>>This week on NewsNight, part two of our look back at some of the top stories of 2023, including affordable housing, homeowners insurance and permitless carry.

Plus, a discussion about the future of space exploration with a retired shuttle astronaut.

NewsNight starts now.

[MUSIC] Hello, I'm Steve Mort, and welcome to NewsNight.

With the help of journalists from across central Florida, we've covered some of the biggest issues facing our community over the last 12 months.

Let's start the final program of 2023 with affordable housing.

Rent continued to skyrocket this year, leaving many people struggling to make ends meet.

As wages once again failed to keep up with inflation.

Several Florida markets continue to experience the highest inflation rates in the nation.

In an attempt to try to solve the affordability crisis, lawmakers this year passed the Live Local Act.

The legislation allocated more than $700 million for workforce housing, including incentives for developers to build affordable units.

But the laws provision preempting local rent controls, drew the ire of critics.

NewsNight's Krystel Knowles shared the stories of people directly impacted by the soaring rental prices.

>>Single mother of four Charlotte Pierre, represents the changing face of the affordable housing crisis.

Despite working since graduating high school, Pierre found herself without a place to call home priced out of the rental market.

>>I finished high school, but all I can get was like 15, maybe $16 an hour.

And even if you do overtime, you know, it's not going to show an apartment that you need or a house with your kids is going to cover two times the rent.

And so I said, okay, I'm going to work, you know, for 15-16 hour an hour in a warehouse and then go waitress on weekends at like Waffle House.

But I can't document the cash, so I don't have any proof to show these apartments.

>>Pierce says she wasn't able to qualify for a designated affordable rental for a family of five, so she was forced to live in an Airbnb before moving back in with her parents.

Experts we spoke to for the story say cases like this are becoming ever more common.

They tell us working Floridians are increasingly experiencing homelessness, in part because wages are failing to keep up with the cost of finding a place to live.

Bob Kramp leads Housing for Homeless, an organization that helps people in poverty find accommodations.

He says Charlotte Pierre was lucky to qualify for one of his group's 93 units, amid a shortfall of 350,000 affordable housing units in Brevard County.

Kramp says normally people would transition out of those units into their own places within a couple of years.

Now, many cannot afford to leave.

>>The definition of affordable, according to HUD, is if you don't pay more than 30% of your income for housing.

Under that definition, their idea of affordable housing is fine for anybody as long as they're earning over 84,000 a year.

>>Normally, rental prices go up annually anywhere between 3 to 5%.

But according to Florida Realtors, within the past two years of rental prices went up 36%.

Brevard realtor Elise Brown says this situation is forcing people to either get roommates, move in with relatives, or risk homelessness.

She says tenants used to rent to save money for a down payment on a house.

Now, she says, high prices in the housing market, combined with rising rents, leave people with few options.

>>There are a lot of people that need to rent now that can't afford to buy a home, so the landlords feel that they can just raise rents astronomically and have no consequences.

>>Meanwhile, another demographic struggling in the current affordable housing crunch.

Seniors on a fixed income.

Mary Foreman tried to move out of her sister's house but ran into roadblocks.

But after putting in the work, she qualified for a Habitat for Humanity home.

What I'm paying now is $1,222 a month.

So had I gone out and got an apartment, a one bedroom apartment would have cost me $1,500 dollars plus.

The prices were ridiculous.

>>Krystel Knowles reporting.

But we discussed this issue with journalist Joe Mario Pederson of 90.7 WMFE News and former Spectrum News 13 reporter Molly Duerig.

Molly, let's start with a live local act.

Just outline what's in that bill.

The legislators are likely to take up early in the session, right?

>>Right.

So SB 102 or the Live Local Act, as is being described as a comprehensive workforce housing strategy statewide, it would inject a record amount of funding into our state's Sadowski funds, which incentivize the development of new affordable housing and provide for rental assistance in a wide variety of ways, it would inject, I think, one and a half billion over the next ten years.

It also, interestingly, would remove some preemption.

So basically it would encourage expediting the development of new affordable housing.

Usually local governments kind of have to go through lengthy administrative processes like rezoning if they want to develop affordable housing.

Well, this would kind of buy it would allow them to bypass those in certain areas under certain criteria, not in residential areas.

