Florida News That Impacts You – May 26th, 2026
Bottom Line: Your daily recap of the biggest news from around the state that impacts you throughout the Palm Beaches and Treasure Coast.
- Governor DeSantis signed the Extracurricular Activities and Athletics in Public K-12 Schools bills into law. The new laws allow school districts to use funds raised from high school booster clubs for activities to pay the coaches of those activities, supplementing their district compensation. Authorize school districts to classify athletic coaches and activity sponsors of extracurricular activities as administrative personnel and negotiate salary compensation that may not exceed the highest paid school administrator in the school district. Revises student eligibility and participation requirements across all school choice options for interscholastic and interscholastic extracurricular activities, including athletics, by defining key terms and establishing an “eligible student” framework for home education, charter, private, Florida Virtual School, alternative, and traditional public-school students. Authorizes students who wish to participate in a sport that their current school does not currently offer to participate in that sport in another school in their district. Authorizes K-12 head coaches to use up to $15,000 in personal funds per year to support student-athlete welfare. Coaches will be required to report the use of personal funds to the Florida High School Athletic Association.
- Blue Origin has announced a significant expansion of operations at Cape Canaveral. As part of a $600 million campus expansion at Rocket Park, Blue Origin will hire 500 additional aerospace employees – with an average salary above $98,000 annually, bringing the company’s footprint to over 4,000 employees.
- It’ll be warm, mostly sunny, with a chance of a passing shower and gusty today – especially along the coast with highs in the upper 80’s – a little warmer than usual for this date. Similar weather is expected on Wednesday.
- The price of gas continued lower through the Memorial Day weekend. The average price for regular unleaded fuel is currently $4.32 per gallon statewide – 11 cents lower than a week ago - though prices remain higher locally. In Palm Beach County the average price is $4.50 per gallon, in Martin the average is $4.29, it’s $4.36 in St. Lucie, and in Indian River County the average is $4.38 per gallon.