March 28, 2024

Monday's Afternoon Update

What you need to know about Florida today

| 4/4/2022

With North Florida casino drive over, Seminole Tribe stays in control

With the collapse last week of the most recent effort to broaden casino gambling — at a cost of more than $73 million — Florida’s gaming action may be secured under the control of the Seminole Tribe of Florida. Florida Voters in Charge, the group backed by the Las Vegas Sands Corp., announced Friday it was folding its effort after a massive petition drive and aggressive courtroom efforts appeared to be a losing hand. More from Florida Politics.

Florida lawmakers raid $100M from affordable housing for program that doesn’t exist

In the midst of a statewide housing crisis, the Florida Legislature swept $100 million out of a nationally respected affordable housing rental assistance program for low-income families into a home-buying program that exists in name only. Affordable housing advocates say the Legislature broke a promise made only a year ago that it would never again raid the Sadowski Affordable Housing Act fund, created in 1992 as a dedicated source of revenue to finance affordable housing programs. More from the Orlando Sentinel.

State says redistricting case should be put on hold

With lawmakers heading into a special legislative session this month, Secretary of State Laurel Lee is asking a federal court to put on hold a case that argues judges should set Florida’s new congressional districts. Lee filed a motion Friday in U.S. district court in Tallahassee seeking a stay of a federal lawsuit filed March 11 by the groups Common Cause Florida and FairDistricts Now and five voters. More from the News Service of Florida.

Gainesville's mixed-use housing buildings have an abundance of vacancies

The closing of the Target store at The Standard building has highlighted the fact that mixed-use student housing buildings in Gainesville are struggling to keep or attract retail businesses on the bottom floors. The high retail vacancy rates are highlighted in a recent study by the Kelley A. Bergstrom Real Estate Center at the University of Florida's Warrington College of Business. More from the Gainesville Sun.

New Orlando airport boss Kevin Thibault envisions OIA becoming ‘aerotropolis’

By the first full month of the pandemic, April 2020, Orlando’s airport had a zombie vibe as empty planes came and left like ghost ships, stray travelers avoided each other like plagues and financial wounds threatened to ooze for years. Now, with the mask mandate set to lapse, reminders of COVID-19 are fading. The airport’s fiscal health has rebounded with federal grants, runways again handle nearly 1,000 takeoffs and landings daily, and two milestones are near: opening a new terminal, pursued for nearly a quarter-century, and the start of Brightline’s upscale passenger rail service, under development for about a decade. More from the Orlando Sentinel.

Profile
Entrepreneur’s journey from $200 and an answering machine to $500 million

 Tampa-based franchise executive Greg Muzzillo isn’t a preacher, but he spent a recent Friday morning in Naples revving up a crowd on what he calls “achievable, believable entrepreneurship.” And Muzzillo, founder of Proforma, one of the nation’s largest providers of business graphics, marketing materials and printing and packaging services, has practiced what he preaches.

» More from the Business Observer.

 

Transportation
At long last, bike sharing reaches Sarasota

floridaFor most urban areas, bicycle-sharing programs are not a new concept. The idea of a communal bike system, where residents of a city can share bikes with one another and zip about town, is widely used in the U.S. everywhere from New York and Los Angeles to smaller hippie cities like Portland and Seattle – where you might expect to see that sort of thing. But despite the popularity and wide availability of so-called "micromobility" forms of transportation, Sarasota has never really had one. Until now.

» Read more from the Sarasota Herald-Tribune.

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Bitter-to-swallow cocoa costs force chocolate shops to raise prices
Bitter-to-swallow cocoa costs force chocolate shops to raise prices

Central Floirda chocolate shops are left with a bitter taste as cocoa prices hit an all-time high earlier this week.

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