Author name: bruce

Bill Baggs Cape Florida State Park Florida’s 160 state parks are open free through Sunday to anyone with a library card, a library book or gently-used family book that they can donate. The Florida Department of Environmental Protection is offering the free entrance to celebrate September as “State Park Literary Month.” DEP officials are encouraging […]

Senate President Jeff Atwater today said a special session of the Legislature in October is highly unlikely and he raised doubts about whether it should include consideration of lifting Florida’s ban on offshore oil drilling. Gov. Charlie Crist last week said drilling should be included in a special session in October to take up an

Witnesses for an environmental group and utilities wanting to build nuclear power plants sparred Tuesday before the Public Service Commission over the predicted costs of construction and how to pay for them. Florida Power & LIght and Progress Energy Florida each have proposed building new nuclear plants and are asking the PSC for approval to

Florida’s oldest business group today said it wants the Legislature to take up oil drilling during an expected special session this fall. Gov. Charlie Crist said Tuesday that he may call a special session in October to adopt a gambling revenues agreement with the Seminole Tribe and that he would like drilling to be on

Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility says Gov. Charlie Crist has abandoned carbon emissions cap-and-trading in his quest for a U.S. Senate seat, but a state Department of Environmental Protection response suggests it’s all untrue. PEER, a watchdog group of former government employees, says the state, under Crist, has decided to to drop its cap-and-trade rule

The Gulf Restoration Network today said Florida gets a D+ grade for its efforts to protect water quality, which was about the average grade for Gulf coast states. In a report card for the Gulf states, the group particularly faulted Florida for not setting specific limits for nitrogen and phosphorus in waterways, giving it an

Environmentalists today met with House Speaker Larry Cretul to urge his support for Florida’s conservation land-buying program, but the issue of using oil drilling revenue to buy land was not discussed. Supporters of offshore oil drilling in the Legislature continue to promote the idea of using oil revenue to pay for the land-buying program, which

Few people who drive along Franklin Boulevard east of the state Capitol notice a ditch between the lanes of traffic or realize it may have historical significance. The ditch was once a stream called St. Augustine Branch that flowed towards a waterfall that became a landmark in the siting of Florida’s capital city in 1823.

A state climate panel today rejected a commissioner’s recommendation for Florida to replace its test for analyzing energy programs — a test that environmentalists have argued is a barrier to conservation. The Florida Energy and Climate Commission instead voted to recommend that the Public Service Commission use a revised version of the “rate impact measure”

During Tuesday’s Cabinet meeting, Agriculture Commissioner Charles H. Bronson and Smokey Bear presented a national wildfire prevention award to Melissa Yunas, wildfire mitigation specialist in the Florida Division of Forestry’s Okeechobee District office. Gov. Charlie Crist and the Cabinet on Tuesday approved a new conservation lands purchase list but only after Agriculture Commissioner Charles H.