A pair of Gulf Coast House Democrats are sponsoring the proposed oil-drilling ban that will be the centerpiece of next week’s special session called by Gov. Charlie Crist.
Reps. Keith Fitzgerald, D-Sarasota, and Rick Kriseman, D-St. Petersburg, are sponsoring the measure (HJR 7C) which emerged from bill-drafting Thursday.
The measure bans oil exploration in Florida waters, which extend roughly 10 miles from the state’s shoreline. The measure includes a line clearly meant to comfort the state’s seaports, petroleum industry and other business interests by noting “this prohibition does not apply to the transportation of oil and gas products produced outside of such waters.”
The measure needs to win support from three-fifths of lawmakers in both the House and Senate to be set for the November 2 ballot. Under state law, an Aug. 4 deadline also looms to get any measure before voters in November.
Crist set the four-day special session, scheduled to begin Tuesday, without much consultation with House and Senate leaders.
House Republicans generally have condemned the special session as unnecessary, since state law already prohibits oil-drilling in state waters – and there’s not much appetite currently for repealing the ban.
But Crist, who broke with the Republican Party and is running for U.S. Senate as an independent, says a constitutional ban is needed in light of House efforts the past two spring sessions to allow oil-exploration as close as three miles from Florida’s Gulf shore.
With the House legislation sponsored by a pair of Democrats, that seems also to underscore Republican opposition in that chamber to Crist’s session call. The governor, however, is likely to gain more GOP support in the Senate, where Sen. Alex Villalobos, R-Miami, has said he will sponsor a similar drilling ban.
The News Service of Florida
