Florida utility regulators prepare to raise energy bills

The Florida Public Service Commission will be tested Tuesday as it is asked to take two votes that could have a significant impact on customer electricity bills in the future: one to set rules for charging customers billions to bury power lines and another to wipe out energy conservation incentives that utilities say are unneeded. More from the Tampa Bay Times and the Miami Herald.

Five years after voter approval, advocates say Florida lawmakers still failing to implement land conservation program

Environmentalists gathered Monday at the Florida Capitol to celebrate the fifth anniversary of voters overwhelmingly approving a ballot measure aimed at steering billions of dollars toward land and water preservation. But the fight over money remains. “The unrealized potential that’s left and is before the Legislature today is to fund Florida Forever,” said Will Abberger, with the Trust for Public Land and campaign manager of the Amendment 1 proposal in 2014. More from the Sarasota Herald-Tribune and the Florida Times-Union.

‘Made in Florida’ features 90 fascinating residents

Art Levy is an associate editor at Florida Trend magazine, where for many years he has written one of the magazine’s most enjoyable features: interviews with Floridians. Now 90 of those fascinating conversations have been gathered into a book, Made in Florida: Artists, Celebrities, Activists, Educators, and Other Icons in the Sunshine State. [Source: Tampa Bay Times]

Drone-mounted lasers reveal ancient settlement off Florida coast

Drone-mounted lasers have revealed details of the architecture of an ancient island settlement off Florida’s Gulf coast, researchers said in a new paper published on Monday. University of Florida archaeologists, doctoral candidate Terry E Barbour and Professor Ken Sassaman, used aerial drones with light detection and ranging (Lidar) sensors – to create detailed 3D maps of the surface of Raleigh Island. [Source: Guardian]

Florida community gardens help farmworkers feed themselves

It’s a sad truth that often the people who pick the food that appears on countless dinner tables across the country, sometimes can’t afford to feed themselves. The Farmworker Association of Florida assisted with the creation of community gardens that help low wage-earning farmhands to grow and purchase their own food. [Source: The Star]

ALSO AROUND FLORIDA:

› Florida gas prices expected to remain fairly steady this week [Tampa Bay Times]
Gas prices have been on somewhat of a roller coaster recently, but AAA, the Auto Club Group, expects pump prices to stay largely steady this week. State gas prices averaged $2.44 a gallon Monday, up 4 cents over the week. Tampa Bay pump prices were $2.40 a gallon on average, up 9 cents since last week.

› Bonita Springs builder awarded contract for St. Pete Pier attraction [Business Observer]
Gates Construction has been awarded the contract to build a Doc Ford’s Rum Bar & Grille at the new St. Pete Pier, set to open in spring 2020. Gates, headquartered in Bonita Springs with offices in Sarasota and Palm Beach Gardens, has been in business for more than 25 years, providing construction management, general contracting and design-build services throughout the Southeast United States and Latin America.

› Auburndale bottler markets tariff-free French rosé [Lakeland Ledger]
An Auburndale company that imports and bottles French wine is doing an end run around the new tax that’s expected to hit American consumers of everything from German coffee to Scotch whisky. Florida Caribbean Distillers is importing large shipping containers of bulk rosé wine from an area near the Provence region of France and bottling the product at its Auburndale plant.

› British cruise line Marella to sail from Port Canaveral in 2021 [Florida Today]
The British cruise line Marella Cruises will begin sailing from Port Canaveral in 2021, offering four itineraries with a total of 11 port-of-call options. This is Marella's first entry into the U.S. market, and also marks the first time an international cruise company will have a ship based at Port Canaveral, according to port officials.

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› Iconic St. Pete motel sells for 11 times what it did in the ‘80s [Tampa Bay Times]
The price was among the top paid for property along Fourth Street N and reflects its status as one of Tampa Bay’s prime shopping and dining streets. "As far as a retail corridor, that’s basically as good as it gets for us,'' said Pinellas County Property Appraiser Mike Twitty.

› Miami investor proposes the Jacksonville’s tallest building [Jacksonville Daily Record]
A Miami investor is proposing Jacksonville’s first Northbank high-rise in almost 30 years that would tower over Downtown’s tallest buildings. Miami real estate investor Ramon Llorens presented conceptual designs for a 54-story, mixed-use tower at the site of the former Downtown Greyhound terminal to Downtown Investment Authority CEO Lori Boyer.

› Orlando apartments rent out Airbnb style, targeting tourists instead of tenants [Orlando Sentinel]
A handful of Orlando apartments are wading into new territory, renting out some of their units not to local tenants, but to tourists. They’re called apart-hotels. It’s a model that’s been allowed in regions of Central Florida for a while but is still somewhat of a novelty.

› Florida-grown startup, RORO.com, makes it easy to ship large assets [American Journal of Transportation]
The Roll On Roll Off (RORO) Company, a digital freight forwarder, recently launched its new platform, RORO.com, to accelerate global trade of large assets. With access to instant quotes, schedules and bookings, users can save time and money on shipping machinery, automobiles, boats and more.