Florida

Florida's Growler Bills Officially Defeated

Beer geeks across the state of Florida have tears in their beers as the bills legalizing 64-ounce growlers didn't make the final cut when the Florida legislature ended its session last Friday Senate Bill 1344 did not make it past the Commerce and Tourism committee and the House's version, HB 714, d ... More >>

Fly By Night Down the Highway to Hell

Florida Bong Ban Bill Passes Senate 31-2 But Now Doesn't Actually Ban Bongs

A day after a bill that would ban the sale of bongs and certain pipes in Florida overwhelming passed the Florida House, its sister bill found similarly broad support in the Senate. The bill passed the legislative body 31-2 today, and will now head to Gov. Rick Scott. Though, the bill has been cons ... More >>

Anti-Bong Bill Passes Florida House 112-3

While other states are legalizing medicinal marijuana and decriminalizing possession of small amounts of pot, Florida is going in the exact opposite direction. A bill that would ban the sale of pipes and bongs that could be used to smoke marijuana passed the state House yesterday with a lopsided 112 ... More >>

Smoke Pot Now, Tallahassee

Florida Leads Nation in Foreclosures, Miami Tops All Cities

You're first in the nation, Miami! Sadly we are not talking about the Miami Heat, we are talking foreclosures. Florida, during the first quarter, has been America's foreclosure capital, while Miami leads all cities in Florida with a terrifying one in every 79 residences being involved in some sort o ... More >>

Brew at the Zoo: Five Must-Try Beers and Haiku Ticket Giveaway

Our sister paper may have just hosted Beerfest, and you may have already gotten your fill of beer for the month. But where's the fun in that? Brew at the Zoo is inching closer, and it's about time you realize what you'll miss out on if you skip this annual extravaganza. Do you like Florida beer ... More >>

Old and Nu

Food Stamp Debacle: Meet the One Governor Who Botched Public Aid Worse Than Rick Scott

Ah, government. It protects and serves. Floridians spent last year lamenting Gov. Rick Scott's bright idea for welfare recipients: a ludicrous plan to drug-test every single person on state aid. (The courts later threw that idea out the window.)Believe it or not, there's now a governor whose food st ... More >>

Suze Orman May Leave Florida Over Gay Marriage and Taxes

Financial guru Suze Orman may be packing up her partner and her jacket collection and moving to a state that recognizes gay marriage if the Supreme Court overturns DOMA.Orman currently lives in Fort Lauderdale with partner Kathy Travis, but the tax breaks that could come with federally recognized ma ... More >>

Florida Leads Nation in "Zombie Homes," Empty Houses in Foreclosure

All across our lovely, sun-drenched peninsula, acres and acres of cookie-cutter suburbs sit wilting in the humidity, bereft of human beings. They're "zombie homes": properties mired in foreclosure whose owners have simply walked away, leaving the rotting places to become havens for drug dealers ... More >>

Florida Bill Would Limit Miami-Dade Police's Use of Drones

The Miami-Dade Police Department is one of the few local law enforcement agencies in the country that currently owns a drone. While they've never actually used the thing, legislation is making its way through the Florida legislator that would limit its usage if they ever do.

Would You Vote in a Second Primary to Ensure Florida Got Fewer Crazy Politicians?

Ever wonder why over the past decade Florida's elected officials seem to have become increasingly partisan? It might just be a general change in mood of politics across the nation. It might be gerrymandering that renders so many state legislative districts uncompetitive. Or it might be par ... More >>

If Your Facebook Pic Is Red Today, Maybe Take Five Seconds to Let Your State Legislators Know You Support Domestic Partnerships

If you've been on Facebook in the past 24 hours, you've surely noticed the explosion of people using a red version of the Human Rights Campaign's logo to express their support for gay marriage as the U.S. Supreme Court hears two potentially landmark cases. That's very nice and all, but the Supreme C ... More >>

Beer Growlers: A Waste of Your Tax Dollars

Yesterday a committee of the Florida Senate unanimously passed Florida SB 1344. The bill -- introduced by Bill Latvala, a Republican senator from Pinellas County -- doesn't have anything to do with campaign finance reform or tourist development taxes or ethics. It has to do with allowing Florid ... More >>

Booze Bills Could Help Florida's Craft Alcohol Industry

Floridians Really Want Gun Background Checks, Support Assault Weapon Ban

Florida may well be the "Gunshine State," but like the rest of the nation, its residents still overwhelmingly support background checks on all gun purchases. More surprising, a solid majority of Floridians also want a national ban on assault weapons and high-capacity magazines.That's according to Qu ... More >>

Florida Man in Women's Clothes and Pink Fuzzy Slippers Robs Bank

A man was bending genders and the law when he showed up to a PNC bank in Sebastian, Florida this week dressed in women's clothes complete with a handgun in his purse. While his lacy pink sweater and matching pink, fuzzy slippers suggested something casual, the man meant business and demanded cash fr ... More >>

