The Florida Roundup - Access to Canadian drugs, state budget highlights and the truth behind '40 Acres and a Mule'

Episode Date: June 14, 2024

This week on The Florida Roundup, we find out more about the company at the center of Florida’s plan to import drugs from Canada with the Orlando Sentinel’s Jeffrey Schweers (00:24) and breakdown the 2024-25 state budget with Politico reporter Gary Fineout (11:53). Then, a new series explores the legacy of America’s broken promise in "40 Acres and a Mule" (19:23). Plus, we get the latest on Boeing’s Starliner with Central Florida Public Media’s Brendan Byrne (33:27). And later, torrential rain brings dangerous flooding and standing water to much of South Florida (37:15), a federal judge blocks Florida’s ban on gender-affirming care (38:50), and more news from the week (40:31).

This is the Florida Roundup. I'm Matthew Petty. Tom Hudson is out this week. We're going to talk about the state budget in a moment. $116.5 billion, including things like increased funding for public schools, pay raises for state employees and a package of sales tax holidays. We'll also talk about what didn't make it in nearly a billion dollars of line item vetoes. But first, an update on Florida's plan to import cheaper prescription medications from Canada. The Kaiser Family Foundation says its polling shows Americans are worried about the high cost of prescription drugs. And there's strong bipartisan support for measures to bring down the cost of medications, including allowing importation of drugs from Canada. In the meantime, Florida built a giant warehouse in Lakeland to store those medications, including allowing importation of drugs from Canada. In the meantime, Florida built a giant warehouse in Lakeland to store those medications, but the plan has stalled for the

moment. Well, to talk more about this, we're joined by Jeff Schweres. He's the Orlando Sentinel's Tallahassee Bureau reporter. Thanks for being here, Jeff. Thanks for having me. And you can call in with your questions and comments on prescription medications. Are you feeling the pain of the price of those medications? Would the plan to roll out these cheaper prescription drugs from Canada affect your pocket and your health, I guess, as well? We can call us at 305-995-1800. Email us. We're radio at thefloridaroundup.org. Well, Jeff, DeSantis has been working on a plan to get cheaper prescription medications into the state of Florida since he was elected. He's well

now into his second term in office. So what's going on? What's the holdup? Oh, that's correct. He approved this plan in 2019 when Donald Trump was last president. And the plan was endorsed a couple years later when President Joe Biden became elected in 2021. So the, you know, the approval's been there, but the process of getting the Canadian pharmaceuticals to, you know, south of the border into the United States is a lengthy one, as you can imagine many federal processes are. Yeah, indeed. So, you know, when, if I guess this drug import plan finally does get rolling, what are we talking about here? Like what kind of drugs are going to be brought into the country? I imagine it's not going to be absolutely everything that you can currently get at your local CES or Walgreens, right?

Correct. It's Florida has requested a list of 14 drugs. Some of them are similar in nature to others. Many of them are like multiple drugs are for HIV and AIDS. And then there's other drugs to treat other illnesses as well. So, but initially they're looking at importing these 14 drugs. And Life Science Logistics was contracted to build this warehouse and come up with the plan and do all the prep work that goes into making this happen when it eventually does. Now, there were lawsuits.

There was concerns from Big Pharma blocking this approval from the feds. And then there was also the Canadian government itself that had questions, didn't want to give their drugs to people in the United States because they were worried that there would not be enough drugs for Canadians. So when all that got resolved. The federal government, our federal government, finally gave Florida the first approval to import the drugs. But there were some other things that Florida had to submit

to get the final approval, to get the final green light. And that hasn't happened yet. I don't know when that will happen. I think a lot of people are wondering when the exact release date's going to be, when they're finally going to get that green light. Yeah, I mean, your reporting and others have shown that the word from the DeSantis administration is basically things are in the federal government's ballpark now. It's up to them and the holdup is coming from them. Is it just kind of the,

I guess, some friction between the state and federal thing? Is it just kind of bureaucratic red tape that's tying things up? Well, I think it's, yes, friction is a good word for it, I suppose. Finger pointing, you know, it's a process. It's a bureaucracy, you know, the federal, and it's one of those bureaucracies that Governor DeSantis and the legislature can't get around, unlike they were able to get around some of the bureaucracy when it came to providing hurricane relief following Ian and, you know, some of the later storms we've had. The, you know, the federal government says it's, you know, this The federal government says the state needs to provide

information. So they're saying the holdup is on the state side. The state said, and I reported them saying that we are working with the federal government to finalize this so we can get going. you know, finalize this so we can get going. And that's, you know, that's where they're at right now. Meanwhile, you've got, you know, this giant warehouse that it cost only like maybe six and a half million to build. The company's received over $50 million for it, is slated to get another $29 million over the next two years for a grand total of $82 million. And yet I've not seen any record of what that money has paid for despite repeated requests. They've summarized what the money's supposedly paid for, but I haven't seen the receipts. And I think that's one thing that we still want to try to get to confirm what exactly has this money paid for.

