Lake County, FL: The annual Lake County Legislation delegation meeting is where various local agencies make a pitch for Florida State government funding or regulations from the Lake County Florida State legislators (Reps and Senators), and where Marilyn Bainter previously asked for changes to the Hospital District legislation to allow a flexible millage rate (which were ignored). I don’t have the time yet, but it will probably be at the auditorium at Lake Sumter CC.
So, if someone let Godzilla loose in Eustis, and he and King Kong took out some historic homes, and your agency wants the State to initiate legislation to provide grant funding for a specific Godzilla rehab clinic grant, this might be the place to make a pitch. (Good luck on that... )
At a previous delegation meeting two years ago, the Legislators let hospital reps give a presentation, but them forced Bainter and her supporters to wait until the END of the meeting after everyone left to give their public input. Hopefully, if Bainter makes a presentation this year, she won't be treated so badly.
The County BCC is being asked in next Tuesday’s agenda (tab 6) to approve a staff prepared list for the new Chair, Jennifer Hill to pitch to the legislators. HERE is a link to that list, including a 10 page overview of the issues, which was created apparently by staff and only includes wish list items related to Social Services, Transportation and Environmental. The BCC legislative wish list completely ignores economic development, jobs, education, comp plan or other issues. If you think the County should add something else to this list, let your Commissioner know, or check other agencies plans to make a pitch to see if they include what you think is needed.
The legislator's Delegation can take requests to support a regulation or position, or take a request to initiate a State law applying to all the State, OR, they can take a request to implement a LOCAL law which only applies to the County (I assume) and only requires a majority of the County legislators to approve it.
According to my discussion with one legislator, the requester of a local law must provide it in a format and wording that is acceptable to the local legislators, so you need to know what you are doing, even if the requested law is only two pages in length. My opinion is that a requester should check with the legislators staff to get wording examples and any tips or feedback, if available. Don't hope the legislators will do your legwork for you. Don't expect them to approve a law like the Obamacare legislation diagrammed in the image at left.
I found it interesting that the BCC staff legislative priority list did not include LAST YEAR’S requests and explain what happened to those issues. In business, they always expect to see the prior plan and actual results, but they are not included in the backup documents. Thus you have no idea how successful the prior requests were.
Note: Since this meeting is mostly for agencies, you probably won’t see much publicity in the papers for the public.
vj
