Florida Retail Federation celebrates projected retail growth for 2024

The Florida Retail Federation (FRF) is predicting solid retail growth in 2024 in the Sunshine State as a national projection foretells steady retail sales increases for the remainder of 2024. The National Retail Federation (NRF) last week released its retail sales forecast for 2024. The report stated that retail sales across America will increase between 2.5% and 3.5% this year. That amounts to a total between $5.23 trillion and $5.28 trillion in retail sales this year. [Source: Florida Politics]

The key to Florida beaches’ hurricane recovery: the humble sea oat

From eye level, the wisps of green emerging from sand dunes up and down Pinellas County’s barrier islands look sparse, stubby, almost tentative as they peek at the sun. Below the surface, though, they are spreading out, trapping sand in place and acting as a sort of skeleton for a whole ecosystem. These are young sea oats, unassuming plants that allow our beaches as we know them to exist. [Source: Tampa Bay Times]

DeSantis eases decades-old limit on work hours for those 16 and 17

Gov. Ron DeSantis on Friday signed a measure that will ease decades-old regulations on the hours that 16- and 17-year-old Floridians can work. The bill (HB 49), one of 25 signed Friday by DeSantis, was toned down in the waning days of this year’s legislative session but still drew concerns about the impact of longer work hours on students’ studies and the potential use of teens to address labor shortages. [Source: Tampa Bay Times]

Some Florida universities are pushing back enrollment deadlines because of FAFSA delays

An overhaul of the Free Application for Federal Student Aid — or FAFSA — has caused delays in the process that determines how much money students can get to pay for college. As a result, some colleges and universities are pushing back their enrollment deadlines as they wait for the FAFSA data needed to determine financial aid packages for students. That aid includes grants, loans, scholarships and work-study dollars. [Source: WLRN]

Manatee status could spur lawsuit

Supporters of bolstering protections for manatees notified the federal government Thursday that they are preparing to file a lawsuit over delays in determining whether manatees should be classified as an endangered species. The notice stems from a petition that four organizations and an individual filed in November 2022 asking the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to reclassify manatees from a threatened species to an endangered species. [Source: News Service of Florida]

ALSO AROUND FLORIDA:

› Florida jobless rate unchanged at 3.1% in February, metro Orlando up slightly [Orlando Sentinel]
Florida’s unemployment rate held at 3.1 percent in February for the third consecutive month, even as job losses were posted in many industry sectors. The unemployment rate for the Orlando-Kissimmee-Sanford metropolitan statistical area rose to 3.2 percent from 3.1 percent in January.

› End of an era: Last ULA Delta IV Heavy triple-core rocket to lift off from Cape Canaveral [Florida Today]
Marketed as "the most metal of rockets," United Launch Alliance's massive triple-core Delta IV Heavy roars to life amid a blazing hydrogen fireball on the launch pad, with raging flames billowing and blackening its orange boosters seconds before liftoff. Heavy-metal-music pyrotechnic comparisons aside, Rob Long has a soft spot for the retiring mega-rocket — as do many of thousands of employees involved with the program the past two decades on the Space Coast.

› Lambos. Jewels. How ‘easy money’ from Uncle Sam made Miami a feast for PPP fraudsters [Miami Herald]
When the coronavirus threatened to turn the nation into a graveyard of failed businesses, Congress rushed through an emergency loan program: about $800 billion — roughly the size of the annual defense budget — was doled out in a matter of months to millions of companies. South Florida was a fraudster’s feast.

› Tampa Bay companies say AI will help workers, not replace them [Tampa Bay Times]
Artificial intelligence burst onto the scene in a big way last year after the launch of OpenAI’s ChatGPT. Even casual internet users have asked the chatbot to help them craft emails, generate illustrations and answer philosophical questions. While tech companies have been studying AI for decades, many types of businesses are jumping aboard, said Joe Liberatore, CEO and president of the professional staffing services company, Kforce.

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› How Tampa children’s hospital nurses, doctors handle high-intensity jobs [Tampa Bay Times]
St. Joseph’s Children’s Hospital isn’t the largest of its kind. It boasts 219 beds, employs more than 550 people and handled more than 37,000 emergency room visits last year. However, compared to other children’s hospitals across the country, staff there say the Tampa facility enjoys a workplace culture that fosters better collaboration among employees. And that improves efficiency and makes the high-intensity environment less stressful.

› FAU Tech Runway unveils its next Venture Program cohort [Refresh Miami]
An AI college assistance platform. A startup that connects young people with trade companies looking for workers. As a cross between LinkedIn and crowdfunding, an app that allows college students and college-bound students to collect donations and more. These are a few of the 13 companies recently accepted in the FAU Tech Runway’s 13th cohort of its Venture Program.

› onePulse dumps tax bill on Orange County [Orlando Sentinel]
The onePulse Foundation left Orange County a parting gift when it went belly up: an unpaid property tax bill. The $50,000-plus obligation accompanied a piece of land on 438 W. Kaley St. that the group seeking to commemorate the Pulse nightclub manager bought with a county grant of tourist tax funds, and then handed over to the county in late 2023 when it announced its inability to build a promised museum on the site.

› USF research lab receives nearly $3 million in federal support to build and enhance anti-trafficking tools [Tampa Bay Business and Wealth]
The University of South Florida’s Trafficking in Persons Risk to Resilience Research Lab will create added resources to combat human trafficking and aid victims, after receiving nearly $3 million from the 2024 federal spending package. The funds will go towards the development of a statewide database to assist law enforcement in human trafficking investigations and the expansion of an online platform to provide critical resources to survivors, such as housing and mental health, as they transition into a new life.