305-995-1800. Give us a call. We're talking about plans to import cheaper prescription medications from Canada into Florida and what impact that would have. So tell us more about this warehouse and the company behind it. I guess, what have you found out about kind of the way this deal was done, how it was done? Yeah. Life Science Logistics is a Dallas-based company that has contracts, similar contracts with the federal government and other states, including California, Texas, New York, Michigan, and in fact, much larger warehouses in those other states. And they call it stockpiling strategic medications. They did some of that during COVID. contract for this warehouse was hatched during the COVID pandemic at its height when they were importing or bringing, when the federal government was sending COVID vaccines to Florida and they

needed cold storage for the vaccines and a place to put them and then a central place to distribute them from. So they got the contract for this one part of the deal. The state has other warehouses as well. But they built the warehouse. They have not obviously imported any Canadian drugs yet because they haven't had permission to, but they've used the warehouse for some staging during hurricanes and then be empty again. Meanwhile, they're supposed to be building an online infrastructure for receiving prescriptions and then delivering the goods out to however many people are going to be participating

in this program once it does get up and running. They've had to train people to run this program. And then I think at some point it gets turned over to the state. And then that's why they had these delays, by the way, or why they got a three-year extension on their original contract. So the contract is not just to build this giant warehouse, but also to kind of run it and help manage the program once they do get the material. Well, to get it up and running, yeah. I don't know how long they'll be involved in managing the program. The contract ends in 2026.

And I don't know whether they'll opt to renew it. If they need to, they probably will make that decision down the road somewhere the legislature would have to make that call. It's a pretty narrow kind of range of prescriptions, and there's also some restrictions on who would be eligible, right? I mean, it's not just everybody who could rock up and get these cheaper drugs. So what do we know about that? I mean, once everything gets going,

once these kind of holdups are resolved, could this plan be expanded? Is there talk of that? I don't know about expansion, to be honest with you. Obviously, the program is not... people who have private health insurance are not eligible for this program. It would be people on Medicaid, I believe, or – I get the two mixed up sometimes. But it would be for people who are on assistance, not for people with private insurance. And then just finally, I think you kind of alluded to this before, but this particular company also has a contract for another warehouse, right? But this is a separate, it's not connected to this potential plan

to import these cheaper medications. Yeah, so the governor just approved the budget that includes $116 million for yet another warehouse, a much larger one for the Division of Emergency Management and the Florida cabinet, which is the governor, the attorney general, the CFO and the agriculture commissioner approved the contract just this past week. 75 million of that is to go towards the purchase of the land. It's a 40-acre-plus property in Auburndale, and it appears to have existing buildings on it that would be renovated. That would be life science logistics responsibility under this contract to renovate it And then there's also $5 million to manage the facility, $5 million a year for running the facility

Well, Jeff, we're going to have to leave it there But thank you so much for your reporting and for joining us on the Florida Roundup We've been speaking with Jeff Schweers, Tallahassee Bureau reporter with the Orlando Sentinel. Thank you so much. Thanks for having me. I appreciate it. I was glad to help out. We're turning now to that state budget signed by Governor DeSantis in Tampa on Wednesday. The governor touted the budget as both fiscally responsible after slashing nearly a billion dollars in projects with his veto pen and one that delivers more funding for certain things.

The bottom line with this year's budget is this. We are providing historic support for education, historic support for conservation and environment and protecting natural resources, historic support for transportation and infrastructure, and major tax relief. All the while, the budget is actually spending less than we did last year. Well, among some of those line item vetoes, about $32 million in arts and cultural grants, $80 million for group health insurance for state

college employees, $54 million for support services in the House and Senate, and dozens of water drainage, sewage, and other infrastructure projects around the state. Well, I want to welcome Gary Fineout to the program. Gary Fineout is a reporter for Politico where he covers Florida. Thanks for being here. Thanks for having me on. What were the takeaways from the budget for you? Well, I think a couple of the big takeaways were that it sort of appears that the governor was trying to aim for a specific goal in mind in terms of the total amount of the budget. As you played in that clip there, he acknowledged that the spending was slightly above, sorry, slightly below what it had been. And not to get into the weeds, but we're talking all state spending because the legislature sometimes, as they did this year, will place a great deal of spending outside of the actual Appropriations Act.

side of the actual appropriations act but all told the spending between with the with the vetoes he did and with the outside spending as i understand it it's going to come in about a hundred million dollars less than the current fiscal year so and so he so he gets to use that as a talking point and and to be able to tout that in terms of his record, I will say that, of course, over his time as governor, the budget has gone up pretty substantially a couple of years. And that was due in no small part to the enormous infusion of federal money that came down as a result of both the CARES Act and the American Rescue Plan. Yeah, it just seems to kind of keep going up each year in some ways. But I wonder about the kind of politics behind the scenes here. I mean, what difference do you think it makes that DeSantis is no longer in the presidential race? Are you seeing some of that play out in the signing and kind of how the budget was put together?

