U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla., says he and U.S. Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo.,   are filing legislation to dock congressional paychecks by the same percentage as any federal worker furloughed as a result of sequestration.

“No one should get paid for inaction,” Nelson said in a statement.  “And Congress clearly hasn’t done the job to avert the sequester.

“Everyone expects us to work together and find a common ground,” the Florida Democrat added.  “But too many in Washington keep fighting for their own political side.”

The $85 billion sequester kicks in on March 1. And if it’s allowed to stand, agencies are predicting that most federal employees will be put on unpaid furlough for one or two days every two-week pay period — a pay cut of 10 to 20 percent. The furloughs are expected to begin in April.

Said McCaskill: “The federal workforce is looking at furloughs that would result in a sizable pay cut—and there’s absolutely no reason members of Congress should exempt themselves.  We can and should reach a balanced compromise to replace these damaging across-the-board cuts, but until we do, this is an obvious step to hold Congress accountable for the job we need to get done.”

By William E. Gibson, Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON — It’s time for Congress to stay on the job and resolve this darn sequester, three South Florida newcomers declared on Thursday.

Rather than run out of town for a long weekend, Congress should be working out a budget deal to prevent an across-the-board set of budget cuts that start on Friday, said U.S. Reps. Lois Frankel of West Palm Beach, Patrick Murphy of Jupiter and Joe Garcia of Miami.

“We want to roll up our sleeves, and everybody should roll up their sleeves and get to work,” said Frankel.

The Democratic freshmen acknowledged that the world won’t change much on Friday, or for the rest of this month, because of the budget cuts. But by next month, they said, the impact will filter down to the local level and throw thousands out of work.

Their press conference reflects attempts by Democrats to raise public alarms and force Republicans to make a budget deal to avert the sequester, which could include tax increases by removing deductions for the wealthy.

“It is not Armageddon. We are aware of that,” Murphy said. “But jobs will be lost.”

The message to the world, he said, is that “our government, our leadership, is dysfunctional right now. It is very frustrating to watch this happen.”

Some of the groups behind the Orange County sick time effort are holding a pre-legislative session community meeting that they say could include one of the sponsors of a bill which would snuff it out locally.

Orlando-area groups including Organize Now, Home Defenders League, Community Business Association, 1199 SEIU, Mi Familia Vota and Florida New Majority, are holding the legislative town hall meeting tonight.

Organize Now leader Stephanie Porta just emailed to say that last night state Rep. Steve Precourt, R-Orlando, said “he was going to try” and make it to the Priorities of the People Town hall.

Precourt filed legislation this year that would block local governments from passing stronger wage and benefit rules. The aim of his HB 655 measure is to ensure a uniformity of rules for businesses.

Here’s more detail on the where and when it’s going to be held.

TALLAHASSEE — A House panel debating the implementation of the Affordable Care Act could make a decision Monday as to whether the state should expand Medicaid.

“We’ll see how it presents itself with the membership,” said state Rep. Richard Corcoran, R-Land O’ Lakes.

The House and Senate are slated to have a joint meeting Monday morning where the state economists will present a comprehensive economic study on the expansion of Medicaid and the overall impact of the Affordable Care Act. The two committees are then going to hold separate meetings for committee discussion.

Corcoran, who is personally skeptical of a Medicaid expansion, said that he wants to give committee members time to debate, but if they are ready to make a recommendation, they will.

A coalition of progressive groups released its upcoming legislative agenda, and killing bills that block local wage and benefit measures sits near the top of it’s list.

“Florida’s low-income earners should be protected from corporate extremists aiming to preempt local laws designed to prevent wage theft or provide benefits such as earned sick time,” reads a top priority in the 2013 Middle Class Agenda.

The groups behind the goals are Florida Watch Action, Progress Florida, and America Votes.

This year’s agenda includes a raft of other goals, including curtailing private school vouchers, getting rid of long voting lines and fighting efforts to cut corporate taxes. You can see the group’s entire upcoming Middle Class Agenda here.

They tracked who shared similar goals last year, and the champs were nearly all Democrats, and included former state Rep. Scott Randolph, D-Orlando, now the county Tax Collector.

Central Florida made a better showing on its “offenders” list, those who voted 100 percent with Gov. Rick Scott. The Scott “puppets” included state Rep. Jason Brodeur, R-Sanford, state Rep. Steve Crisafulli, R-Merritt Island, Rep. Ryan Nelson, R-Apopka, and former Reps. Chris Dorwroth, Eric Eisnaugle, Mike Horner, Scott Plakon, and then-Rep. Dorothy Hukill (now a Port Orange Senator), along with Sen. Andy Gardiner, R-Orlando.

