As Mike Vasilinda tells us, It’s removal marked a five year effort by black legislators and civil rights advocates to see it sent to a museum.

Florida was the third state to join the Confederacy.

The battle flag has been a presence in Tallahassee every since.

It was at this 1996 March on Martin Luter Kings birthday that one of the marchers noticed the Confederate Flag flying with the other flags that have flown over the state. In 1996, Kendrick Meek (D-Miami) was among Black legislators calling for it’s removal.

“I don’t believe it needs  to become a number one priority for the state to get rid of the flag now, but I feel it does need to come down” said Meek at the time.

But nothing happened…until one day in early 2001, just a month after the bitter 2000 election was settled…that the flag poles on the west side of the Capitol were gone.

The Rev. RB Holmes Jr went to Bush with a message. “We went to him and said, Governor, this flag must come down. And he brought the flag down, the confederate flag that is, without major dissension” says Holmes.

At the time, Jeb Bush said the flag no longer represented modern Florida.

“We should be proud of our past. We should not ignore it. We should learn from the lessons of history, but we are a progressive state that is moving forward” said Bush in February 2001.

Not everyone believes Jeb Bush’s motives were pure. The NAACP had been pushing for an end to the Flags display since 1999. Dale Landry is theNAACP Criminal Justice Chair. “Even Senator Meek, who at the time was a state Senator, thought it was for other reasons in that Jeb actually did it in preparation for his run again in 2002” says Landry.

The Flag ended up at the state museum, just a few blocks away…where construction will keep it from being see by anyone for at least another month.

Jeb Bush did not publicize the flags removal, nor did he issue a news release. But the Sons of Confederate Veterans said at the time they felt “betrayed.”

The NAACP says at least one black church in South Florida has reported it received a threat that was turned over to the FBI and the Florida Department of Law Enforcement. Dale Landry, the Chair of the NAACP’s Criminal Justice Committee is asking everyone to be on the look out for threats on social media.

“So what we are saying and what we’ve been asked in joining with the FBI and the Florida Department of Law Enforcement asking anybody if you see it out on social media, capture it, then get it back to law enforcement so they can investigate it. Because we need to remember it wasn’t long ago they were burning the churches down. Now they’re going into churches and shooting up people” says Landry.

The Department of Law Enforcement confirmed the Miami Gardens Police Department and the FBI are investigating the threat. The Department of Law Enforcement is assisting.

Lawmakers have officially ended 2015’s special legislative session with a state budget. Matt Galka breaks down the final moments.

The state legislature put a bow on 2015’s special session with the ceremonial hankey drop that usually ends regular sessions earlier in the year. The only reason they did it: to honor the Senate’s retiring Sergeant at Arms.

There were plenty of hugs and smiles even though session was unique.  A deep divide developed over Medicaid expansion. The Senate pushed for it. The House ultimately killed the idea.

“We come here knowing that we’ve got to work together get things done for out state. We had a job in front of us, and we all stood up for what we believed in. At the end of the day we were able to pass a balanced budget,” said House Speaker Steve Crisafulli.

Members from both chamber maintain there’s no hard feelings now that session is over.

“I don’t think there’s any ill will, you saw the comments made on each side today, things were respectful, everybody has their opinion, but you saw what happened. At the end of the day you have a bicameral process. People have different opinions. But that budget was a balanced budget and it passed bipartisan,” said Rep. Matt Hudson (R-Naples).

The budget ended up being close to $79 billion dollars.  Lingering issues like healthcare will need to be addressed in the future.

“Time is an ally here. And I think, over time, we’ll reset the clock, some of these issues still exist,” said Senate Budget Chief Tom Lee.

The Governor gets the final say. He’ll be wielding a veto pen and whittling down the budget before the current budget expires at the end of June.

As soon as session was over, committee meetings were announced for lawmakers ahead of next year’s legislative session. Everyone will be back at the Capitol in mid-September.

Florida Congressman Patrick Murphy was in Tallahassee on the day lawmakers are expected to pass a budget to scold the legislature for not passing Medicaid expansion.

Surrounded by state democrats, Murphy cited a pending Supreme Court ruling that could impact many Floridians currently on Obamacare.

“Floridians pay a certain amount of taxes and these taxes are now going to every other state and not coming back here to hardworking Floridians paying these taxes. And in doing so, we have left 4 billion dollars on the table as Floridians,” he said.

The disagreement over expanding Medicaid in the state forced lawmakers to go into a special session. It was ultimately shot down by the Florida House.

By the end of today (Friday) Florida should have a budget in place and a government shutdown will likely be avoided. Matt Galka wraps up what lawmakers were doing before they voted on the spending plan.

Senator John Legg acknowledged Florida’s unique legislative session during a prayer.

“Today we find ourselves at the end of that very long journey. And yes, we are a little more tired, a little more weary, but we are grateful and stronger,” said the Lutz Republican.

The regular session started in March and went off the rails when both the Florida House and Senate couldn’t see eye to eye on healthcare funding. It delayed a budget, which pushed the state to the brink of a government shutdown and forced lawmakers into overtime.

The Senate spent a majority of Friday debating the budget, the house did their debating on Thursday.

A budget it all but in place pending a final vote. But that didn’t stop Senator Jack Latvala (R-Clearwater) from pointing out the bitterness between the two chambers. He cited the House’s refusal of film and stadium incentives.

“That hurts in Jacksonville, that hurts in Orlando, that hurts in Miami. And that especially hurts in Daytona Beach, and we fought for those on behalf of the Senate, but the folks at the other end of the hall don’t like incentives,” he said.

Senator Nancy Detert (R-Venice) also took a shot.

“There’s an old expression ‘you can’t choose your relatives,’ we also can’t choose our colleagues down the hall,” she said.

When lawmakers do go home for the year, they won’t have as much time to sit and stew. 2016’s legislative session is set for January. The early start means lawmakers will be back meeting again in the fall.