Floridians Have Surprisingly Boring Taste in Porn

Florida may have a reputation for being the weirdest state in the nation, but apparently our collective taste in porn is pretty damn boring.Porn search engine PornMD.com collected its most-used search terms over the past six months and broke them down geographically by American states and internatio ... More >>

Giant Ferocious Mosquitoes Could Invade Florida This Summer

If regular mosquitoes are like chihuahuas, small ankle-biting little buggers, then gallinippers would be pit bulls. They're twenty times the size of a regular mosquito, and have mouthparts so strong they can pierce through clothing. Their eggs can lie dormant for years, but scientists warn that weat ... More >>

Tourists Spent a Record $71.8 Billion in Florida in 2012

Florida's economy might not exactly be fully recovered, but one of our main industries broke a record last year. Tourists spent a combined $71.8 billion in Florida in 2012. That's an all-time record, and a 6.8 percent increase from 2011, which was also a record year.

Florida Bill Would Require Bullet Buyers to Take Anger Management Classes

State Senator Audrey Gibson, a Democrat out of Jacksonville, has caught the ire of gun right groups after introducing a bill that would require anyone who wishes to buy ammunition in Florida to complete an anger management class. The bill would also require a three day waiting period for the sale of ... More >>

Another Case of Florida Fraud Found After Felon Wore "I Voted" Sticker to Meet With Probation Officer

Rick Scott's supposed plan to derail voter fraud in Florida resulted in nothing but long lines and the discovery of very little voter fraud. But now it seems there was at least one case of fraud in the past presidential election: a convicted felon wore an "I Voted" sticker to a meeting with her ... More >>

Chill Out for the Cause at Big Gay Ice Cream Social During SoBeWFF

Disney World: Where dreams come true. Florida: Where dreams of equal marriage are crushed. Well, for now, at least. Ah, Florida... we have such a happy place nestled right in the bosom of our state, but all around us, gay couples are advocating for the right to marry. How can we be truly happy i ... More >>

Florida Legislator Trying To Legalize Growlers So You Can Drink More Good Beer

Ever had a sinking feeling that something isn't quite right while surveying the beers at your grocery store? Sure, the selection is fine -- maybe not as many local craft beers as you'd like to see, but hey, this is Miami after all. But wait. Why are all the beers SO SMALL?Turns out there's a 45-year ... More >>

Florida's New Driving Law Pisses Off All of Canada, May Violate Geneva Convention

Florida's legislature is not famous for passing competent, legally sound bills. (Remember when they tried to forbid doctors from talking to patients about guns and the courts were like, "LOL! First Amendment. No." Good times.)Still, it takes a particularly dumb law to simultaneously piss off all of ... More >>

Bill Filed to Keep Florida on Daylight-Saving Time Year-Round

Finally! Frivolous legislation out of Tallahassee we can finally get behind!State Sen. Darren Soto, an Orlando-area Democrat, has filed legislation that would keep Florida on daylight-saving time (DST) all year long.

Is Florida's New Business Friendly Logo Sexist?

Last week, Gov. Rick Scott unveiled a new PR campaign intended to help draw businesses to Florida, and because Scott can't do one single thing without generating controversy critics are attacking the logo design used in the PR push as sexist. 

Did Rick Ross Just Crash His Rolls-Royce In Fort Lauderdale After Getting Shot At? UPDATE

This much, at least, is clear: Around 5 a.m. this morning, someone opened fire on a Rolls -Royce on Las Olas Boulevard in Fort Lauderdale. More than a dozen shots were fired, and the Rolls ended up careening into the front of a restaurant.Now for the real question: Was Rick Ross in the car? Witnesse ... More >>

70-Year-Old Senator Bill Nelson Will Now Try to Kill Pythons Himself

Always careful to take up practical, non-partisan causes instead of throwing partisan bombs, Sen. Bill Nelson has made Florida's invasive python problem one of his key issues. So now the man we've dubbed Senator Spacesnakes is actually taking on the problem directly. He's joining Florida's controver ... More >>

The Winner of Global Warming: Manatees!

Yesterday it was confirmed that 2012 was indeed the hottest year on record in the Lower 48, and yes maybe global warming may mean doom and gloom for the future of humanity.But don't worry. There's a cute side to the story. Thanks to a warmer winter, fewer manatees died in Florida waters this year th ... More >>

Hundreds of Maniacs Sign Up To Hunt Pythons in the Everglades This Weekend

Does slogging around a foreboding, swampy wilderness searching for man-hungry pythons that can grow longer than a city block sound like your idea of a fun weekend? For hundreds of people from around the country, the answer is a resounding yes.More than 400 souls who have apparently never seen cinema ... More >>

Are We Really Surprised a Headless Goat and Some Roosters Were Found Floating in Biscayne Bay?

