BILL SUMMARY DETAILS

SB 458 (Rodriguez) authorizes the Department of Environmental Protection to provide wastewater grant program grants to projects directed at or focused on a water body that is included in the Department’s verified list of impaired waters. (O’Hara)

HB 177 (Gossett-Seldman) and SB 172 (Berman) require the Department of Health to adopt and enforce certain rules and issue health advisories for beach waters and public bathing places if the results of bacteriological water sampling at the site fail to meet health standards. The bills also expand the current law preemption of the issuance of health advisories related to bacteriological sampling of beach waters to include public bathing places. The bills specify that beach waters and public bathing places must close if closure is necessary to protect health and safety and must remain closed until the water quality is restored in accordance with the Department’s standards. The bills require the Department to adopt by rule specifications for signage that must be used when it issues a health advisory against swimming in affected beach waters or public bathing places due to elevated levels of specified bacteria and require such signage to be placed at beach access points and access points to public bathing places until the health advisory is removed. The bills specify that municipalities and counties are responsible for posting and maintaining the signage around beaches and public bathing places they own. Finally, the bills require the Department to develop an interagency database for reporting fecal indicator bacteria data and specify that fecal indicator bacteria relating to sampled beach waters and public bathing places must be published in the database within five business days after receipt of the data. (O’Hara)

SB 336 (Rodriguez) and HB 363 (Mooney) require the Department of Environmental Protection to submit updated reports analyzing the need for regulation of auxiliary containers, wrappings or disposable plastic bags to the Legislature. The bills also authorize specified coastal communities to establish pilot programs to regulate single-use plastic products. (O’Hara)

HB 111 (Hunschofsky) revises current law provisions that require certain public-financed projects and infrastructure undergo a Sea Level Impact Projection Study prior to construction. The bill expands the types of projects and infrastructure subject to the requirement by including “potentially at-risk” projects within an area that is “at-risk due to sea-level rise.” The bill defines “at-risk due to sea-level rise” and “potentially at-risk structure or infrastructure.” The bill also adds a requirement that a public-financed constructor provide a list of flood mitigation strategies evaluated as part of the design of the potentially at-risk structure or infrastructure and identify the flood mitigation strategies that have been implemented or are being considered as part of the structure or infrastructure design. (O’Hara)

HB 361 (Robinson, F.) requires a municipality that operates a water or sewer utility providing services to customers in another recipient municipality using a facility or plant located in the recipient municipality to charge customers in the recipient municipality the same rates, fees, and charges it imposes on customers within its own municipal boundaries. (O’Hara)

HB 371 (Killebrew) provides an exemption from surface water management and storage regulations for implementing certain projects for environmental habitat creation, restoration and enhancement activities, and water quality improvements on agricultural lands and government-owned lands. It removes current law requirements for the Department of Environmental Protection and water management districts to be notified of such projects. (O’Hara)

HB 559 (Roth) extends the retirement date of bond issues to fund the Florida Forever Act. It revises distributions for various programs funded by the Land Acquisition Trust Fund and specifies that the lesser of 40% or $350 million shall be appropriated annually to the Florida Forever Trust Fund. It prohibits moneys distributed from the Trust Fund from being used for executive direction and support services by state agencies. (O’Hara)

HB 423 (Cross) requires septic tank owners to have the system inspected every five years and directs the Department of Environmental Protection to implement the inspection program. It requires basin management action plans to include estimated pollutant load reductions that meet or exceed the amount of load reductions needed to meet the total maximum daily load requirements under the plan. The bill requires the allocation of pollutant load reductions in a basin management action plan to consider projected increases in pollutant loading due to growth in population or agricultural activity and requires the plan to provide strategies for mitigating or eliminating pollutant load increases for the life of the plan. It requires the Department of Environmental Protection to conduct assessments of projects included in a plan to determine whether the project is working as intended. (O’Hara)

SB 106 (Brodeur) authorizes the Department of Environmental Protection to establish a program to recognize local communities located along or in proximity to one or more long-distance nonmotorized recreational trails as “trail towns.” The bill revises provisions relating to the Florida Greenways and Trails Program. It authorizes the Greenways and Trails Council to recommend priorities for regionally significant trails for inclusion by the Florida Department of Transportation in the Florida Shared Use Nonmotorized Trail Network. The bill revises the responsibilities of the Division of Tourism Marketing to include promotion of the Florida Greenways and Trails System and the Florida Shared-Use Nonmotorized Trail Network and to coordinate with the Office of Greenways and Trails to promote and assist local communities to maximize use of nearby trails as economic assets. It directs the Department of Transportation to give funding priority to specified trails and to ensure that local support exists for projects and trail segments. The bill authorizes state agencies and local governments to obtain sponsorships from nonprofit or commercial entities and to use the sponsorship revenue for maintenance, signage, and amenities. (O’Hara)