Well, yeah, maybe somewhat. Yeah. I mean, I think what was kind of interesting, and one of my colleagues reported about it this week, is there was not what appeared to be sort of some widespread vetoes against people who might be perceived as not being 100 percent supportive of the governor. And what I mean by that is lawmakers who supported Donald Trump in the run for president versus Governor DeSantis. And it doesn't appear that there were a lot of, because last year we had some vetoes that there were people who, lawmakers, particularly Senator Joe Grutter out of Sarasota, who backed Trump from the get-go, did not back DeSantis. And he publicly complained and said he thought his his projects had been vetoed because he supported Trump and not to Santas. We appear to have apparently saw less of that. I mean, but I would also tell you that there were I mean, there are a lot of interesting sort of decisions that, you know, kind of get into the kind of the sort of slightly off the radar kind of battles that

come up that happen up here, Tallahassee. You mentioned the veto of there was like, you know, close to 57 million veto from the legislature. And it was because DeSantis and his people close to him have acknowledged this is why he did it. He was upset about a study having to do with credit card, what they call interchange fees. And the legislature had agreed to pay for it. But they did it in such a way that the only way to eliminate the study was to wipe out an entire chunk of funding from the legislature. So an own goal for the for the governor? Well, I mean, so.

It wasn't I mean, it deals with the legality of when you put what it's called provisional language. And when you put it in the budget, you really can't wipe out the provisional language unless you wipe out the accompanying spending item. So that's what he did. But yes. So now the Senate president, the House speaker yesterday sent out a memo saying, well, yes, we acknowledge that the governor's veto wiped out funding for the support services. And apparently it's about 200 employees who had who were theoretically in jeopardy. The legislation, the governor's office say, no, we're going to find a way to fund it, even though it was vetoed. Waiting to see the logistics of that and how that works and how that, you know, there's constitutional issues and potentially I'm not a lawyer, but so. But if you were, there'd be a lot of work for you. But go ahead.

Yeah, I was going to say, we are kind of running up on the clock a bit. I did want to ask about the political committee that DeSantis launched sort of a little bit quietly a few weeks back. Let's just play a little bit of tape from his comments on that. Yeah, we have a political committee. I mean, I do think that there is a number of things that are going to be important for the state's future. You know, I was just being downtown here in Tampa. If that marijuana passes, this will smell like marijuana.

Like when you go outside, it will because it's written so broadly how the court let that language on the ballot. I will never understand. So, I mean, he's talking about what that committee is going to be focused on just in the last sort of minute or so we have here, Gary, what is the purpose of this? So you're right. It's called the Florida Freedom Fund. And it basically is a political committee that's being chaired by his current chief of staff who works for him on the official side. But he's also going to have this now this role with this committee on the political side. And as has been explained to me is that they are going to raise money to go after the two amendments, the abortion access amendment and the marijuana amendment. They're going to try to

raise money, I guess, to help orchestrate a no campaign on that, and that he's also maybe going to use it for school board races. And he added, when he was asked about it at that press conference, he also said he might use it to weigh into the state attorney races in Orange, Osceola County, and in Hillsborough County, where he removed, he suspended those two prosecutors from office, they are running to get their jobs back. Right. So a lot of options there. We've been speaking with Gary Finer, reporter for Politico, where he covers Florida. Thank you so much for your time, Gary. Appreciate it. Thank you for having me.

Up next, a new investigation into America's abandoned attempt at reparations for former enslaved men and women in the aftermath of the Civil War. Plus, Boeing's Starliner capsule made it into orbit with astronauts on board last week, but the spacecraft still has some issues. You're listening to the Florida Roundup from your Florida Public Radio station. This is the Florida Roundup. I'm Matthew Petty. Tom Hudson is out this week. Forty acres and a mule is seen as America's first attempt at reparations for formerly enslaved people in the aftermath of the Civil War. In 1865, Union General William T. Sherman issued an edict that would reserve a big swath of land along the coastline of South Carolina, Georgia, and North Florida, where those newly freed could live, work, and govern themselves.

where those newly freed could live, work, and govern themselves. It's a promise that was never kept, and a new investigation from Reveal and the Center for Public Integrity, 40 Acres and a Lie, digs into the details of who was promised land and what happened next. Through painstaking analysis of Reconstruction-era documents, journalists identified 1,250 formerly enslaved black Americans who were given land only to have it taken away and returned to the former enslavers. They also spoke with descendants of those black Americans who were given land only to have it taken away and returned to the former enslavers.