Interestingly, another thing that's gotten a lot of attention is it would permanently ban rent control in the state of Florida.

So that's gotten a lot of criticism.

>>And the state has been accused in the past, of course, of raiding that Sadowski Fund for other priorities.

So, Joe Mario, that brings me on to you.

Some Democrats have called this a corporate giveaway and they also object to this this this ban on local authorities imposing rent controls.

What are their main objections here?

>>So the main objection is how you define affordability.

And they're setting affordability at 120% of an area's income.

And they're saying that that's going to have varying impacts throughout the state.

What's affordable in Miami, you know, apartment one by one, apartment that's like $2,200 a month is not affordable in other places throughout the state.

Right.

So that state precedent is what they're saying could be problematic.

>>Yeah.

Molly, as you mentioned, this bill bars local authorities from imposing those those rent controls.

Orange County voters, right.

Passed the rent stabilization ordinance that's been blocked at the courts.

In the courts.

We've talked about that a lot here on the show.

Remind us what that ordinance did and where it stands legally right now.

>>So that ordinance that Orange County voters passed by about 60% of the vote-- >>Yeah it was a big margin, right?

>>Yes.

It would have temporarily stopped rent control over a certain amount.

So it wouldn't have stopped.

All right.

Sorry.

Rental increases over a certain amount.

So it wouldn't have been a blanket stop on rent control.

It would've been a one year temporary restriction on raising rents above a particular amount.

So right now, it's it's been held up in the courts, as you said.

So right now, the supervisor of elections is not allowed to certify that vote.

It's not allowed to.

So basically can't be enforced.

>>And it was controversial even on the on the county commission.

I know the mayor was was skeptical about about whether it was the right thing to do.

Joe Mario, the existing statute in Florida says there's got to be a housing emergency, right.

In order to to impose rent controls.

And that's been the main sticking point for Orange County.

I think when it comes to trying to see this challenge off in the courts.

But this new legislation would ban these controls under any circumstances.

Why do the bill's supporters say that rent controls would be so damaging for the market?

>>So they're saying basically that it would deincentivize landlords and developers from doing more.

So specifically for developers.

For them, it would dissuade them from creating more in the supply.

Right.

So you would have this shortage of housing, right.

And that would increase rent in other places.

>>The Live Local Act says a housing development must be approved if 40% or more of the units are considered affordable, even if it's located in a commercial or industrial area.

It includes property tax incentives and a sales tax exemption for affordable housing developments.

Well, be sure to join the conversation on social media we're at WUCFTV on Facebook, X, and also on Instagram.

Staying with housing.

And this year or more attempts by legislators to tackle Florida's homeowners insurance crisis.

Farmers and at least six other companies stopped writing policies in Florida this year.

I spoke with former Republican state Senator Jeff Brandis, who now heads the Florida Policy Project and then discussed the issue further with Beth Kassab from the Winston Voice and Chris Heath from WFTV, Channel 9.

>>We have to get to a place where insurance companies can make money.

Unfortunately for the last four years, they've lost $1,000,000,000 every year throughout the industry.

Nobody's going to invest in companies that are losing billion dollars as an industry a year.

And what we see now is what, 10-12 property insurers leave the state over the last two years, Citizens growing from half a million policies just six or seven years ago to almost 2 million policies by the end of this year, potentially putting Floridians on the risk for almost $800 billion of insured properties.

That's unsustainable.

And frankly, one large Category one or Category two storm could put put a place in a place where Floridians are having to bail out the Citizens Property Insurance company.

That isn't sustainable either.

Ultimately, we need more companies to come in.

The way that they're going to do that is if they can write profitable business without the government putting its foot on their throat.

>>And by unhappy coincidence maybe Farmer's insurance this week announced it would no longer be writing new policies or renewing existing ones in our state.

The move impacts some 100,000 Floridians.

In a statement, Farmers wrote, "We've advised the Florida Office of Insurance Regulation OIR of our decision to discontinue offering farmers branded auto home and umbrella policies in the state.

This business decision was necessary to effectively manage risk exposure.

Farmers offers insurance through several different brands, and this decision applies only to policies issued through our exclusive agency distribution channel.

There is no impact to 70% of policies currently in force for customers in the state."

