News from the South - Florida News Feed
Alternative to noncompete agreements under consideration by Legislature

Alternative to noncompete agreements under consideration by Legislature
by Mitch Perry, Florida Phoenix
March 17, 2025
Although a number of states have passed legislation empowering workers by barring companies from binding them with noncompete agreements, the Florida Legislature is looking at an alternative known as “garden leave agreements.”
A bill (SB 922) proposed by Ormond Beach Republican Tom Leek would establish the framework for these arrangements, through which an employee typically is relieved of duty yet technically remains employed and therefore cannot go to work for a competitor.
They are free to tend their gardens, as it were, while retaining pay and benefits.
The bill states that these agreements would require advance notice of up to, but no more than, four years before terminating the employment or contractor relationship.
The law would only apply to employees most likely to have access to sensitive information, Leek said, as well as to those who make at least twice the annual mean wage of employees in Florida, plus workers party to confidential employer information.
Leek, a labor-and-employment attorney, told the Senate Commerce and Tourism Committee on Monday that it was important to distinguish between noncompete agreements, which restrict former employees from certain activities, and a garden leave agreement, whereby the employee keeps the job but provides no services to that employer.
Jacksonville Democratic Sen. Tracie Davis noted that most noncompete agreements last between one and two years. Why should the state allow garden leave agreements of up to four years?
Leek referenced the moves made by the Federal Trade Commission last year to adopt a comprehensive ban on new noncompetes with all workers, including senior executives (the ban was overturned by a federal judge in Texas last August).
“Florida is poised to become one of the finance capitals of the world,” Leek said. “And if we want to attract those kinds of clean, high-paying jobs, you have to provide those businesses protection on the investment that they’re making and their employees.”
Orange County Democratic Sen. Carlos Guillermo Smith noted that noncompete contracts are falling widely into disfavor. As of last fall, four states banned them and 33 restricted their use, according to the Economic Innovation Group.
“Are we not disincentivizing them coming to Florida because, unlike other states, we have strengthened the ability for employers to require noncompete rather than rolling them back like other states,” Smith said.
Leek said he didn’t believe that was the case. In his own practice, “I don’t see a current trend dialing back restrictive covenants. I saw the federal government try it, and it failed and it didn’t happen.”
Out of favor with public
John Navarra was the only member of the public to address the committee. He said he opposes the bill because he fears that while the measure is currently aimed only at employees who have sensitive information, it could spread to additional workers.
He mentioned that he has worked as a grocery clerk at a Winn-Dixie.
“What happened if I lost my job at Winn-Dixie and I went to Publix, and I said, ‘Please give me a job so that I can put milk on the shelf, something as simple as that, and Publix could not hire me. It’s an outrage that the state of Florida would try to keep working people down by limiting their opportunities,” he said.
While businesses highly favor noncompete contracts, polls have shown that the majority of Americans don’t like them. An IPSOS public opinion survey conducted last May found that 59% of Americans supported the FTC’s proposal to ban such agreements.
The measure passed on a party-line 6-3 vote, with all Republicans in support and all Democrats dissenting.
A House companion has been filed by Tampa Bay area Republican Traci Koster (HB 1219).
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Florida Phoenix is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Florida Phoenix maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Michael Moline for questions: info@floridaphoenix.com.
The post Alternative to noncompete agreements under consideration by Legislature appeared first on floridaphoenix.com
News from the South - Florida News Feed
South Florida 11 p.m. Weather Forecast 4/19/2025

SUMMARY: The South Florida weather forecast for 4/19/2025 anticipates a breezy Easter Sunday, with warm temperatures in the mid-70s to start the day. Although radar shows some bird activity and minimal moisture, only a stray coastal shower is possible. Expect continued warm and windy conditions into Monday, with drier air moving in. Calmer weather is forecast for Tuesday and Wednesday, but breezy conditions will return later in the week, potentially increasing rain chances, though overall moisture remains low. A high rip current risk exists along the beaches, with choppy waters in the Atlantic. Temperatures are expected to remain in the mid-80s.