They also spoke with descendants of those black Americans, dozens of families including some in Florida. Journalists who worked on the investigation detailed how the loss of that land denied those families intergenerational wealth. And they explore what it means for the notion of reparations. Here's reporter April Simpson talking with Greg Estevez, who lives in Jacksonville, Florida. He's the great-great-great-grandson of Jim Hutchinson, an enslaved man who was given land on Edisto Island, South Carolina. Simpson asks Estevez whether he thinks descendants like him should get reparations. So if you look at the totality, 400 years I've been in this country the Middle Passage free labor Jim Crow civil rights yes you know I think there should be some type of

reparations what that is I can't tell. And I'm not smart enough to know how to fix it. I don't know how to fix it. You know, even today, a lot of people don't even want to acknowledge. And if they do acknowledge it, they downplay it. And here's Jenks McKell talking with Reveal producer Nadia Hamden. McKell is a descendant of Isaacs Jenkins McKell, the plantation owner who enslaved Jim Hutchinson. The federal government gave the McHales land back to them

after the 40 Acres program was revoked. Jenks McHale said he doesn't support reparations. Anybody in this country who wants to do better has the opportunity to do it. There are many, many, many black folks around this country that have been very, very successful. Now, you explain to me why. I mean, I guess I'm trying to understand how... It's all up in them.

Hundreds of... If we keep giving away stuff, that's all we're going to be able to do is give away, because people don't want to work, because they don't have to work because they don't have to work because all we're doing is giving them freebies. Nobody ever gave me anything other than this, but I now had to sweat bullets to keep it. Well, I'm joined now by Alexia Fernandez-Campbell, a senior investigative reporter at the Center for Public Integrity in Washington, D.C., where she covers labor and inequality, and Mila Rios, who lives in Fort Lauderdale and is one of the subjects of this series. Her great-great-grandfather was given land in Savannah,

Georgia, before it was taken back. Thank you both. You're most welcome. Thanks for having me. Alexia, I want to start with you. The Center for Public Integrity combed through 1.8 million records to find titles to land, like the four acres issued to Pompey Jackson and that's Miller's Four Bear. So how was that search carried out? Yes. When I was researching a completely different project, I was in the National Archives and the Freedman's Bureau Records looking for some different documents. And then I found some land titles. It was in a miscellaneous folder online and I didn't know what I was looking at. And then I realized, oh my goodness, these are land records. This is people got land titles through the 40 acres program,

which everything I'd heard about the program, you know, I got the impression that it was something that was promised, but that never actually happened. So that was the beginning of it. Then we got a whole team involved. We wanted to see if there were more land records, if there were more land titles. I also found logs with names of people who got land, which is how I found Mila's great-great-grandfather, Pompey Jackson. He was on a register saying that he got four acres in Grove Hill, a plantation outside of Savannah. And then also one of my colleagues used image recognition, AI, to scan all 1.8 million records to see if he could find documents that looked like the land titles and looked like the logs. And then he turned up hundreds more names and like about 100 more

land titles. Could you have done this project without some of those tools like the AI recognition you talk about? We could have done it because I did find some of them manually, but we wouldn't have been able to identify as many people, find as many descendants. So it just wouldn't have been as big of a project. What was the goal of tracing the family trees and then talking with descendants of those who had been promised land only to have it taken away? Yeah, I think the goal was just to tell this story, but not just like as a historical event that happened, but also the impact today and, you know, kind of tell the

stories of a family who got the land, had it taken away, what did they do? Were they able to get land on their own? What happened? What happened to their descendants? And what about their descendants who are alive today? Kind of like a story arc over generations. It was really, really hard. And luckily Mila knew a lot about her ancestors, so that helped. But it was really hard to piece together. But we wanted to tell stories that have largely been forgotten because these records have been buried for so long at the National Archives. And also just to tell people about that connection to this history that lots of people didn't know. And Mila was unaware of this particular connection. So that was pretty cool. Mila, what was it like for you to find out

that your great-great-grandfather had been promised that parcel of land that he was once forced to work while enslaved? I was amazed, actually. My great-grandmother was very, very good at telling our family history. However, her father was so young when he was given the land. He was only like 18 or 19 years old, and he was only given four acres because he was not married at that time. And I think it didn't affect him as much as it would have had he have been older and had a family. So that is an aspect that my great grandmother never mentioned. So I don't know if her father, being that he was so young, even spoke to her about that. What was he like? I mean, this is kind of detailed in the reporting, but your great-grandmother, as you say, should have described Pompey Jackson. So can you share