State Rep. Steve Precourt, R-Orlando, and David Simmons, R-Altamonte Springs, made the ‘puppet’ list, too.

Precourt and Simmons have filed bills this year to block the local wage and benefit measures by taking those powers away from local governments. The Republicans say that the lack of uniformity on local wage and benefits across Florida drives away businesses and makes it harder for bigger companies to comply with them.

The Florida Chamber of Commerce has made their bills a top priority, and other business heavyweights, such as Walt Disney World and Darden Restaurants helped craft the measures, both Republicans said.

Orange County is ground zero in the battle over preserving local control on wage and benefit issues. Commissioners blocked a sick time measure last fall from going on the Nov. 6 ballot. But a judicial panel told them this month that in doing so, they violated their own charter by not honoring the 50,000 voter petitions asking for the vote.

This week commissioners voted to put it on the August 2014 ballot. But if the Precourt or Simmons bills become law, that vote would be rendered largely moot.

Orange County Mayor Teresa Jacobs said she’s not lobbying for the bills, but agrees Tallahassee is better suited to deal with wage and benefit issues.

TALLAHASSEE — Want to email a member of the Florida House? Check the text of a bill? Live-stream a session of the House on your smartphone?

There’s an app for that. But maybe not before the Legislature opens its 60-day session on March 5.

House Speaker Will Weatherford, R-Wesley Chapel, unveiled “FL House,” designed by an Orlando firm called Echo Interaction Group, that soon will be available for both Apple and Android smartphones and tablets.

“I think what the Florida House here is doing today is creating an opportunity for us to set a national standard for a new way to communicate with government,” said Weatherford, who at 33  is one of the youngest speakers in Florida history. “This is the way that people are communicating, it’s the way that people want to learn, it’s the way they access information and the development of this app is bringing government in the state of Florida into the 21^st century and we’re excited about it.”

The app has 80 different features, including bill-tracking and live-steaming capabilities, House email addresses and names of committee members. It was developed by Echo over the past six months on a $130,000 contract, though Weatherford said the final costs will be slightly more than that.

Echo CEO Carlos Carbonell said the app has been submitted to Apple’s vetting process to be approved for the company’s iPhones. Once Apple signs off, the app will also be available on Google Play for Android phones.

Carbonell says the firm met its goal to have the app done before March 3 but that he couldn’t predict when Apple would sign off on it.

“It’s up to Apple,” Carbonell said. “We have it submitted…but they have to review it.”

Carbonell said his minority-owned company built the app in just six months, adding that the intent was to help citizens understand the process and to better understand what lawmakers do.

“It’s like a civics lesson,” he said. “It shows you how the House really works and operates, and I think that it would be disingenuous to think that everyone knows how everything happens.”

He said Echo Interaction Group has produced over 60 apps, including one for the City of Orlando. He said the company is currently working with the Orange County Library System, Department of Veteran Affairs, and U.S. Department of Agriculture.

The Senate Office said there are currently no plans to create an app version of their site because “when the Senate website was redesigned under President Haridopolos it included similar mobile capabilities that are compatible with all browsers and all devices.”

Watch an example of what the app will look like and what features it will have here.

By Jim Saunders, The News Service of Florida

TALLAHASSEE — Rejecting arguments that counties have been shortchanged, a state appeals court Thursday sided with the online-travel industry in a major legal battle about payment of hotel bed taxes.

The 1st District Court of Appeal, in a 2-1 ruling, said companies such as Expedia and Orbitz cannot be forced to pay local tourist-development taxes on part of the money they collect from customers. The majority found that the disputed amounts relate to reservation charges — not to the actual amounts paid to rent hotel rooms — and described the companies as “conduits.”

“In this role, the companies collect the monies owed for the room, including taxes and fees, and pass on to the hotels the money for the room rental and the taxes on the price of the room,” said the opinion, written by Judge Brad Thomas and joined by Judge Marguerite Davis. “The consideration the companies ultimately keep is not for the rental or lease, but for their service in facilitating the reservation.”

But Judge Philip Padovano dissented, writing that the taxes should be based on the overall amount that customers pay. He wrote that he did not think state law was “ambiguous” on the issue, a rationale that a Leon County circuit judge cited last year in ruling in favor of the online-travel companies.

“(It) is not confusing or unclear,” Padovano wrote. “It imposes a tax on the funds paid by a tourist to rent a room in a hotel. The matter is no more complicated than that.”

The lawsuit — and others like it in Florida and across the country — focuses on a major part of the way online-travel companies do business. They serve as sorts of middlemen between travelers and hotels, charging customers for room rentals and fees related to providing the service.

