Latest news with #LaVonBracyDavis
Yahoo
19-05-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
Nine Florida legislators sign letter to support Planned Parenthood funding
Planned Parenthood funding is under attack (Photo by Michael B. Thomas/Getty Images) Nine Florida Democratic lawmakers sent a letter Monday calling on members of Congress to oppose efforts to defund Planned Parenthood. In all, 562 state lawmakers from 50 states and the District of Columbia signed the letter a letter. The effort was organized by the State Innovation Exchange's Reproductive Freedom Leadership Council (SiX RFLC) and comes after anti-abortion lawmakers in Congress released a draft budget cutting off Planned Parenthood and other abortion providers from Medicaid funds. Reps. LaVon Bracy Davis, Kevin Chambliss, Anna Eskamani, Rita Harris, Dianne Hart, and Felicia Robinson signed the letter. So did Sens. Shevrin Jones, Tina Polsky, and Darryl Rouson. The State Innovation Exchange was founded in 2014 when the Center for State Innovation, the Progressive States Network, and the American Legislative and Issue Campaign Exchange (ALICE) merged. SiX works to promote racial, gender, social, and economic justice. According to Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF) one in three women have been to a Planned Parenthood health center for care, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation. In Florida, almost 100,000 patients relied on Planned Parenthood health centers for care last year – from birth control and cancer screenings, to STI treatment and wellness visits. SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX 'Planned Parenthood is an irreplaceable part of our health care system in Florida,' Laura Goodhue, executive director of the Florida Alliance of Planned Parenthood Affiliates, said in a prepared release. 'These lawmakers understand that 'defunding' Planned Parenthood would shut down health centers and leave patients across our state without access to essential and affordable health care. We are proud to work alongside them to continue fighting relentlessly for access to affordable reproductive health care for all Floridians.' Indeed, Planned Parenthood officials told the Florida Phoenix earlier this month that their clinics expanded their offerings in Florida after the state's six week abortion ban took effect on May 1, 2024. 'We've expanded our service line. I think it's important for the community to know we do much more than abortion care. We do vasectomies, we do prenatal care, we do fertility care. We do menopausal care. It's not just abortions and STDs (sexually transmitted diseases). 'But I think the community is learning that. There's a large need for Planned Parenthood,' Cherise Felix, chief medical officer of Planned Parenthood of South, East, and North Florida told the Florida Phoenix. SUPPORT: YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE
Yahoo
24-04-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Grayson joins race to fill Geraldine Thompson's Florida Senate seat
The Brief A special election is set to fill Florida Senate District 15 after the death of Sen. Geraldine Thompson. Democrats LaVon Bracy Davis, Randolph Bracy, Alan Grayson, and Coretta Anthony-Smith will compete in the June 24 primary. Republican Willie Montague will advance unopposed to the Sept. 2 general election. ORLANDO, Fla. - A special election is set to fill Florida Senate District 15 after the death of Sen. Geraldine Thompson. What we know A special election is scheduled to fill the Florida Senate District 15 seat left vacant following the death of longtime Democratic lawmaker Geraldine Thompson in February. The Democratic primary will take place on June 24, with the special general election set for September 2. Candidates who qualified for the race include prominent names like former Congressman Alan Grayson, State Rep. LaVon Bracy Davis, and former State Sen. Randolph Bracy. Coretta Anthony-Smith, a lawyer from Ocoee, is also on the Democratic primary ballot. Republican Willie Montague, the only GOP candidate to qualify, will advance automatically to the general election. The backstory Senator Geraldine Thompson, a respected and longstanding Democratic voice in Florida politics, passed away earlier this year, triggering the need for a special election in District 15, which includes parts of Orange County. Her death opened a competitive field, drawing familiar political figures, particularly from the Bracy family, who have deep roots in the district and state politics. Big picture view District 15 is considered a Democratic stronghold, making the primary contest particularly important in determining who is likely to take the seat. The race is notable for its concentration of high-profile Democratic candidates, including a former U.S. Congressman and two members of the politically active Bracy family. STAY CONNECTED WITH FOX 35 ORLANDO: Download the FOX Local app for breaking news alerts, the latest news headlines Download the FOX 35 Storm Team Weather app for weather alerts & radar Sign up for FOX 35's daily newsletter for the latest morning headlines FOX Local:Stream FOX 35 newscasts, FOX 35 News+, Central Florida Eats on your smart TV The Source This story was written based on information shared by the News Service of Florida.
