FL Democrats To GOP: If You're Serious About Environment, Lose The Preemption Bills You So Love
Democratic lawmakers in Florida demanding clean-energy and climate-change policies said Wednesday that the first thing Republicans can do to help is stop blocking local ordinances that aim to protect the environment.
The trend, almost uniformly, is local governments trying to do progressive things, said Sen. Jose Javier-Rodriguez, representing part of Miami-Dade. The Republican conservative legislators would try to take those powers away from local government because, frankly, its easier for lobbyists to get their way up here than it is at city halls.
Preemption bills strip local governments of authority to legislate locally on topics such as environmental protection, minimum wages, sick leave, gun use in public, discriminatory housing practices, rent caps, and high-speed broadband. The National League of Cities, in its 2018 update on city rights nationwide, called it a worsening trend of infringements on local democracy. I represent a lot of municipalities in a county that has progressive legislation on the books, Javier-Rodriguez said, mentioning limits on plastic bags and Styrofoam.
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He and Eskamani praised the handful of moderates among Florida Republicans for at last joining Democrats and independents in the conversation about environmental protection and climate change, which national-level Republicans including President Trump have longed dismissed as a hoax. Its hard to exaggerate how hostile the Republican leadership is on anything on energy policy. It is insane, Javier-Rodriguez said. We are not the Sunshine State, far from it.
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https://www.floridaphoenix.com/blog/democrats-denounce-gop-preemption-bills-for-stifling-fight-against-climate-change/