Florida News That Impacts You – August 12th, 2024
Bottom Line: Your daily recap of the biggest news from around the state that impacts you in South Florida.
- Today is the first day of school for most school districts across the state including The Palm Beach, Martin and Indian River County School Districts. A host of new education laws passed during this year's state legislative session that took effect July 1st will be in use for the first time including enhanced security policies, more restrictions on book challenges, additional opportunities for military families and students seeking military careers and greater local control of school districts. Related...
- All of Palm Beach County’s high schools will begin the year with metal detectors in place following last year’s pilot programming and phased in rollout at select high schools. Also, Palm Beach County has installed vape detectors at select schools picking up on a test program used by the Indian River County School District last year, and that has been expanded by the school district entering this year. The detectors are used in bathrooms and send alerts to principals and vice principals if vaping is detected.
- Over a million Floridians have voted in Florida’s August primaries already. With the onset of early voting over the weekend about 1.4 million Floridians had voted either by returned vote by mail ballots or early voting in advance of Florida’s August 20th primaries. Republicans have outvoted Democrats by about 43,000 votes statewide. Early voting continues daily throughout this week. Palm Beach County is operating early voting locations from 7 am to 7 pm. In Martin County early voting is available from 8 am until 5 pm daily and Indian River County is operating early voting locations from 8 am until 4 pm.
- Hot again today with highs in the lower 90’s. Temperatures will be about 5 degrees warmer than usual for this date. The National Hurricane Center is tracking a potential tropical cyclone in the Southern Atlantic that will be approaching the Leeward Islands tomorrow. The system is expected to develop into a tropical storm while crossing the Leeward Islands and eastern Puerto Rico before breaking towards the north as a likely hurricane. It is not a threat to Florida.
- Gas prices fell through the weekend and are 14 cents lower than a week ago. The average price for regular unleaded in Florida is currently $3.32 per gallon. In Palm Beach County the average price is $3.50 per gallon, in Martin the average is $3.33 and in Indian River County the average is $3.34 per gallon.