CBS News Miami’s NEXT Weather Meteorologist Dave Warren says to expect a breezy Easter Sunday as winds blow through much of South Florida on Saturday night.
News from the South - Florida News Feed
Roman Reigns endorses President Trump, CM Punk tears into Elon Musk

SUMMARY: In this episode of Going Ringside, the discussion revolves around WWE’s WrestleMania 41 and coinciding political comments from its stars. Roman Reigns sparked controversy with his Vanity Fair interview, expressing support for President Trump while acknowledging disagreements with him. This comment generated significant attention. Shortly after, CM Punk criticized Elon Musk on a podcast, addressing allegations related to a hand gesture Musk made, which some interpreted as a Nazi salute. The WWE, traditionally cautious about political matters, finds itself exploring new territory, given its ties to high-profile political figures and events.
The post Roman Reigns endorses President Trump, CM Punk tears into Elon Musk appeared first on www.news4jax.com
News from the South - Florida News Feed
FIU police says agreement with ICE is for the best; faculty disagree

by Jay Waagmeester, Florida Phoenix
April 19, 2025
Florida International University’s police chief believes the university community would be best served by the department signing an agreement with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, although the faculty is uneasy.
During a Faculty Senate special meeting Friday, interim President Jeanette Nuñez, the former lieutenant governor, and FIU Police Department Chief Alexander Casas fielded questions from faculty members about what a 287(g) agreement with ICE will mean for students and faculty, particularly ones fearing detainment.
Under the agreement, FIUPD officers could act as immigration enforcement officials to question and detain people they suspect are in the country without authorization.
“If we have to deliver someone, we’re the ones you want to do it, because it will be done in the most FIU way, the most Panther way, we can think of,” Casas said.
Casas signed the agreement with ICE, as have several other university police departments in the state, and is awaiting a response from the federal agency before officers can begin training. When it’s signed, Casas said, he will choose his “best officers” to be trained.
“If I don’t sign that agreement, we open the door for other agencies who are on this agreement, whether they’re federal agencies in power to do so or state agencies directed by our governor or local agencies that have agreed,” Casas said.
Casas told faculty he wants his department to have a say in how immigration enforcement goes at the South Florida institution.
“Once I deliver someone to Krome or turn them over to ICE, you’re right, I lose control. But, absent this agreement, I don’t even have input. At the very least, once they execute it, at least now I have input and my officers do have a little say in what could be the outcome,” Casas said.
“If it has to happen because there’s a warrant in the system, who do you want interacting with you? God, I hope you say it’s me,” Casas said.
Nuñez said she spoke at length with Faculty Senate Chair Noël Barengo earlier in the week after he reached out. She added that she wants to make sure she is “constantly addressing concerns.”
Faculty Senate members were not so convinced. Florida universities have made national news for signing the agreement with ICE.
Students live in fear for their ability to remain in the United States, faculty members said. One professor shared about a student who is not a citizen who came to him worried after receiving a parking ticket.
Juan Gómez, director of the Carlos Costa Immigration Human Rights Clinic at FIU, said students have approached him to say they are afraid to look up items on their computer. Some, in abusive relationships, are afraid to call police.
“I don’t know the status of any of our students. PD does not have access to any of that information,” Casas said, adding that his department has to follow FERPA, the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act.
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Casas said he did not get a call from the governor encouraging him to seek a 287(g) agreement; instead, he approached Nuñez after conversations with other law enforcement convinced him it “really is with our best interest at heart.”
Faculty senators approved a resolution opposing the agreement, saying it “goes against the university’s values of truth in the pursuit, generation, dissemination, and application of knowledge, freedom of thought and expression, and respect for diversity and dignity of the individual.” The resolution called for the university to withdraw.
Well into the two-hour meeting, Philip Carter, an FIU professor, remained unconvinced.
“It’s been good to hear you,” Carter said. “I haven’t heard anything that convinces me that this is a good agreement. It still sounds like a really bad agreement. I still worry about the safety of our students on campus who fear for their status and their safety. I worry, frankly, about all of us, I worry about faculty, I worry that there’s a slippery slope beneath us.”
Nuñez stressed that visa revocations and ICE agreements are different but sometimes get conflated. FIU has no control over visa revocations, she said.
Earlier this week, FIU confirmed to the Phoenix that 18 students have had their visas revoked since Jan. 1. The University of Florida told the Phoenix that eight visas have been revoked; Florida State University, three.
Alana Greer, director of Community Justice Project, said the FIU 287(g) is “deeply unprecedented” and the “agenda behind relaunching these 287(g)’s is specifically engineered to break trust, to tear apart our communities and to get us to see our neighbors, our peers, our students as ‘other.’”
Greer referenced her involvement with a story the Phoenix reported on Thursday, when 20-year-old Juan Carlos Lopez-Gomez, a U.S. citizen, was arrested by a Florida Highway Patrol trooper as an “unauthorized alien” and held for ICE.
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Florida Phoenix is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Florida Phoenix maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Michael Moline for questions: info@floridaphoenix.com.
The post FIU police says agreement with ICE is for the best; faculty disagree appeared first on floridaphoenix.com
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