As far as things found floating in Biscayne Bay, yesterday's discovery of a headless goat and some decapitated roosters was pretty tame. So why are we acting like this is a thing that doesn't happen all the time here?

That Fiscal Cliff Deal Is Going To Cost Florida Billions; Here's How Much More You'll Pay

Chances are, when you heard that the GOP-controlled House had finally relented on a deal that kept the nation from plunging Wile E. Coyote-style off a fiscal cliff, you popped a little mental champagne. But even though the compromise prevents huge tax increases and keeps unemployment benefits in pla ... More >>

War on Drugs Fail: Heroin Deaths Back on the Rise in Florida After Pill Mill Crackdown

Here's the truth about the war on drugs: You can pass new laws. You can carry out police stings. You can put people behind bars. You can squash one growing probably, like Florida did with pill mills. And, yet, even after all of that people are still going to find ways to abuse drugs.See, heroin deat ... More >>

An Orange By Any Other Name

Georgia Has Inherited Florida's Old Pill Mill Problem

Florida -- and Broward County in particular -- used to be America's illicit pain pill capital until Florida politicians actually got around to drafting laws that effectively stamped out the problem. That hasn't stopped the pill heads of the South from getting their fix, though. The problem has now j ... More >>

Floridians Divided On Same-Sex Marriage, Aren't Down With Legalized Pot, New Poll Finds

Florida voters have pulled a Charlie Crist-esque turnaround on gay marriage one month after several states passed LGBT equality measures. But Sunshine State voters still can't get behind another big winner in November's elections -- the marijuana legalization measures in Colorado and Washington.That ... More >>

Here's What Florida's New License Plate Will Look Like

In a state of 19.1 million people, only about 50,000 bothered to vote in the online contest to pick the next design of Florida's default license plate. Probably because all of them were pretty bland and boring. Anyway, we now have a winner and it might have been our favorite from the batch of four.

Florida Is Set to Issue Its One Millionth Concealed Carry Permit Next Week

Florida is on pace to become the first state to issue its one millionth active concealed carry permit sometime next week, as more than 167,000 permits are issued each year. Florida has already issued more concealed carry permits than any other state, and is set to become the first to break the one m ... More >>

Florida Ranked 34th Most Healthy State in the Station, Which Makes Us Pretty Healthy for the South

You'd think with all our good weather and miles of sandy beaches, Floridians would have extra reason to stay healthy, but no. According to the latest edition of United Health Foundation's America's Health Rankings, Florida is only ranked the 34th most healthy state in the nation. Of course, we are o ... More >>

Florida Announces Food Code and Restaurant Inspection Updates

The Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation, the state agency that's in charge of inspecting all Florida restaurants for cleanliness and food safety, announced updates to the statewide Food Code.The  new code, which goes into effect January 1, 2013, will improve the inspectio ... More >>

GOP Chair Reince Priebus Sued for "Underfranchising" Hispanic Voters

After last month's electoral loss, the Republican Party is desperately trying to make it self over as a Hispanic friendly group, but the fact that a group representing Hispanic Republican voters in Florida has now filed a lawsuit against  Reince Priebus, the national GOP chair with a name that ... More >>

New Florida License Plates: Five Alternative Nominees

Miami May Start Using Inmates For Cheap Labor

It's a common scene in prison movies set in the deep South: A line of inmates, chained together and decked out in bright orange jumpsuits, dutifully picking up trash or digging a ditch by the side of a dusty road as a shotgun-toting sheriff watches over them through tinted aviator sunglasses.The cha ... More >>

Universal Romance

Mitt Romney Campaign Basically Concedes Florida

Some votes are still being counted in Florida, but you can finally color in the state with the faintest shade of light blue. Mitt Romney's campaign has just released a statement finally acknowledging that they've lost Florida.

Biscayne Brewers Bash at Kovens Conference Center (Photos)

This past Sunday, members of B.R.E.W. FIU hosted their first annual Biscayne Brewers Bash in the pavilion of the Kovens Conference Center overlooking beautiful Biscayne Bay. The event hosted 15 local brewers serving over 40 different micro-brews. There was also a booth for beer bread and beer butter ... More >>

It's Illegal to Instagram Your Ballot in Florida, FYI

It's Election Day, which means your Instagram, Tumblr, Twitter and Facebook feeds are full of pictures of people waiting in long lines to vote, their shiny new "I Voted" stickers, and, occasionally, their actual ballots.So, as a friendly reminder, we'd just like to reiterate that it's totally illega ... More >>

Florida County Literally Calls People to Tell Them They Can Vote Until Tomorrow

The joke about telling voters on the other side that they can vote the day after the election is almost as old as democracy itself, but this is Florida, and democracy here sometimes does look like a joke.Indeed, 12,525 people living in Pinellas County, Florida got a robocall this morning from their ... More >>