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Nearly 200 Laws To Take Effect

New rules range from no more boot camps to doggie dining outdoors

June 30, 2006

By BILL KACZOR
The Associated Press

TALLAHASSEE -- Militarystyle juvenile boot camps will be abolished. Public colleges and universities will be barred from sponsoring trips to countries labeled as terrorist states. Public schools will get a lot more money. Dogs may get to dine at some outdoor restaurants.

Those are among the outcomes of nearly 200 new laws, some quirky and others serious, that will go into effect Saturday.

Residential facilities for juvenile offenders will replace the state's remaining boot camps under a law passed because of the death of a teenager who was roughed up by guards. Physical discipline will be prohibited and the focus will be on education, job training, community service and counseling.

The Martin Lee Anderson Act is named for the 14-year-old boy who died after being pummeled by guards at a boot camp in Panama City. Many lawmakers reacted angrily after viewing a video recording that showed the guards manhandling the youngster, who appeared limp for most of the ordeal.

"The biggest thing that's going to change is the atmosphere at the facilities," said the law's sponsor, Rep. Gus Barreiro, R-Miami Beach. "They also know that everybody's watching these programs more than ever."

The boot camps had operated largely out of public view, he said.

"Unfortunately, it took Martin Lee Anderson's death in order to lift that veil of secrecy," Barreiro said.

An initial autopsy report found Anderson's death was natural, caused by complications of a usually harmless blood disorder called sickle cell trait. His body then was exhumed and a second autopsy came to a different conclusion: He had died of suffocation because guards had covered his mouth while forcing ammonia capsules up his nose trying to revive him.

In Polk County the local boot camp will now be under the program dubbed STAR for Sheriffs' Training and Respect.

The STAR program will bring some changes to Polk County's boot camp, but not a lot, Polk Sheriff Grady Judd has said.

Judd said the Polk County boot camp already is in line with most of STAR's new guidelines, including getting a physical by a registered nurse when entering and leaving the program and having a hotline number to make complaints of abuse from guards.

"We already list those hotlines for the Department of Children and Families and the Department of Juvenile Justice," Judd said. "Our best practices are right at 90 to 95 percent. (Other) boot camps will do more changes or additions than we will."

 

 

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