what her recollection was of him? She remembered many things about him. I mean, she would tell me some of the things that he taught her about the making of the wine, about the making of the lye soap, about he was a carpenter by trade and how he was hired in a on a plantation. After he left Grove Hill, he was hired up on Colston Bluff, also by the Habersham family, where he worked there after the emancipation. So she filled me in on all aspects of his life that she knew. And she was the youngest girl. So she was born when Pompey was about 40 years old. So, you know, she really filled me in on that. And I'm very grateful for that.

One thing that really comes through in the reporting about the effort to distribute land to the formerly enslaved and the efforts of people like Reverend Ulysses L. Houston to create this self-sufficient community was just how quickly they got it up and running before it was then thwarted by former Confederates reclaiming their plantations with the help of the federal government. Kind of with this in mind, Mila, do you wonder what might have been had your grandfather been able to keep a hold of that four acres?

Yes, I wonder. I think it would have been a great help to his family. And I think that he may not have moved into Savannah proper. As a matter of fact, I'm sure he would not have. He would have built his home out there and my great grandmother may have stayed there. And to be very honest with you, my entire family may have stayed a little longer. But as I told Alexia, the reason why we left had nothing to do with the land being taken from us. We left because of Jim Crow. Mm-hmm. Alexia, part of your reporting, a big part of it, delves into this issue of reparation. And we did hear from a couple of those frank conversations about reparations with the

descendants of both the formerly enslaved and the slave holders. What do you think this investigation adds to that debate over reparations? Yeah, it's really interesting because we had heard such a variety of opinions and I think it reflects how people just view it differently. We've heard from many black Americans, even descendants, who are like, I don't expect reparations. And then there were black descendants who said, yes, I do expect it. There were white descendants who said, no, we shouldn't be paying reparations. And others who said, absolutely. And what I think this series wasn't meant to like resolve that, obviously, it's not even possible with like a story like this. But I do think it can further the conversation about what if anything is owed and to who.

But I think the main point here, it's actually putting names to people, like very specific instances of people who had land in their hands. It was taken away. For example, four acres now on Grove Hill is worth about $250,000. So kind of looking at the impact of that on like very specific people,

like people with names, people who are alive today. I think it's really hard sometimes when people read about moments in history to understand how that impacts the current situation or how it impacts people who are alive today. So I think that is maybe like what we were trying to do is just showing how that history is playing out also today. And how important was it to try and quantify some of that missing generational wealth? That was one of the things we wanted to do. And it was so hard because these logs, they just say, oh, for example, Pompey got four acres on Grove Hill in Georgia. And then we're like, well, where is this plantation?

It was so hard to find it. Luckily, it helped because now they're building a development there and it's called the Habersham Plantation. But then Mila also found another part of the plantation is actually a community called Grove Hill Plantation. So in those cases, it was easier, but there were so many plantations that we couldn't figure out where they were located today. So how are we going to figure out where the value of that land now? We do have some really good examples of like this one gated community on Skidaway Island near Savannah. And we know it's a massive gated community that's now mostly white. And it sits on like four plantations where dozens of people got

land titles. So that to us was a very concrete example of the value of that land today because it's on the coast. Most all this land is on the coast and it's all valuable land. Mila, what's your perspective on a reparations? Should the descendants of the folks identified in this investigation be entitled to reparations? Should they get reparations, do you think? I don't think that I deserve reparations. I really don't. Now, I know some of my family members may look at that differently, but, you know, I don't even know how they would do it. There are so many of us now. And if you just disperse it to the families, I don't even know how that would be done. So me personally, to be more succinct, no, I don't think I deserve anything. I wonder, Mila, how this investigation,

how kind of your connection to it has changed your view of the world. It hasn't. I'll be very honest with you. It really hasn't. I was very happy to learn about some of the aspects that I didn't know, obviously, like the things that Alexia informed me about that she had come across that pertain to my family. But from my perspective, it really hasn't changed me. I kind of, I knew many things, and I was very fortunate to have had my great-grandmother inform me of the family history and what was done to not only our family, but many of the families that were there at that particular time in East Savannah, where my great grandmother grew

up. Alexia, what are you hoping comes next from your reporting in this investigation? Because there is kind of a public interest aspect to it, right? Like how can people use what you've uncovered to do their own research? Yes. So we are publishing on Mother Jones website with the articles that we wrote, the list, the names of all 1,250 people we identified, and it shows the plantation name and the state. And we're hoping that people who may have not known that connection or realize that they had a connection and may know their ancestors' names can look through that list and learn more about their ancestors because we also scanned a lot of documents so for example there is an editor at mother jones who was looking at that list and he said his uncle's great

