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Citizens Property Insurance gets 5.4 percent rate hike

TALLAHASSEE -- Florida-backed Citizens Property Insurance Corp. has received approval to raise rates by 5.4 percent for homeowner coverage that includes hurricanes.

Insurance Commissioner Kevin McCarty announced Friday he had signed an order establishing new rates for Citizens, the state's largest property insurer with about one million policies.

McCarty rejected a proposal from one of the state's major business lobbies to increase homeowner rates by the full 10 percent allowed by law.

Besides homeowner policies, McCarty approved increases of 8.8 percent for residential rental properties, 1.7 percent for mobile homeowners, 2.1 percent for commercial mobile home physical damage and 10.2 percent for residential condominium associations.

Florida voters want offshore oil drilling, oppose a ``public option'' for health insurance and overwhelmingly support a gambling agreement with the Seminole Tribe, according to a new Miami Herald/St. Petersburg Times/Bay News 9 poll.

The common link among the three issues: the economy.

A full 44 percent of Florida voters said their personal financial situation worsened in the past year. Just 7 percent said it improved, and 48 percent said it stayed the same in a state racked by record unemployment, home foreclosures and budget deficits. By double-digit margins, Florida voters also believe the state and nation are on the wrong track.

With numbers like that, oil drilling is no longer a killer in Florida politics. And even the religious right supports a Seminole gaming deal -- favored by 59 percent of voters overall -- to bolster the state budget.

Healthcare ranked as the top concern, with 39 percent of voters saying it was most important to them. The No. 2 issue: unemployment, at 19 percent.

Yet 47 percent of voters said they opposed a health insurance ``public option'' proposed by congressional Democrats, who say it will increase coverage and lower skyrocketing insurance costs. Just 40 percent of Florida voters said they favored a public option.

``Voters are looking at . . . how healthcare reform impacts their personal pocketbooks,'' said pollster Kellyanne Conway. ``It's not just about a tug at the heart strings. It's not about providing insurance for the uninsured or improving the system . . . Most Floridians are looking at healthcare reform through an economic prism.''

Conway points out that voters who could be expected to support the public option -- those whose personal finances have worsened -- are more likely to oppose the government-run plan.

The poll surveyed 600 registered voters by phone Oct. 25-28, for The Miami Herald, St. Petersburg Times and Bay News 9. The poll was done by Schroth, Eldon and Associates, whose clients primarily are Democrats, and the Polling Co., which mainly works with Republicans. The poll's error margin is 4 percentage points.

FOR AND AGAINST

Democratic voters were overwhelmingly in favor of the public option, 62 to 24 percent. But Republicans opposed it by an even bigger spread, 74 to 16 percent.

Independent voters, who ultimately decide elections in Florida, tended to side with Republicans in opposing the public option, 46 to 38 percent.

Rick Nelson, a landscaper with no party affiliation from Deltona, echoed Republicans in saying that he wanted the government to stay out of healthcare as much as possible.

``We've got enough welfare going on in this country,'' Nelson said. ``All this is, is another type of welfare.''

The poll also shows there's a demographic and geographic divide on the issues.

White voters opposed the public option the most. Minority voters -- blacks and Hispanics -- tend to lack insurance more than whites and favored the public option by double-digit margins.

Voters younger than 35 were the only age group to favor the public option, which was also supported more by people who had children in the home.

Democratic-heavy South Florida -- which has a high rate of the uninsured -- was the only region where voters favored a public option, by a 54 to 37 percent margin. Voters from Republican-heavy Southwest Florida opposed the public option by the biggest margin, 30 to 50 percent.

U.S. and Colombian officials Friday signed a treaty seeing U.S. military landing to Colombian bases that has been vociferously denounced by Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez and opposed leftist Latin American presidents through a regional objection negotiated guidance secret.

The 10-year decision for the use of at least seven Colombian military bases due to operations against drug traffickers and leftist guerrillas was signed in Bogotá by U.S. Ambassador Bill Brownfield and the Colombian ministers of foreign affairs, defense and justice.

Foreign Affairs Minister Jaime Bermúdez said the full matter of the pact would equal made federal and sent to organic Latin American governments, underlining the tensions unleashed this summer when the Bogotá media published details of the negotiations for the deal.

U.S. and Colombian officials verbalize the talks began connections 2006, after Ecuadorean President Rafael Correa declared he would not consent the U.S. military to use the Manta airstrip on the quiet as a form for counter-drug flights when that accord expired leverage 2009.

A stabilize at last in Colombia immediately came adulthood thanks to a possible replacement, several U.S. government officials told El Nuevo Herald, though unbroken spoken they could not relive whether the U.S. or Colombian plane first raised the issue.

Formal negotiations began sway mid-2008 seeing the boon of the Palanquero mindtrip stunt inaugurate as a replacement for Manta. But the talks also took up the consolidation of a string of diverse previous arrangements for the movement of U.S. troops under the so-called liveliness Colombia.

``We had a sturdy but ad hoc progression of arrangements . . . that required a lot of maintenance,'' said a top Obama administration plain who monitors Latin American affairs. ``We wanted to formalize the existing relationship.''

The idiosyncratic primary else item on the agreement would be the Palanquero base, the official added, asking for anonymity to speak frankly on the controversial topic.

Colombia was breezy to oblige, according to both sides.

With the Plan Colombia aid winding down, and Chávez in beside Venezuela buying sophisticated weaponry, Colombian President Alvaro Uribe wanted to keep his U.S. allies close.

``The talks start when Correa announces he wants Manta past. At the common time, Colombia is looking for a larger relationship with us considering of the Venezuelan threat,'' said a Bush administration real who also asked being anonymity in that he was not authorized to respond on the subject.

Several of the U.S. officials interviewed for this story said it was the Colombians who asked that the talks stand for kept secret -- not even the U.S. convention was fully briefed -- and it was the Bogotá feature that leaked corporal to the news media this summer, sparking an uproar around Latin America.

Chávez, who has long alleged the U.S military is planning to gather his country, instantly denounced the agreement, saying that ``the winds of war'' were blowing through the girth. ``We didn't want to buy weapons, but what could we do settle if the Yanquis are establishing seven military bases,'' he said leadership a speech Sept. 14.

``These are things that endanger the whole region,'' Ecuador's Correa declared. ``What if later we put nuclear warheads repercussion Ecuador and declare them to be a matter of down home security?''

Presidents Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva of Brazil and Michelle Bachelet of Chile initially echoed the Chávez besides Correa concerns but toned estranged their statements neighboring Washington assured them the U.S. facilities would not put on used owing to bases for operations against other countries.

The decision owing to the U.S. ``cooperative security locations'' covers Palanquero and two far cry opinion bases, two naval bases, two army bases ``and other units that would mean necessary,'' according to Colombian information media reports.

Colombia commit retain full control of the bases and the current hat on the U.S. military presence there -- 800 soldiers and 600 exposal aggregation -- will advance the same, according to the State Department. The U.S. facilities entrust not think any violation capabilities, but may warehouse humanitarian supplies for disasters.

The pact must imitate submitted to the U.S. congress, but the Uribe subjection is arguing that unaffected does not pressure distinctive approval agency Bogotá for it merely extends current agreements.