In a letter to Farmers, Florida's insurance commissioner wrote, "We want to directly express on disappointment regarding how this decision was communicated.

While the office recognize these companies need to make operational changes to books, if business OIR always appreciates the opportunity to discuss these complex issues prior to receiving notifications of this nature.

All right.

Well, we have Chris in the studio and we always like to talk about insurance when you're here.

Chris, Florida's insurance industry is in such a state that this particular story has been making national news this week.

How big a deal would you say 100,000 policies is for the market?

>>I mean, in the market scope, it's a drop in the bucket in the continuing narrative of six companies having gone insolvent.

AIG pulling back on what it's doing in Florida now, farmers pulling out of Florida.

It's bad.

It's really bad.

An interview with a former governor, current U.S.

Senator Rick Scott, this morning.

And he was lamenting the cost of insurance.

Now, granted, his house is a little bit nicer than mine.

His roof is probably much better than mine, and he could probably afford his policy better than I can mine.

But the fact that it's cutting across, it doesn't matter where you live, who you are in the state of Florida, whether you're buying or renting, you're paying for this because even if you're renting a house, the person who owns that house is paying for a level of insurance.

Not exactly the same, but it's within that same kind of umbrella.

So this is hitting everyone and it's making the state more and more unaffordable.

We got new inflation numbers this week, and inflation in the United States is trending down, obviously, a good thing, but Florida continues to be the outlier.

We are above the national average.

So for as much crowing as Florida does about how good our economy is and it is good, we are now the outlier when it comes to inflation because everyone else is heading in another direction.

We're staying.

That's bad.

This makes it worse.

I don't know how this situation resolves itself any time soon.

And I will tell you this.

Having had conversations with both current and former lawmakers, the remarks by the CFO, Jimmy Patronis about going after farmers for their decision doesn't help the situation, because what that does is, one, Farmers is leaving.

Either way, they're making a business decision, but going after them online and saying, you know, we're going to explore options.

We don't like it when it's handled this way.

The message you're sending to other insurance providers who might be looking at Florida is why would I want to do business there?

If we try and leave the state will come after us?

We'll take a pass.

>>Well, Beth let's talk a bit about some of the reaction.

And Chris mentioned the CFO, Jimmy Patronis there saying Farmers is more interested in playing politics than running a successful company is accused of virtue signaling well on its way to becoming the Bud Light of insurance is what is what Jimmy Patronis says of the farmers.

But have we heard anything specifically about what the state might do now in response?

>>You know, we haven't I mean, over a number of years that this crisis has been building and there have been plenty of warning signs about this and very little action taken.

You know, we we knew that was going to reach this point, but there's still not a true plan.

The legislature has still not fully addressed this.

And the reaction we're hearing from state officials is counterintuitive, because absolutely, if you look back over the last 20 years on any economic development efforts within the state of Florida, the focus has always been on how the cost of doing business is.

Business here is so low, you know, labor costs-- >>Business friendly environment.

>>Business friendly environment, low taxes.

But these costs are very real.

They're building every year at an unsustainable rate.

And I think Floridians are going to demand some actual plan, an actual plan and actual action.

>>Beth, Governor DeSantis has addressed this issue, saying we should knock on wood for this season.

And he believes or hopes that Farmers will return after hurricane season.

I mean, this issue has gotten political quickly, right.

As you talked about there.

Are there likely ramifications for Florida leaders from this?

>>Oh, I think so.

I mean, this is politicians like to talk about pocketbook issues.

And this is just a classic case of that.

I mean, just personally, I had to renew my policy very recently.

And the costs are astronomical.

And you can't really shop like you used to because you go to another company.

I actually even personally called Farmers before this announcement was made and they tried to push me into it and to Citizens Insurance.

>>The insurer of last resort.

>>Yes.

So, you know, that's what people are finding when they're just, you know, at the kitchen table trying to, you know, find a deal, try to save some money.

And ultimately that's going to add up to a huge problem for the state's economy.

But when people feel it and I think they already are with the potential of a lot of worsening out there, that is going to be on the ballot.

>>This month, Governor Ron DeSantis signed a bill that forces citizens, policyholders to move to private insurers that offer policies up to 20% more expensive than the insurer of last resort.