grandfather is on there so that was shocking to me because i don't even know my great grandparents names so i don't think i could just look at a list and be like oh that's my ancestor but some people do and like people like mila who are really like dedicated to learning their family history, I feel like would be able to find that connection if there is one. And I think it's important to note that even though this story seems very central to like North Florida, Georgia and South Carolina, people migrated all over the country. We know during Jim Crow to, you know, through the Great Migration, we found descendants who are living in Michigan, in Ohio, California, New York, all over the country. So it's a story that I think impacts people all over the country. And we're hoping that other people may be able to find descendants that

we couldn't find. And maybe we'll be able to tell stories that, you know, have been waiting 150 years to be told. We've been speaking with Alexia Fernandez-Campbell, a senior investigative reporter at the Center for Public Integrity in Washington. She's one of the journalists who worked on the 40 Acres and a Lie investigation from CPI and Reveal. And Mila Rios, whose great-great-grandfather was given land in Savannah, Georgia, as part of the 40 Acres and a Mule edict before that land was taken away. Thank you both so much for joining us. Thank you very much for having me. Yes, thank you.

And you can hear that investigation on reveal on your public radio station beginning June 15th. Well, next week on our program, a closer look at the legal fight over health care for trans Floridians after this week's ruling from a federal judge. I'm Matthew Petty, and you're listening to the Florida Roundup from your Florida public radio station. Well, Boeing finally got its Starliner spacecraft up to the International Space Station with two astronauts on board. Starliner has faced a listening of problems, and now NASA has delayed its return to Earth until next weekend.

But the two astronauts, Sonny Williams and Butch Wilmore, had good things to say about Starliner. Here's Wilmore during a video link from the ISS talking about their extended stay on the station. Every astronaut looks forward to being in space and is not looking forward to coming home for many reasons. Eventually, obviously, it's time to come home. We all know that. But yeah, a little more time would be great. We're joined now from our partner station, Florida Public Media by Brendan Byrne, host of the Space Exploration Podcast.

Are we there yet, Brendan? Thanks for being here. Great to be here, Matt. So how big a deal, first of all, is it for Boeing to get these astronauts finally flying Starliner and up to that space station? It's a very big deal for Boeing, for NASA, and for really everybody who's been working on this program. As you know, the launch was delayed multiple times, not due to Starliner, but due to the rocket that was getting Starliner into orbit, ULA's Atlas V rocket.

All of those issues were fixed, and they got off the ground. And this is really a critical test of the Starliner capsule, right? NASA wants to use this capsule to transport astronauts to and from the station for operational missions. But to do that, they need this test flight with Butch and Sonny to really put the thing through its paces. They come back to Earth, and then NASA and Boeing can certify it for future missions. So this is a big deal that they got it off the ground. Now, as we've mentioned, NASA has had to push out the return date for the spacecraft a couple of times now, and there have been some helium leaks reported while it's been up in orbit.

What can you tell us about that? Yeah, so as you mentioned, they are not returning until at least a week from Saturday. That's to give them more time to prepare a plan to come back to Earth. But there have been some issues. That helium leak you mentioned is related to the propulsion system of Starliner that's used to kind of maneuver the vehicle while it's in space and coming to the space station. They found five leaks since it's been up there. NASA says they've closed all the manifolds, the valves, and it's no longer leaking. And there's plenty of helium on board to help get them back to Earth. But while they're there, there was another

issue with the thrusters. It seems to be a software issue. So they're going to take this extra time while they're out there to test these thrusters and see why they're not turning on sometimes. Right. And the software, I think people who follow this industry like yourself and others may remember was one of the problems with the earlier iterations of the launch before they even put astronauts on board. Yeah, that's right. That was one of the reasons why the earlier iterations of the launch, before they even put astronauts on board. Yeah, that's right. That was one of the reasons why they had to do a second uncrewed test flight before Butch and Sonny could get on board,

is there was a software issue that prevented it from going to the station. So there tends to be a historic issue with software issues with Boeing in general and with Starliner. Yeah, speaking of that, I mean, is there any kind of parallel at all, Brendan, between the Boeing's troubled 737 MAX program with its commercial airliners and the setbacks that we're seeing with Starliner? I mean, if you ask Boeing, they would say, you know, no, they're two separate things. But, you know, in a public image scenario, there are some concerns, right,

when you look at what Boeing has been doing and also some of the things that have happened to Starliner. You know, early in the iteration of the... We're going to have to leave it there, but thank you so much for your reporting and joining us, Brendan. Appreciate it. You got it, Matt. Space reporter Brendan Byrne from our partners at Central Florida Public Media.