Yahoo
07-02-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
New House panel's chair lavishes rare praise upon a state agency IT project
State Reps. LaVon Bracy Davis (left) and John Snyder, via Florida House of Representatives Despite a federal lawsuit over Florida's Medicaid unwinding following the COVID-19 public health emergency, the online system used by millions of people who apply for Medicaid, food assistance, and temporary cash assistance won praise this week as an example of an information technology project gone right. House Information Technology Budget & Policy Subcommittee Committee Chair John Snyder lauded the Department of Children and Families (DCF) for its management of a multiyear update to ACCESS, the integrated processing system for government assistance programs. On average, ACCESS processes 6 million applications annually and pays out $6.9 billion in temporary cash assistance and supplemental nutrition assistance, DCF Chief Information Officer Cole Sousa told the panel. The system's mainframe has been in use since 1982. DCF is in the third year of a six-year project to replace the 28 disparate legacy systems that comprise ACCESS as well as its 40-plus years old mainframe. DCF is requesting that the Legislature appropriate $36.6 million for the IT project in the state fiscal year 2025-26 budget, which lawmakers will craft when they meet in their 60-day legislative session that begins March 4. 'I just want to first of all call out and commend your staff. I don't want to jinx it because I know we're not all the way there yet, but I think, members, what we have before us is a great example of a project that so far, with a tremendous scope, is on time, is on budget, and is moving forward without any plan amendments,' Snyder said. The comments came during a lengthy hearing in which the committee examined a number of expensive information technology projects, including some that have taken years to finish and required millions in extra funding. House Speaker Danny Perez has made understanding the state's IT policies and funding a priority, creating the Information Technology subcommittee, the only panel in the House that holds jurisdiction over both substantive policy and spending. DCF and the DeSantis administration have been sued over the Medicaid unwinding, or the process following the COVID-19 public health emergency in which the states no longer needed to abide by the federal mandate that they keep everyone enrolled in the safety net health care program. There has been no decision in the federal lawsuit to date. The state is being accused of not notifying people why they were going to lose their health insurance or allow them to appeal before benefits were cut off. Floridians calling the DCF for help with their Medicaid or temporary cash or food assistance applications faced the second longest wait times in the country following the public health emergency, according to a Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) report. On average, people had to wait 42 minutes to talk to an agent, and 44% of calls got abandoned. Sousa told committee members that one of the goals of the IT update is to improve overall customer satisfaction. Rep. LaVon Bracy Davis, a former DCF attorney and ranking Democrat on the panel, asked Sousa to explain why the changeover was happening now. 'So, I guess my question is simple but profound: What took you so long?' she asked. 'What took so long to get to the six-year plan, because the public, the constituents, have been saying that modernization is absolutely needed. And by your own admission, we're talking 1982.' Sousa, who has been in his position for 3.5 years, said he didn't know. 'I know that there were some other attempts, I think, in previous administrations, maybe going back even 10 years ago, to seek the funding to modernize the overall system, and for whatever reason that just wasn't successful. And potentially there were a lot of reasons for that but, unfortunately, I can't speak to that because I wasn't there,' he said. Sousa credited the smooth transition to date DCF Secretary Shevaun Harris. 'She recognized the system was very old, antiquated, that we could just do a better job getting out services to people, faster, quicker, and just making our workforce more efficient. And that's really been the task of the agency to get this modernization done,' said Sousa. The committee's meeting this week was dedicated to hearing IT updates from four agencies as well as their legislative budget requests for the coming year. While lauding DCF's IT update, committee chair Snyder said the compliment was not meant to 'throw shade at any other project or any other agency.' The Department of Financial Services' PALM (planning accounting and ledger management) was first green-lit by the Legislature in 2014 and still isn't completed. The Department of Financial Services is requesting $64 million for the project, which already has cost the taxpayers $285.8 million. If the Legislature agrees to the new financial infusion, DFS' IT project will have cost taxpayers $349.8 million. The Agency for Health Care Administration (AHCA) is behind on its Medicaid management information system update, called Florida Health Care Connections, dubbed FX. AHCA has attributed delays on the massive IT update in part to a lack of staff needed to get the job done. To that end, the Legislature authorized the agency to hire an additional 47 IT staff for the FX project in the current year budget. Florida Deputy Secretary for Medicaid Brian Myer told the House panel AHCA has hired staff and is in the process of hiring more, and that it will have filled 17 of the 47 positions. A spreadsheet shows that AHCA anticipates it will have spent $334 million on the FX system by the end of this fiscal year. Most of that money, or $293.7 million, represents federal funds. AHCA is requesting the Legislature appropriate $28.4 million in the 25-26 budget for the IT update. SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX
