Legislative Update
 
A Message From Your Lobbyist...
I am honored to represent the Professional Opticians of Florida as your lobbyist in Tallahassee. I’ve been involved in the Legislative process now for over 37 years. I served for nine years in the Florida House of Representatives and then 11 years in the Florida Senate, and, after the required two years of retirement from the Legislature, I’ve been back up in Tallahassee lobbying.
This year’s Session in Tallahassee was one of the wildest that I’ve experienced in general, and certainly was the most active for Opticians during the time that I’ve been representing the POF.
First let me discuss why the Session was so different. This year, as has been the case for many years, the House of Representatives, the Senate, and the Governor were all Republicans. Unlike in most prior years, tis year there was bitter disagreement between the House, the Senate, and the Governor. Although at the beginning of Session the House and Senate were united against the Governor, by the end of the Session, all three were fighting each other. As I write this Message, the Regular Session of the Legislature, which was supposed to end by May 2, with the passage of the Florida Budget for 2025-2026, has either been extended or will have a Special Session. The House and Senate have not yet even begun the Conference process to try and pass the budget, because they have been deadlocked on the Tax package. They can’t begin to determine what they’ll spend in different areas until they know how much they’ll have to spend in total, which will be determined by the passage of the Tax package. The House has been investigating the Governor and Attorney General for acts which the House claims were illegal. The House and Senate are fighting with each other over both the tax package and the priority bills for both the Speaker and the President. As I write this, no one really knows what will happen.
This was also by far the busiest year for Opticianry during my many years of representing the POF. We both pushed to pass Legislation that would have aided opticianry and also fought against Legislation that would have hurt Opticianry.
First, we sought to pass Legislation amending Florida Statutes 484.011 and 484.018 that would have clarified that only licensed Opticians can supervise non-licensed personnel, and eliminated the exceptions that permit Optometrists and Ophthalmologists from “supervising” the non-licensed personnel or Opticianry Apprentices. We know that in today’s market model, most Optometrists and Ophthalmologists practice in separate areas from Opticians, and simply don’t have the time, ability, or interest to provide supervision for people in a different area of eye care. Although the Doctors have great skill in eye care, it’s simply in a different area than licensed Opticians practice in.
We were successful in drafting this legislation and getting Republican Senator Rodriguez and Democratic Representative Aristide to file identical Bills (SB1544 and HB1323) to file these bills which would have protected the Public and fulfilled the goals mentioned above. This involved a great amount of work, including drafting and amending the Legislation, finding Legislators willing to sponsor it, drafting talking points for the Legislators, finding POF members willing to come to Tallahassee to support and speak in favor of these bills, drafting and reviewing speeches for those POF members that came to Tallahassee, etc. We even were able to get Senator Rodriguez to have her bill heard in the Senate Committee. Unfortunately, that hearing didn’t turn out as we’d hoped.
I had cautioned that if the Optometrists and Ophthalmologists, and/or the optical chains came out strongly in opposition to this bill, that it could be tough to pass. Any one of those three groups spend much more on Lobbyists and Campaign Contributions than the POF does. One of the reasons that we filed this bill was to see if they would come out strongly against us, or if they’d acquiesce and let this bill pass without objection. Well, we found out. All of them came out strongly against our bills. They mislead the Committee and the Senators. One Senator said that he’d been told that there were only 400 Opticians in the entire State, certainly not enough to let optical chains, Optometrists and Ophthalmologists fill eyeglass and contact prescriptions. The Staff analysis of the bill was incorrect, and even though Dee Pace and I met with the Staff attorney and corrected the Staff report the day after it came out, apparently members of the Committee hadn’t reviewed the amended Staff Analysis. Between the lobbying by the above three groups and the incorrect Staff report, even our Bill Sponsor became confused as to what the bill actually did, and the Bill was Postponed, effectively killing that bill.
Even though this bill didn’t pass, in many ways it was still a Victory for the POF and Opticianry. We drafted a bill, had it sponsored and heard, and showed to the Department of Health, the Board of Opticianry, the optical chains, Optometrists and Ophthalmologists that we have clout in Tallahassee. Even more, I was impressed beyond belief that so many members of the POF came to Tallahassee to speak on behalf of the bill, even though because of the confusion, most POF members didn’t get to speak. We will work with the Different groups and see if there is Legislation that we can pass that they can support.
We also had to oppose a set of bills, and we succeeded on this issue. As part of the Governor’s pledge to DOGE Florida, he proposed eliminating the Board of Opticianry, along with 4 other Boards as part of SB1270/HB1299. That bill also eliminates 7 advisory Councils, as part of the Governor’s goal to eliminate 70 State Boards, Councils, Committees, etc. Opticianry would still be a regulated profession, but would be directly under the Department of Health, instead of Having the Board of Opticianry, which would report to the Department of Health. The POF strongly opposed this. We believe that it would be the first step towards deregulation, it would take away any of our ability to have advocates for opticianry making the rules, and it would put people who only vaguely know what opticianry is in charge of making the Rules, designing the criteria for Continuing education and testing, etc. We let Legislators and Legislative Staff know of our objections to this bill, and an amendment was filed to the bill removing the elimination of all 11 Boards, Councils, Committees, etc., from these two bills. I’m not claiming that the POF alone was responsible for the amendment removing the elimination of the Boards, etc., I assume that the other Boards Councils, and Committees also objected. What we know is that our side prevailed here, and we fought off these changes which would have hurt Consumers and Opticianry.
I’d particularly like to thank Dee Pace, the Executive Director of the POF, Laurie O’Keefe Pierce, the President of the POF, and all of the members of the POF that came to Tallahassee to speak on these issues, as well as the many members that wrote letters or emails to their Legislators. Dee and her team spent incredible amounts of hours working on these issues and representing the POF. Having members come up to Tallahassee and write their Legislators is an important step in making the POF more relevant in Tallahassee. I will also make a plea to all of you to please write Political Contributions to Opticians for Better Vision. We’ll never match the political contributions of any of the three groups mentioned above, but it’s important that we do something for Legislators that support our positions.
Steve Geller, Esq.
POF Lobbyist
Mayor, Broward County, FL
Former FL Senator
Geller Law Firm, PA
If you are not a member of the Professional Opticians of Florida, please join today. POF, membership with a purpose!! https://pof.org/Join-POF
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