A proposal to carve an exemption in the state’s voter-approved minimum wage isn’t expected to pass during this year’s legislative session, Senate President Ben Albritton, R-Wauchula, told reporters late last week.
The proposal (SB 676 and HB 541) sought to allow people to voluntarily accept pay below the minimum wage when employed in positions deemed a “work-study, internship, pre-apprenticeship, or other similar work-based learning opportunity.”
But opponents said it was an effort to weaken a 2020 state constitutional amendment that requires gradual increases in the minimum wage. The wage is $13 an hour and will increase to $14 an hour on Sept. 30 and will go to $15 an hour on Sept. 30, 2026. The federal minimum wage is $7.25 an hour.
“I don’t love it, to tell you the truth,” Albritton said of the proposal. “I think if somebody works, whether they’re being an apprentice or whatever, the minimum wage is in the (state) Constitution for a reason.”
When pressed if the bill is dead, Albritton added, “I would expect so.”
Senate sponsor Jonathan Martin, R-Fort Myers, argued the proposal would help people gain skills through entry-level work experience that isn’t available at the state’s minimum wage.
Opponents countered that employers would simply redefine entry-level jobs as “internships.”
Lawmakers also do not appear likely to pass major property-insurance changes.
The Senate is not slated to take up property-insurance bills Monday or Tuesday.
The House on Friday was to consider a bill (HB 643) that includes issues such as setting new standards about payments that insurers make to affiliated companies — payments that some lawmakers have alleged could mask insurer profits.
But the Senate has not taken up such issues, with the session scheduled to end May 2.
Lawmakers in 2022 passed a package of changes to help bolster insurers amid a turbulent time that included companies dropping homeowners, raising rates and, in some cases, going insolvent because of financial problems.
Some top state leaders and industry officials say the insurance market has improved because of those changes.
But when asked by a reporter Thursday about whether property-insurance legislation would pass during this year’s session, House Speaker Daniel Perez, R-Miami, said property-insurance problems have not been fixed.
“Just because you have gone a slight inch further in the right direction doesn’t mean that you’ve solved for the problem,” Perez said. “We have not solved the problem for property insurance.”
He also said the “Senate, I don’t think, was as bullish as we were on trying to continue to solve for the property insurance problem that we have in the state.”
