The 2026 regular session ends today, and lawmakers must complete their work by six PM. They have already done their heavy lifting for the session, passing a new Congressional map that features five Republican districts and one Democratic district. The Republican led-Legislature’s decision to eliminate one of the Black majority districts upset Democrats and a lawsuit contesting the map will likely be filed.
Melinda Deslatte with the Public Affairs Research Council says a fair congressional map is something that precisely no one at the Capitol can agree on, and the battle has actually been going on for many years, even before the 2022 drawing of the map that started the chain of events that has led us to this point.
It remains to be seen what the map will look like for the November House elections.
Today is day one of Hurricane Season, and GOHSEP is ready. Spokesman Mike Steele says the agency has spent the last several months preparing for the 2026 hurricane season.
Steele notes that due to changes with FEMA, there may be more that would need to be asked of first responders at the state and local levels. But he notes that those are things that they had already started doing.
Registration for a new round of fortified roof grants opens today. Insurance Commissioner Tim Temple says it opened at eight this morning.
Cut 10 (09) “…a potential grantee.”
This round of funding will be for three-thousand roofs, and Temple says history has shown that the number of people registering for the lottery will exceed that number several times over. For more information go the Department of Insurance’s website.