Friday, June 22, 2018

Millions for what? A brief summary of Visit Florida and Emeril's Florida

Anyone who reads my blog knows I haven't updated in a long time, or that I don't update very often anyway. As a perennially preoccupied millennial I often divide my attention among many things, and don't usually have the will to gather those thoughts in to words, but sometimes ideas push me.

I concern myself greatly with journalism, specifically quality of journalism because sometimes it's hard to follow a story.
Take for instance the battle between the Florida House of Representatives and the producer of TV Program called "Emeril's Florida". The producer of this program, Pat Roberts, got the State of Florida's promotional wing to give the show millions of dollars in production funds. For reasons still unclear to me the Florida House decided to find out how the money was spent. (Generally I promote state funds and actions being aired for public viewing.) Citing trade secrets, Pat Roberts has fought a request to turn over financial documents to the state.

Since I could not immediately find recent updates to the story I decided to make this very brief write-up in case anyone else tries to do some digging.

In January a Federal judge denied Roberts' injunction request, demanding he turn over documents within 5 days., but a few weeks later a Florida judge reverse the decision and "quashes final subpoenas."

Although the House promised to continue its pursuit, I can't find any other updates to the story. If anything else comes up in this regard, I will update.
Does sort of make me want to look in to the tussle between the House and Pitbull...

Virgin Trains Brightline Bait & Switch

Something that concerned me greatly when Miami-Dade County decided to fund the purchase and construction of a train station for the private ...