The Florida Times-Union Jacksonville

Gov. Rick Scott rode to election success in Florida with this mantra: Jobs, jobs, jobs.

And the Florida Legislature generally followed his lead. The results have been clear — Florida’s economy has outpaced the nation in many respects.

So it’s odd and disturbing that the Legislature continues to raid a fund that has a record of success and produces jobs in one of the state’s hardest hit sectors.

It’s called the Sadowski Fund and was brilliantly designed to produce revenue for affordable housing in a rapidly growing state.

Enacted in 1992, revenue comes from a portion of documentary stamp taxes on real estate transfers. When housing prices increase, that puts pressure on affordable housing. But the increased prices also produce increased documentary stamp taxes for the Sadowski Fund.

It’s a win-win — at least it’s supposed to be.

But the Legislature raided the fund after Hurricane Andrew, which was entirely justified by the natural disaster. But that turned into a bad precedent by tapping the funds year after year, even in good economic times.

In recent budget years, funding has been increased for the housing trust fund but not at 100 percent levels. For the coming legislative session, the Senate has proposed to spend all $322 million available in the housing trust fund but the House (where good legislation goes to die) is recommending less than half, $122.63 million.

The House also recommends funds going only to areas that sustained hurricane damage — a large area of Florida, granted.

A wiser move would be to take the entire funding proposed by the Senate and devote a larger share to hurricane-damaged areas like Northeast Florida.

The final shame of these raids is this housing trust fund is a great success with support and involvement from both home builders, realtors and nonprofits.

Build on success, don’t starve it.

Protect Florida’s coastline

Protecting Florida’s invaluable shoreline is a full-time business, it seems.

Even though the Interior secretary assured Gov. Rick Scott that Florida would be exempted from oil drilling exploration, some Florida leaders aren’t convinced. Skeptics saw this a blatant political move to support Scott’s bid for a U.S. Senate seat. If so, it could come or go with the shifting political winds.

While the federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management held the only Florida hearing on a program to open more waters to oil and gas exploration in Tallahassee, others will be holding press conferences to warn that the Florida exemption isn’t final, reported the News Service of Florida.

No never means no, said Barney Bishop, an outspoken Tallahassee consultant supporter of offshore drilling.

“You all don’t know about the discussions that are being held in private,” he said.

What would a Deepwater Horizon spill mean to Florida? We have evidence of what it did to the Gulf coast of Florida.

Here is what the Florida Department of Environmental Protection reported. “On April 4, 2016, the consent decree between BP, the United States and the five Gulf Coast states was approved and entered into by the court. The consent decree requires BP to pay a total of $18.5 billion, which is broken down between Clean Water Act civil penalties, natural resource damage claims and economic claims across the Gulf states. The state of Florida will receive at least $3.25 billion.”

What would oil rigs off the coast do to Florida’s tourism?

Florida’s Department of Environmental Regulation opposes the offshore drilling. Secretary Noah Valenstein said in a letter that Florida’s coastal areas have “high environmental, economic and military value not only for Florida but also for the nation.”

The irony of all of this is that the U.S. is one of the world’s great energy producers again, thanks to the fracking revolution. There is no energy emergency that justifies drilling off the coast of the Sunshine State.

Protecting orange industry

Florida’s orange industry, battered by disease, foreign imports and hurricanes, needs federal aid.

Production is down 40 percent compared to past growing seasons, reports the News Service of Florida.

This is the lowest output since World War II.

Therefore state leaders are lobbying that part of the federal hurricane disaster relief package needs to include relief for the citrus industry. A relief package for Florida farmers includes relief for Florida farmers.

Damages from Hurricane Irma were estimated at $761 million for the citrus industry, $624 million for the nursery industry, $383 million for the sugar industry, $237.5 million for the cattle industry and $180 million for non-citrus growers. on February 16, 2018.