CLEARWATER -- For the members of a statewide task force on fireworks, the overriding message from the public was clear: Please ban the bangs. But a prohibition on exploding and aerial amusements, which a majority of blast-weary people across Florida told the panel they wanted, was not possible from the start. ...more

February 14, 2008

Touch-screen voting machines likely performed properly and were not to blame for the large number of undervotes in the District 13 congressional election in 2006, federal investigators said in a draft report obtained Wednesday by The Associated Press. ...more

February 7, 2008

No one saw it coming. But following hours of heated deliberation at an afternoon workshop Tuesday, Hernando County School Board members switched gears and voted 3-2 against placing the district's future gifted education center at Spring Hill's Challenger K-8 School of Mathematics and Science - and 4-1 for placing it at Explorer K-8, the new 2,100-student school set to open in August off Northcliffe Boulevard. ...more

February 5, 2008

After meeting a 14-year-old Polk County girl on MySpace.com, a Fort Lauderdale man recently took her to motels four times and committed lewd acts during several of those encounters, Polk County deputies say. ...more

January 15, 2008

Since April, members of a new city committee have discussed issues affecting the Hillsborough River within the confines of a meeting room. ...more

November 21, 2007

More state oversight of private contractors of foster care and common-sense safety measures are among recommendations released this week by a task force created to protect children in state care. ...more

October 11, 2007