HB 175 (Busatta Cabrera) and SB 192 (Avila) require comprehensive plans and plan amendments that apply to any land within, or within two miles of, the Everglades Protection Area (EPA) to follow the state coordinated review process for state agency compliance review under Part II, Chapter 163, Florida Statutes, and requires the Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) to coordinate with the affected local governments on mitigation measures for plans or plan amendments that would impact Everglades restoration. The EPA consists of the three state-designated Water Conservations Areas (WCA-1, WCA-2 and WCA-3) as well as Everglades National Park. If DEP determines that any portion of a proposed plan or proposed amendment will adversely impact the EPA or Everglades restoration objectives, the local government must modify the plan or plan amendment to mitigate such impacts before adoption of the plan or amendment, or that portion of the plan or amendment may not be adopted. Plan amendments that apply to any land within, or within two miles of, the EPA must be transmitted to DEP within 10 days of the second public hearing on the amendment. Finally, the bills require a county whose boundaries include any portion of the EPA, and the municipalities within the county (any municipality within Palm Beach, Broward or Miami-Dade County), to transmit a copy of any small-scale plan amendment to the Department of Economic Opportunity within 10 days after adoption. (O’Hara)

HB 293 (Hinson) would create the Energy Transition Task Force within the Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services to provide recommendations for fostering a fair and equitable transition of the state’s energy infrastructure to renewable energy technologies within minority, underserved, rural and low-income communities. It directs the Task Force to submit a report with its recommendations to the Governor and Legislature by September 2024. (O’Hara)

HB 77 (Fabricio) and SB 186 (Avila) provide that beginning July 2023, the ground vibration limit for construction materials mining activities within one mile of residentially zoned areas may not exceed .15 inches per second. The bills authorize the Chief Financial Officer to direct the State Fire Marshal to modify the standards for the use of explosives in connection with construction materials mining activities within one mile of residentially zoned areas. (O’Hara)

SB 64 (Hooper) – Department of Transportation

HB 155 (Holcomb) and SB 198 (DiCeglie) – Tampa Bay Area Regional Transit Authority

HB 349 (Bankson) promotes the development of a network of vertiports that will provide residents in Florida with equitable access to advanced air mobility operations for passenger and cargo services. For vertiports to operate in the state, the owner must comply with the Federal Aviation Administration's regulations and guidance relating to vertiport design and performance standards as well as submit a layout plan to the administrator of the Federal Aviation Administration. The bill specifies that a local government may not exercise its zoning and land use authority to give an exclusive right to one or more vertiport owners or operators. (Branch)

HB 85 (Snyder) and SB 360 (Hutson) – Causes of Action Based on Improvements to Real Property

HB 315 (Andrade) – Civil Remedies for Unlawful Employment Practices

HB 401 (Beltran) removes the statutory limits on liability for tort claims against the state and its agencies and subdivisions (which include cities). The current statutory limits for claims are $200,000 per person and $300,000 per incident. The bill eliminates these statutory limits subjecting government entities to unlimited liability arising from potential claims. (Cruz)

SB 92 (Garcia) and HB 105 (Basabe) codify the ability of local governments to require vacation rental owners or operators to designate and maintain at all times the name and contact information of a responsible party who is able to respond to complaints and other immediate problems related to the property. (Taggart)

HB 25 (Benjamin) – Citizen's Arrest

HB 45 (Skidmore) and SB 66 (Berman) – Risk Protection Orders

HB 151 (Daley) and SB 146 (Polsky) – Sale or Transfer of Ammunition

HB 153 (Daley) and SB 148 (Polsky) – Pub. Rec./Sales of Ammunition

HB 187 (Waldron) and SB 208 (Polsky) – Sale, Transfer, or Storage of Firearms

HB 165 (Hunschofsky) and SB 164 (Polsky) – Controlled Substance Testing

SB 214 (Burgess) and HB 221 (Snyder) – Sales of Firearms and Ammunition

HB 571 (Hinson) – Storage of Firearms in Private Conveyances and Vessels

HB 353 (Skidmore) and SB 318 (Polsky) – Conditions of Pretrial Release

HB 335 (Amesty) – School Safety Training

SB 368 (Osgood) – Machine Guns

SB 428 (Rouson) and HB 403 (Basabe) – Community Violence Intervention and Prevention Grant Program

SB 462 (Berman) and HB 579 (Eskamani) – Assault Weapons and Large-capacity Magazines

HB 215 (Rayner-Goolsby) and HB 456 (Berman) prohibit the possession or use of a firearm in “sensitive locations.” The bills define a sensitive location as numerous public facilities including but not limited to buildings or facilities owned, leased or operated by government entities, including public transportation. (Taggart)

HB 341 (Amesty) revises the time period that a 911 public safety telecommunicator certificate may remain inactive or be reactivated from 180 days to 6 years. (Taggart)