During Senator Kathleen Passidomo’s recent appearance before the Southwest Florida Community Advisory Board, it became clear why the Republican of Naples was nominated by her fellow legislators as the next President of the Florida Senate after the 2022 election.
During her nearly hour-long session with the Advisory Board, Passidomo reflected in a thoughtful and clear manner on the recent endeavors and future roles of the Florida legislature – a way that many of her colleagues in Tallahassee would well emulate.
While Passidomo, for example, raved about how much the legislature achieved during its just-concluded session – including converting an expected $ 6 billion deficit into an approved $ 101 billion budget with ample reserves, passing a major bill on reforming child protection and passing a COVID liability law to protect businesses and more – she also freely admitted to some frustration that many achievements were obscured by the attention devoted to various polarizing, divisive bills also on the Showed up.
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“This past session was the most productive in my opinion, having been in the legislature for 11 years,” said Passidomo. “(But) a lot of important bills that we passed haven’t really been talked about. . . because of a couple of red meat bills that took the air out of the room. “
Such words from a legislator who clearly values realism more than conjuring up lively headlines – and Passidomo’s sensible pragmatism was also evident in other observations during the advisory board interview.
When asked to name the biggest problem that Floridians – and especially those in their district – face, Passidomo left nothing out: “(It is) water,” she said. “Water quality, water quality, blue-green algae, rottide. . . The water quality is (No. 1), No. 2 and No. 3 .. “
In the debate on the house rules of local communities, Passidomo said she was in favor of sensible legislation that would protect the flexibility of individual governments to make policies that fit their specific areas – but also provide controls and countermeasures to local communities prevent enforcement of ill-conceived laws that were impracticable and largely unenforceable.
“We have some jurisdictions (in Florida) that have ordinances that are stupid for lack of a better term,” Passidomo told the advisory board. “The problem you have is that if a local government issues such an ordinance, what legal remedies are available for the businesses involved?”
And in response to the challenges posed by Florida’s growing medical needs, Passidomo made a compelling, compelling case for simply expanding the number of health clinics across the state.
“When I was first elected, we basically closed our local health department clinics,” Passidomo said. “I think we threw the baby out there with the bath, so to speak. Instead of finding a way to get these clinics back to working as they should, we closed many of them. ”
In short, Passidomo acts like a breath of fresh air in a nationwide political environment that often seems to be constantly puffed up with hot air. Given this welcome departure from the pesky norm, Passidomo’s upcoming tenure as Senate president has the potential to be both productive and refreshing.
Editorials from The News-Press and Naples Daily News, part of the USA Today Network-Florida.
See similar https://www.heraldtribune.com/story/opinion/editorials/2021/06/30/kathleen-passidomo-florida-senate-naples-legislative-session-review/7794639002/
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