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Following Friday’s court ruling affirming, for the third time, that parents have the right to opt-out their children of school mask mandates, the Broward and Miami-Dade School Districts have become the latest to acknowledge the law. Parents are now able to opt children out of mask mandates at all levels of public education. Miami-Dade will implement the legal standard effective Friday while Broward stated the change will be effective November 20th. Around the state, the trend of new COVID-19 cases continues to decline. An average of 1,532 new cases per day have been reported over the past week.
In other news, Governor DeSantis is calling Florida’s share of the soon-to-be-signed so-called “bi-partisan” infrastructure bill into question. The Governor posed the question “Is Florida being treated well in this?” as the initial indication is that Florida may be receiving funding well less than our state’s population-adjusted share. All of Florida’s Congressional Democrats voted for the legislation while all Congressional Republicans in our state voted against it.
The first drafts of newly proposed maps for redistricting are expected from the Senate Reapportionment Committee today. Florida’s Legislature is tasked with creating a new map that will account for an additional Congressional district within the state due to Florida’s population growth as reflected in the Census. Once released, the drafts will be available on the state’s floridaredistricting.gov website.