And the Florida Office of Insurance Regulation approved four new property insurance companies this year in a further effort to stabilize the market.

Next tonight, gun laws in Florida.

A new concealed carry law this year removed the need to obtain a permit in Florida.

Firearms training is also no longer required.

It triggered a heated debate among lawmakers as the changes made their way through the legislature.

>>Are you aware that guns are right now the leading cause of death of children in America?

>>Senator Berman there are statistics on many sides of this equation that can be cherry picked and there are many causes.

And as a dad and someone who takes that very serious, we are all for responsible gun ownership.

And and that's why we're doing this.

>>So if guns are causing children to die, don't you think we should be doing something to limit guns, access to guns, rather than increase it?

>>No, I do not.

There is a constitutional right to keep and bear arms, and that is what we're fighting for right now.

That is what our discussion is on.

We cannot make or legislate people to make wise decisions.

But ignorance and making poor choices is something that is an individual responsibility and right.

>>I discussed this issue with Daralene Jones from WFTV, Channel 9, Curtis McCloud from Spectrum News 13 and Joe Mario Pedersen from 90.7 WMFE News.

Critics of permitless carry say that these efforts in the legislature will increase gun violence.

How do gun control advocates and even some gun retailers draw that conclusion?

>>Well, essentially, it's very interesting because they think that it will do what is actually already being done.

People are already carrying guns without a permit.

And so I think it just depends on where you are on either side of this.

You know, people are going to get a gun if they want to have a gun with or without a permit.

And it begs the question of are the people who are getting the permits, the ones out there committing the violent crimes, or is it the people who are going to decide to get a gun anyway by any means necessary who are actually out there committing the crimes?

And so it's, you know.

>>Yeah, it's a it's a discussion.

Curtis, final word to you.

The Florida Sheriffs Association and the Florida Police Chiefs Association, I think back permitless carry.

Why would law enforcement agencies support such a move if critics are right that it would increase gun violence?

>>I think it goes back to kind of what Daralene was saying.

People are going to get get a gun and those few that want them are going to get them.

And also those people.

A lot of people do have guns without permits anyway already.

So they're they're their thought process is along those lines that, you know, without with a government piece of paper, you're not going to be able that's that's it's not a a sign of responsible gun ownership.

>>It's sort of maybe maybe popular and something that's-- >>Checking a box.

>>Right.

And that's exactly that's exactly what it's doing.

You know, for most people who have pretty much already crossed that threshold already anyway.

>>Lawmakers could try again in 2024 to pass legislation to reduce the minimum age requirement for owning a gun from 21 to 18.

Political watchers also expect open carry to return to the agenda in Tallahassee.

A reminder, be sure to head on over to our website to see this or any previous episode of NewsNight Plus, lots more content.

Visit us online, wucf.org/newsnight along the bottom of your screen.

Finally tonight, a record year of launches from the Space Coast as commercial companies led the way on missions to low-Earth orbit.

NASA's continue to press ahead with its Artemis program.

To talk about how the space program has changed and what Artemis means to Florida, I sat down with retired shuttle astronaut Winston Scott.

He's also a professor emeritus at Florida Tech in Melbourne and the author of the book Reflections from Earth Orbit.

Did you ever think space exploration was going to become the commercial business that it is today?

And we see these businesses sprouting up on the space Coast all the time.

Did that ever occur to you that that would be the way space would go?

>>Yes, I had no doubt about it.

I had no doubt about it.

One of my jobs after my active duty days was directing what was called the Florida Space Authority.

Some people may recognize that as Space Florida now.

That's why it's called Space Florida now.

Yeah, it used to be called the Florida Space Authority.

Governor Bush Jeb Bush was in office at that time.

I directed it for three years.

And what we pushed for then was for the facilities, the government facilities to be opened up to.

And we encourage commercial space companies to come in and launch from the space Coast.

So what we see happening now, many of us I was only one of many people push for it back then because it doesn't surprise me at all that the private commercial companies are coming in and they're partnering with NASA and they're doing such a good job.

They're doing exactly what private commercial companies should do.

They're making access to space cost effective, more efficient, and so on.

>>But that's a good strategy, you think, for NASA to sort of hand over those kind of low-Earth orbit, day to day operations to commercial?

>>Yes, exactly.

