Florida House Approves Push For Year-Round Daylight Saving Time
February 15, 2018
The Florida House on Wednesday overwhelmingly approved a proposal aimed at observing daylight-saving time year-round in the state. House members voted 103-11 to support the measureĀ filed by Rep. Jeanette Nunez, R-Miami, and Rep. Heather Fitzenhagen, R-Fort Myers.
Fitzenhagen said moving to daylight-saving time could help the tourism industry, as people would be able to stay out later in the sunlight. A similar billĀ also is moving through the Senate. If approved by the Legislature, the proposal to shift to year-round daylight-saving time would depend on congressional approval.
Representiaves from Escambia and Santa Rosa County were split in their votes on the plan — District 1 Rep. Clay Ingram (who represents the North Escambia area), and District 3 Rep. Jayer Williamson voted in favor of the proposal, while District 2 Rep. Frank White voted no.
The House proposal does not include switching the Panhandle to Eastern Time, and that idea has been dropped from the Senate plan after much public outcry.
Daylight-saving time will start March 11 this year and end Nov. 4.
by The News Service of Florida with contribution from NorthEscambia.com
Comments
14 Responses to “Florida House Approves Push For Year-Round Daylight Saving Time”
Count me in, I have always hated the time changes and more daylight at the end of the day sounds like a great reason to get outside away form the couch and tv. It has also been proven that it reduces crime rates because criminals prefer the cover of darkness. Plus I live and work in Florida (the State proposing the time change), so I could careless how it affects a neighboring state. Far more countries have abandoned DST than still use it.
So…if they are staying on DST all year, which means they will be permantly “Sprung Forward”, then half of the year Pensacola will have one extra hour of sunlight and Orlando will have two hours more sunlight….that’s only like 4 hours of night?!?! That’ll be like the opposite of Alaskansas where they have frigid temps and 16 hour nights. Count me out
Tar and feathers, and hopefully some people will face primary challenges because if they think this is a good idea for legislators all over America doing their own thing, then they probably do not belong in office. Things work so much better when the railroads decided to use a standard for rail sizes, and folks for a hundred years could count on what time it was. What motivates an elected person to seek headlines and waste time and money. Stupid does not even begin to cover it when we have so many real problems and across America our representatives are working half the time in committees than they did in 1968. I am going to donate to every local canddidate’s primary opponent who voted for this. People need to be face primary competition in both parties. Enough!
@Anne- you will not “have” to pay for for extra cooling or heating. There will not be an extra hour of sunlight during the day nor longer nights…The orbits of celestial bodies are fairly rigid and not subject to legislation.
What a headache for service companies in the area that do a lot of business in Flomaton or Atmore, if this goes through. Now half the year they will have the same time… the other half of the year they will constantly have to be keeping track, does 3:00 PM mean our time or your time? It will be a pain to keep the scheduling straight… I guess they’ll have to just put everything in their calendar as FL time and then remember to subtract the hour when they are talking to the customer.
Dang Annie
Still only 24 hours in the day, the current amount of time that I keep my house cool
Anne????? another hour of power usage????? Are they stretching our day to 25 hours now?
It is a better plan – kids and adults alike have a hard time switching back and forth. It will be much better to stay on the same schedule all year.
I’m with Fred & JustMe. It’s a truly silly idea. What’s the big deal? What’s the push for the change? Why not let those who live in the area decide?
So, if I understand this correctly, the whole state would stay on DST all year around. This means that the part that’s on Eastern Time would then be an hour ahead of the rest of the Eastern Time Zone when they all switch back to Standard Time in October. That’s Atlantic Time, with the Virgin Islands and the extreme northern New England states. This is a silly idea.
And this is a better proposal? Still going to be and hour off from Alabama during those months of the year. May as well just move to Eastern and leave DST alone. The state has plenty more challenges to worry about than this.
Great plan for the power companies so we have to pay for even more power to keep our homes cool for another hour of power! Lobbyists sure do tip well, these men are against the voters who live here, remember their names!
Great plan for the power companies so we have to pay for even more power to keep our homes cool for another hour of power! Lobbyists sure do tip well, these men are pigs, remember their names!
WiseMen
Idiots