If online-travel companies were forced to pay tourist-development taxes on the full amounts they collect from customers, not just on the amounts that go for room rentals, it would cost the industry millions of dollars a year.

Thursday’s ruling upheld a decision last April by Leon County Circuit Judge James Shelfer in a case that was filed in 2009 and has involved 17 counties. State lawmakers in recent years also have grappled with the tax issue but have not agreed on a bill that could help resolve the disputes about the taxes.

During oral arguments earlier this month, Thomas alluded to the Legislature considering bills about the issue, an issue he also mentioned in the 13-page majority opinion.

“As the trial court (Shelfer) here correctly determined, it is for the Legislature, and not the judiciary, to decide whether to apply the tax to the full amount that the companies charge their customers who utilize their website to obtain a hotel reservation,” Thomas wrote.

But Padovano wrote that, while the issue is “emerging” in Florida, courts in some other states have ruled against the online-travel industry.

“There are certainly differences in the wording of the statutes in these cases, but the fundamental principle is the same in all of them,” he wrote. “The tax at issue is a tax on the total amount of money a tourist pays to stay in a hotel room.”

The counties that have been involved in the case are Alachua, Charlotte, Escambia, Flagler, Hillsborough, Lee, Leon, Manatee, Nassau, Okaloosa, Pasco, Pinellas, Polk, St. Johns, Seminole, Wakulla and Walton.

Another Leon County circuit judge, Terry Lewis, also sided with online-travel companies last year in a case spearheaded by Broward County. A notice of appeal was filed Feb. 5 in that case, according to a docket on the 1st District Court of Appeal website.

WASHINGTON — Proving that it’s never too early for campaign season (does it ever end?), the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee today is launching a series of robo-calls against U.S. Rep. Dan Webster, R-Winter Garden, and 22 other House Republicans in an effort to convince voters that GOP lawmakers are at fault for looming federal budget cuts.

The DCCC wouldn’t release the cost of the calls, the length they would run or the number of households it would target. But the messaging is clearly part of the ongoing firefight between the White House and congressional Republicans over who should be blamed for the automatic spending cuts that the  White House and congressional Republicans both agreed to.

The text of the call is after the jump.

Continue reading Webster targeted by Democratic robo-calls over sequester »

TALLAHASSEE — In classic politico two-step, House Speaker Will Weatherford deflected a question Thursday about whether he had interest in running for governor in 2014.

The Wesley Chapel Republican was asked about seeking the office at a Capitol press conference to announce a still unnamed, unavailable mobile app for the House.

Republican Gov. Rick Scott is facing an internal backlash from his party over his decision last week to support expanding Medicaid as part of President Barack Obama’s health-care law. Agriculture Commissioner Adam Putnam last week blasted Scott’s decision, and Attorney General Pam Bondi has also tweeted that she has concerns.

But the Florida Legislature will have the final say in what happens when they write the budget, and Weatherford said in the same gaggle Thursday he was “extremely skeptical” of the proposal which could add another 1 million to the 3.3 million already covered under the program.

“I’m very skeptical that that inflexible law is going to help the citizens in the state of Florida.”

Weatherford’s comments didn’t come off as a campaign ground-breaking like Putnam’s press releases last week and awkward exchange with the Republican Party of Florida. But they were an opportunity to ask if he was eyeing the governor’s race, as some bloggers have suggested.

“I think people who say these things must not know me very well. I’m busy enough trying to be the speaker of the House,” Weatherford said, laughing. “I think the governor’s doing a good job. …I’m not thinking about any of that stuff right now. I’m thinking about the agenda we have for the next 60 days.”

Asked again if he would rule it out, he said “I just said I don’t have any plans to do anything like that. I think it’s funny I’m being asked it. The governor’s a friend. I think he’s doing a good job. We agree on a whole lot more than we disagree on.”

TALLAHASSEE — Good morning and happy Thursday.

Here’s what we’re reading this morning.

* The Orlando Sentinel reports that Universal is laying out the red carpet for GOP lawmakers and lobbyists for some last minute check writing before the 2013 legislative session starts Tuesday.

* Foreclosure sales decline in Palm Beach County, the Sun-Sentinel writes.

* The Tampa Bay Times/Miami Herald writes that Citizens Property Insurance released a list of internal complaints in an attempt to prove it handled problems at the company correctly.

* The Palm Beach Post reports that Department of Juvenile Justice is changing the way it uses anti psychotic drugs on juveniles.

* The Everglades Foundation is beefing up is lobbying efforts, the Florida Current reports.