Because NASA's we need a good, strong program to go off and do cutting edge, esoteric exploration type things.

But once they become routine, the companies that can make them cost effective, which are people who do business, the business men and women, the Elon Musk, the Jeff Bezos, those people know know how to do business.

And they're doing exactly what what we hope they would do.

>>Well, what do you see the role of NASA going forward now with Artemis, especially as sort of commercial interests seem to, as you mentioned there, Elon Musk and yes, SpaceX seem to harbor sort of similar ambitions for the moon and Mars.

Yeah, I see it.

Well the role of NASA's still NASA's still the leading agency for space exploration.

That's the government agency.

And NASA is still leading us back towards the moon and off the Mars.

But as you say, you know, we see Space X and some of some of the others saying, hey, you know what, we're going to take our own parallel path.

And that's a look out.

We may get there before you do.

So as we speak, I think we need a strong NASA leading the exploration part of it.

But we do have the commercial companies coming along that would want to do that same thing.

I think what's going to be a limiting factor is the end goal.

I admire what our commercial partners are doing.

Again, I push for it back in the day, but bottom line is they going to have to turn a profit.

They're going to have to make money.

That's what they're in business for and that's what we want them to do.

>>Expensive, expensive, though right?

>>But turning a profit is not always consistent with exploration.

When you explore, you don't know what you're going to find.

You sink dollars into it.

It may be decades before there's a there may never be a payoff.

So that's why you need a government agency.

The government can put money in the things we explore at some point down the road.

It pays off.

But commercial companies, private companies, they can only put so much into exploration.

That's where the dividing line, I think, is going to come.

But I like a lot of good, healthy competition and I think it's a good thing.

>>They can certainly use government grants and things to to to explore low-Earth orbit and some deep space.

That's a whole.

>>Exactly.

>>A whole.

>>And even off to the moon, because we have been to the moon before, you know, this is it.

We haven't done it in 50 years, but it's been done before.

So the companies that come like, I want to go to the moon, they don't have to start from ground zero.

The start from scratch.

They can still build on on technology that has already been developed.

>>NASA's made a point to ensure diversity in its Artemis II crew, reflecting sort of, I guess, the the advances in America since that the sixties and seventies.

I mean, how important do you think diversity is in these endeavors to sort of establish particularly a permanent base on the lunar surface?

Is that important?

>>Absolutely.

I think diversity is important and diverse is important in everything we do in this country, because if our country is going to be strong, if we're going to maintain a leadership position in the world, we have to tap all of our pools of talent.

Pools of talent lie in diverse, diverse places.

You know, you only have one race or one gender or one age group that has all the talent you have to tap everybody.

And that's where diversity comes in.

So I'm not so much thinking about diversity just for the sake of how things look.

That's important too, because that's inspirational to young people.

But the pool of talent, again, is a diversity, and we need to dip out of that entire pool so our country can be strong for everybody.

>>I mean, I guess as humans look for that place in the universe.

>Yes.

>>We as we move further and further away from us.

You want a proper representation of humans.

>>Well, we do.

Absolutely.

Yeah, but to get to that point again, we need to dip in that entire pool of talent.

And the talent is come from a diverse group of people, not just one segment of the population.

>>There hadn't been an African-American in the space of back to the 1980s.

Now we have Victor Glover.

He's right, the first black astronaut to go to the moon.

You know, how do you see the significance of that and can that be an important moment?

>>Well, it is an important moment.

Again, I think it's symbolic in many ways.

One way is to say to young people of color coming up that, look, it is possible for you this this, this endeavor, this occupation is available to you if you choose to do it.

If you qualify for it is not something that's that's so far that that's out of reach.

I think that's the message we want to send and not just to African-Americans, but to all of our people across America, across the world.

You know, space should belong to everybody and everyone should have an opportunity to to reach space, either as a professional or as a tourist or whatever it is.

So so Victor's selection is is is symbolic in that way, in that he represents a group that's underrepresented and he's inspirational to others.

>>2024 will be an important year for the Space Coast as NASA's plans to launch its crewed Artemis II mission for a moon flyby, possibly in November.

Well, that's all the time we have for this week and this year.

In the meantime, from all of us here at NewsNight we hope you have a great new year and we'll see you next week for our first program of 2024.

Take care.