By: Gray Rohrer
| Posted: December 15, 2010 4:05 AM
The Florida Retail Federation hopes to get $20 million from BP -- perhaps by paying for tax-free holidays -- to help make up for Northwest Florida retailers' lost sales and vitality during the oil spill.
By: Kenric Ward
| Posted: October 19, 2010 4:05 AM
Setting the stage for one of the biggest U.S. House upsets of 2010, Republican Steve Southerland has built a double-digit lead over seven-term Rep. Allen Boyd in Florida's 2nd Congressional District, a new Sunshine State News Poll shows.
Gov. Charlie Crist requested in a letter to the U.S. Department of Commerce Wednesday that the federal government declare a commercial fishery failure in Florida due to the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.
The designation would pave the way for Florida to receive federal money to compensate for the losses the commercial and charter fishing industry sustains from the spill. Florida would be the fourth Gulf state to receive the designation since the BP-leased Deepwater Horizon oil rig sank more than a month ago.
Florida has absolutely no frame of reference for the Deepwater Horizon oil spill or its effect on the state economy. And officials admit it will take years -- not weeks or months -- before they can respond to all the claims likely to come from the disaster.
If Panama City resident Leon Delikat is any indication, Attorney General Bill McCollum’s focus on Rick Scott’s history with Columbia Healthcare/HCA in their contentious primary for the Republican gubernatorial nomination will not carry McCollum to victory Tuesday.
Oil that dispersed in the Gulf of Mexico is still out there, coating deep-water spawning grounds and potentially resurfacing on Panhandle beaches, University of South Florida researchers say.