Up next, South Florida gets a soaking, causing widespread flooding and chaos for drivers, but the frogs are happy about all that rain. You're listening to the Florida Roundup from your Florida Public Radio station. This is the Florida Roundup. I'm Matthew Petty. Tom Hudson is out this week. Much of South Florida has been deluged this week as a tropical disturbance dumped rain on the state. More than 20 inches of rain has fallen since Tuesday in some places. The downpour triggered flash flood watches and Governor DeSantis declared a state of emergency for Broward, Miami-Dade, Collier, Lee and Sarasota counties. In Sarasota, up to 8 inches of rain fell in three hours on Tuesday in what was described as a thousand-year storm. County Public Works Director Spencer

Anderson said crews were out all night clearing debris from storm grates and trying to keep drain systems clear, but there was only so much they could do with so much rain. Especially areas like St. Armands, just the topography out there, the island's shaped like a bowl, so it does take a while for water to go down. The pump stations on St. Armands, we had recently invested over a million dollars to rehabilitate those, and they were all functioning. The amount of rainfall completely overwhelmed the system. Sarasota's fire department responded to more than 280 calls for help, about 100 more than their daily average. Almost 50 of those calls were related to flood water and vehicles attempting to drive through them. Sarasota Assistant Fire Chief Tim Dorsey said drivers should stop and turn around when they come up to floodwaters. You don't know

how deep it is. It might look to be six inches deep but the road may be undermined. It may be five or six feet deep. Major highways including a section of I-95 in Broward County were closed as floodwaters covered the road. With the ground extremely saturated and the risk of river and lake runoff, flood watches continued through Friday. A federal judge this week blocked a state law and rules that restrict health care for transgender adults and children. From our partner station WUSF in Tampa, Dalena Miller reports the ruling calls last year's restrictions to care unconstitutional. The 105-page ruling by U.S. District Judge Robert Hinkle says Florida can regulate care but cannot deny transgender people safe and effective medical treatment, especially since the same treatment is given to cisgender

patients with the state's full approval. Simone Criss is with Southern Legal Council. She says expert and patient testimony proved that the state's motives were not based in science. It was motivated by anti-transgender animus and bias. It was motivated by a desire to deter people from being transgender. And that is not a rational or legitimate state basis justification motivation. this justification, motivation. Chris says the state has already vowed to appeal the ruling alongside several other transgender-related cases she's litigating. It could take more than a year to play out in court. I'm Dalena Miller in Tampa. Despite the judge's ruling, Kareen Mariposa, a trans woman in Miami, says the damage to trans adults has already been done. Mariposa told our partner station WLRN that she lost access to her medical provider after the law passed and had to make adjustments. I did what most every trans person I knew did, which was get their pills from either Canada or Venezuela.

Governor DeSantis said he's confident the state will win on appeal. During a press conference at his budget signing in Tampa on Wednesday, DeSantis noted the 11th Circuit Court of Appeal had overturned a law in Alabama that he called, quote, almost identical to Florida's law. This week marked eight years since a gunman killed 49 people at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando, at the time the worst mass shooting in modern U.S. history. Community members and families gathered for a remembrance ceremony honoring the 49. From our partner station Central Florida Public Media, Marion Summerall reports the ceremony proceeded with the ringing of the bells in downtown Orlando. Inside First United Methodist Church, families, friends and community leaders gathered to read the names of those killed. The church bell rang 49 times, a ring for each of the victims that were killed on June 12th in 2016. Brett Regas was at Pulse the night of the massacre.

He lost his partner. He says he hopes the community recognizes the importance of this memorial. It's healing. Until that memorial is built, this is the only way that we can really get together and connect and be in each other's lives. The City of Orlando is working with the community to establish a permanent memorial remembering the victims of the shooting. I'm Marion Semerle in Orlando. I'm Matthew Petty, and you're listening to the Florida Roundup from your Florida Public Radio

station. A little jazz and food for the spirit. A Black History Museum in Delray Beach is coalescing Father's Day and Juneteenth festivities to honor black contributions. From our partner station WLRN in Miami, Wilkin Brutus has the story. That's the smooth saxophone leading the Jesse Jones Jr. Quartet. Jazz musicians will serenade a Juneteenth gathering inside the Spady Cultural Heritage Museum in Delray Beach, a nonprofit Black history museum. And the celebration is a toast to Black fatherhood, says Charlene Farrington, the executive director. We decided that this Juneteenth was a perfect time to celebrate our Black men, who, quite frankly, without them, we would have no society. We would have no communities. Black men keep going. Black men keep going. The gathering includes jazz musician and producer Milton Mustafa Mustafa Jr., son of legendary Melton Mustafa Sr.

