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Much ado about special session turned out to be nothing
Posted Sep 1, 2010 by Catherine Whittenburg, Tallahassee bureau
Updated Sep 1, 2010 at 12:34 PM
Well, so much for that. House Speaker Larry Cretul and Senate President Jeff Atwater have no plans now to hold a special legislative session this fall to address Florida’s response to the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.
When House and Senate members quit the July special session imposed by Gov. Charlie Crist without taking up his proposed constitutional amendment to ban oil drilling, many did so declaring their intentions to attend to the more urgent needs concerning communities’ recovery from the spill, primarily in Northwest Florida. Senate President Jeff Atwater, who was particularly bullish on holding a special session to address those issues, said as recently as Aug. 19 in a letter to fellow senators:
“After gaveling the Special Session to a close I publicly offered my views on what had transpired, and reiterated my desire for a more meaningful gathering. I will repeat again what I said then, I will be disappointed if we do not return in a Special Session at the earliest possible date.”
The earliest possible date, however, has steadily been moving back—and now appears to be no earlier than the regularly scheduled session for Spring 2011.
Here’s what Cretul wrote to fellow House members today, upon reviewing reports from several House workgroups on issues related to the spill: “Based on the workgroups’ recommendations, it would appear that while there are some issues where legislative action may be appropriate, there are no issues that require immediate formal legislative action. Additionally, there are several areas where it is clear that we do not yet possess the information necessary to make informed decisions. Moreover, many of these issues require solutions that would benefit from closer scrutiny during a regular legislative session.”
Atwater forwarded Cretul’s message to the Senate, adding that he has asked the Senate’s committee on the economy “to continue developing proposals, gathering data, and working with incoming leadership in preparation for the next session.”
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