Category Archives: Florida

I'm really starting to like our Governor, Charlie Crist.

Other than as regards the DFC (which he cleverly handed over to a Democrat), our new governor is governing as a centrist — for example by taking some actions that will help slow global warming — which turns out to be great politics:

Something that was once unimaginable in Florida happened last week: A Republican governor hosted a global warming summit.

Then he issued a series of executive orders aimed at greatly reducing air pollution from cars, utilities and new homes.

He's also putting solar panels on the Governor's Mansion, asking utility companies to build more windmill generators and ordering all state vehicles to use ethanol or other biofuel blends.

It's official: Charlie Crist is the un-Jeb.

You might dismiss acting to slow global warming as a bit of a stunt. It's a popular issue, and we here have more to lose than most as it's too hot already, and most of the state is only feet above sea level.

But consider this next fact: Governor Crist just vetoed an obscure but very awful bill that would have totally transformed Florida's administrative procedure laws. The bill would have dramatically limited agency rulemaking powers, and would have made it much easier and more profitable for private parties to challenge previous rules and all non-rule documents, not least by in effect stopping all rules from taking effect when challenged, no matter how silly the challenge.

Vetoing it was absolutely the right thing to do, and won't win points with the far-right anti-government crowd, but it can hardly be called grandstanding.

Unchanging: The Florida Dept. Of Children and Families is still screwing up, and kids are dying,

It was the fourth time in as many years that state child welfare workers had visited the home of Stephanie Dorismond.

The oldest of five children, Stephanie, 15, had told North Miami Beach police that her uncle had asked for sex and that a family friend had molested her. An investigator took less than a week to devise a safety plan:

''Mom told [to] ensure the safety and wellbeing of the child at all times,'' he noted in his report.

Case closed.

But even as Department of Children & Families investigator Williams R. Ajayi moved on to his next case, Stephanie, a slim girl with a glowing smile, was already in peril. On April 10, a day before DCF closed its case, a counseling group assigned to work with the family told Ajayi that the teen had run away from home.

Records show Ajayi did nothing.

And Stephanie was found dead in a hotel room soon afterwards.

Summer brings out the weird news, and Florida's is just a little weirder than most people's:

Man acquitted of assault with a dead chicken (via Flablog).

On Thursday, a jury acquitted the neighbor, Juan Fernando Carrasco, of hitting Shaffer in the head with a dead 4-pound chicken.

“I wasn't injured but I certainly felt it. He got my attention,” saidShaffer, 78.

The April 12, 2006, dispute between the two neighbors — separated by a 3-foot-high fence on Jane Lacy Lane, a dirt road of 2 1/2-acre lots in New Smyrna Beach — ended when Shaffer called a sheriff's deputy.

And when Carrasco refused to accept a plea agreement by the State Attorney's Office, the battery-with-a-dead-chicken case went to trial. On Thursday, a jury of four women and two men took 20 minutes to decide Carrasco was innocent of battery.

…

“Sounds like something you hear on 'Jay Leno' but it's not a joke,” Assistant State Attorney Larry Avalon argued. “Mr. Shaffer was hit with an object that has weight. That is battery.”

But Carrasco's attorney, Diego Handel, argued that the state's only evidence was Shaffer's testimony claiming Carrasco hit him with the dead chicken.

“It may be a case involving a dead chicken but it is extremely serious to Fernando (Carrasco),” Handel said. “The lack of evidence supports the conclusion that Fernando is not guilty. It's a situation of 'he said and they said.' “

After the trial, Shaffer said he was satisfied with the jury's decision.

“He had 14 months to worry about it and it cost him a bunch. That's enough,” Shaffer said. “It was his word against mine.”

One member of Carrasco's family called it the “alleged assault with a dead weapon.”

Update: Was it a battery hen?

The headline in the print version of the Herald says it all: “Man With Bad Headache Learns His Wife Shot Him”; the online version's headline is less funny.

A woman was arrested Tuesday after her husband woke up in the middle of the night with a terrible headache and later learned he had a bullet lodged in his head.

St. Lucie County sheriff's deputies initially thought Michael Eugene Moylan had been hit by a stray bullet, but later realized the couple's story did not match up, Sheriff Ken Mascara said.

April Moylan, 39, was arrested Tuesday night and charged with possession of a firearm by a convicted felon, Mascara said. Moylan was being held in jail.

I can hear the jokes already…

Daily Kos: Florida's Paper Ballots Come with a Catch