Farrington says music illuminates the Black experience. So jazz music is a no-brainer in terms of what kind of music should we share that we can all enjoy and celebrate. The month of June also coincides with Black Music Appreciation Month, adding to the celebration of black contributions. I'm Wilkin Brutus in Palm Beach County. Well, manatees have been in the news lately and not for the best reasons. They face multiple threats from boat strikes, red tide, and water pollution that is killing the seagrasses they eat. From our partner station WUSF in Tampa, Steve Newborn reports on a new facility opening soon that will help at least some of them survive. Several large tanks are being repurposed for a new manatee rehabilitation center at the Clearwater Marine Aquarium. The tanks have elevators that lift injured manatees to new

emergency rooms where doctors can operate on them. James Buddy Powell is the aquarium's chief zoological officer and one of the world's foremost experts on manatees. He says their work here is akin to first responders. When you look at some of the injuries these animals come in with — you know, broken bones and punctured lungs or going through convulsions because they've been exposed to red tide or all their ribs are showing and so forth, just given a little extra help, they'll make it. They'll start out with the capacity to treat a couple of manatees that were rescued as orphans.

The sea cows will likely stay here until the winter, when they'll be old enough to be released into the wild. As larger pools are built, the aquarium will be able to treat six to eight manatees at a time. I think if manatees were not as resilient as they are, given everything that's kind of thrown at them to survive, we probably wouldn't have manatees in the state right now. But we give them that sort of extra help to make sure that the population is stable. This is one of only 10 manatee hospitals in the state, including Disney and SeaWorld and Zoo Tampa.

The heavy rains that doused our state this week helped with drought conditions in south and central Florida. And after a long silence, out came the frogs. From our partner station WUSF in Tampa, Kerry Sheridan spoke with an ecologist who monitors frog populations and has this audio postcard. I think that's a southern toad. Southern toads for sure. Keep going. I'm pretty sure that's leopard frogs in here too.

And I'm hearing these Cuban tree frogs and the mnemonic I use for them is like a door in a scary movie. My name is Winn Everham. I'm a professor of ecology and environmental studies at the water school at Florida Gulf Coast University. I'm feeling particularly in the last three to five years that one of the manifestations of climate change locally is that we're not necessarily getting less rain we're just getting it in bigger slugs so you know I've heard a

lot of meteorologists talk about we're seeing like these three days is what we normally get for June as a whole. Frogs are able to survive during the dry season. They can find refugia that will allow them to exist. So they've been there, but they aren't going to put their energy into calling until they know that the conditions are right for them to be able to reproduce. You know, why go to the bar and try to pick up a date when, you know, it's not going to do any good, right? So this is a signal to them all that good time to make babies.

Sometimes one calling, like, triggers the rest of them to call, because it's really males that are trying to say, I'm a better person to date. It's like a change of the seasons, right? People who aren't from here think that the seasons don't change in Florida, it's just because they're not paying attention. You know, the seasons change, it's just subtle. And one of them is when the rains come back and the frogs start to call. It reminds me of up north,

on that first good spring day when the sun comes out. You know, and everybody says, oh, spring is here, right? So when I hear them in that concafony, it's, um, summer's here. There's a poem by William Stafford, and he's got a line in there where he says, the frogs are singing their national

anthem again. And then the next line is, I never knew a ditch could hold so much joy. That was Wynne Everham, a professor of ecology at Florida Gulf Coast University, and the sounds of a chorus of frogs in Sarasota this week. This audio postcard was produced by WUSF's Kerry Sheridan. Well, that's our program for today.

The Florida Roundup is produced by WLRN Public Media in Miami and WUSF Public Media in Tampa. The show is produced by wlrn public media in miami and wusf public media in tampa the show is produced by bridget o'brien and grayson doctor wlrn's vice president of radio and our technical director is peter maz engineering help from doug peterson charles michaels jackson harp and blake bass richard ives answers the phones our theme music is provided by miami jazz guitarist aaron libos at aaronlibibos.com. If you missed any of today's show, you can download it and past programs at wlrn.org slash podcast. Thanks for calling in and listening. Hi, this is Tom Hudson. Every Friday on the Florida Roundup, you can expect discussion, not disinformation.

Hi there, I'm a family therapist. This is a First Amendment violation. Revelations, not empty rhetoric. Today I just found out that I was eligible for $23 a month in food stamps. And even some surprises. Dr. Brown, you helped deliver my baby, and I owe you my life. Oh, wow. It's the Florida Roundup, Fridays at noon.