Another 233,927 Floridian filed first-time claims for unemployment benefits during the week ended May 16, a report released Thursday by the U.S. Department of Labor said. Since mid-March, 2.2 million state residents have filed initial unemployment claims. Nationally, there were 2.4 million first-time claims for the week ended May 16. The advance seasonally adjusted insured unemployment rate was 17.2 percent for the week ending May 9, the Labor Department said.
Innisbrook in Palm Harbor will permanently lay off 433 employees on June 30. The golf and spa resort said in a May 15 Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification that cutting costs and aligning the business with customer demand is imperative for the future of the company. Innisbrook was supposed to host the Valspar Championship in March, before the event was cancelled by the PGA Tour. Innisbrok previously furloughed 490 workers on March 23, in response to stringent public health measures enacted to slow the spread of Covid-19. "Since March 23, 2020, when the furlough was implemented, Innisbrook has experienced a significant decline in demand in the hospitality industry, which will result in a dramatic decrease in revenue and resulted in the need to take further action with regard to our workforce," the WARN said. The affected employees include office workers as well as those in restaurant, spa and golf operations.
Short-term vacation rental properties in Pinellas County can resume accepting reservations and check-ins, effective immediately, after the county's safety plan was approved by the state Wednesday afternoon. Vacation rentals were among the businesses that closed during efforts to control the spread of Covid-19. In a letter to the state outlining the safety plan, County Administrator Barry Burton said tourism supported more than 100,000 jobs and contributed more than $9 billion to the local economy last year, and the diversity of lodging is key to bringing back employment and visitors. Property owners and managers will receive a copy of the plan outlining safety and sanitation measures that must be followed to reopen, according to a news release from the county. One requirement in the plan is that reservations from areas identified by Gov. DeSantis as high risk must be for periods longer than the required quarantine period.
First Citrus Bank in Tampa and First Home Bank in St. Petersburg both made American Bankers’ new list of top-performing community banks. The list is based on a a three-year average return on average equity, a measure that tells investors how efficiently a company is handling the money that shareholders contribute to it. First Citrus (OTC: FCIT) was the highest-ranked Florida bank, based on a three-year average return on average equity of 10.98 percent. First Citrus ranked No. 96 and was the only Florida community bank in the top 100. In a news release announcing the recognition, First Citrus said it has helped secure $106 million in Payroll Protection Program loans for more than 1,000 Tampa Bay businesses, with 92 percent of the loans going to businesses with less than 25 employees. First Home Bank, with a 10.07 three-year average return on average equity, ranked No. 140 on the list of top 200 community banks.
Minority communities in Florid are facing disproportionate impacts from the Covid-19 crisis, according to the findings of a statewide survey by University of South Florida and Nielsen. African Americans are significantly more likely than whites to have had their hours or pay cut or have been laid off and filed for unemployment, the Sunshine State survey found. Hispanics were twice as likely to report being laid off than non-Hispanics. Both African Americans and Hispanics were significantly more likely to express concerns about their ability to meet their financial obligations over the next three months, the survey found. Overall, economic anxiety is high among all Floridians, with more than 60 percent reporting they are concerned about their ability to meet their financial obligations over the next three months. See complete survey results here.
The average weekly wage in Pinellas County in the fourth quarter of 2019 was $1,070, according to a report released today by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. The average weekly wage in Pinellas increased 4.4 percent from the same quarter a year earlier. In Hillsborough County, the Q4 2019 average weekly wage was $1,120, a 3.6 percent increase over the year-ago period. Workers in both Pinellas and Hillsborough counties get paid better, on average, than those statewide. The Florida average weekly wage for the last three months of 2019 was, $1,044, up 3.6 percent from a year earlier.
Hancock Whitney, one of the larger banks operating in the Tampa-St. Petersburg area, pledged an $80,000 investment to local food pantries in Tampa Bay as part of the bank’s Covid-19 community relief efforts. Metropolitan Ministries and St. Petersburg Free Clinic each will get $40,000, a news release said. For Metro Ministries, the funding will provide an estimated 3,000 meals per day for two weeks; at $1 per meal, the donation will impact nearly 42,000 individuals, a news release said. The funding for St. Pete Free Clinic will help the organization meet the increasing demands by purchasing food in bulk. It also will ensure that staff serving on the frontlines of food programs, interacting with hundreds of people per day, stay safe, healthy and compensated with "appreciation pay," the news release said.
Grow Financial Federal Credit Union has launched an initiative designed to support small businesses and local restaurants in the Tampa-St. Petersburg area. Under the new Grow On Us program, the credit union will pick up the tab for area residents at about 30 small businesses, starting next week and continuing through the end of August. Grow Financial expects to spend about $200,000 on the program, which is designed to counter the negative impact of Covid-19 on the economy. Participating businesses include The Blind Tiger, Bella Prana Yoga, Urban Brew & BBQ, Seventh Avenue Apothecary, Mekenita Cantina, Tidal Brewing, and Deviled Pig, among others. Membership with Grow Financial is not required to take advantage of an open tab, the credit union said. More information is here.
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services is delivering $11 billion in new funding nationwide to support testing for Covid-19. That includes $492.4 million for Florida, an announcement from HHS said. Each governor or designee of each state or other government entities receiving funds has to submit a testing plan to HHS, including 2002 goals that specify the number of tests needed month-by-month, monthly estimates of laboratory and testing capacity, and a description of how the resources will be used for testing, including easing any Covid-19 community mitigation policies, HHS said.
Rep. Kathy Castor has asked Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and Surgeon General Scott Rivkees to provide answers regarding the apparent firing of Rebekah Jones. Jones was the geographic information system manager for Department of Health’s Division of Disease Control and Health Protection, which manages the state's coronavirus data portal. Jones was removed from her job after she raised serious concerns about the lack of transparency of Covid-19 data being reported by the state of Florida, a news release from Castor's congressional office said. "This appears to be a troubling pattern by the state of Florida," Castor, D-Tampa, said in a letter to DeSantis and Rivkees. Castor cited previous reports about the state withholding information on infections and deaths at nursing homes as well as overall mortality data from medical examiners. The nursing home data has since been made public. Read Castor's full letter here.
U.S. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell named Sen. Marco Rubio as acting chairman of the U.S. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. Rubio, a Florida Republican, has been a member of the committee, which oversees and studies the intelligence activities and programs of the United States Government. The committee's chair, Sen. Richard Burr (R-NC), temporarily stepped down from that post Friday afternoon. Burr is one of several U.S. senators under federal investigation for alleged insider trading leading up to the coronavirus pandemic. In April, the committee released a report on Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election, concluding there was no reason to dispute the intelligence community's conclusion that Russia conducted an unprecedented, multi-faceted campaign to interfere with election, a news release said.
A task force looking at ways to reopen the campuses of Florida's 12 state universities now has a timeline for its work. Marshall Criser III, chancellor of Florida's State University System, is scheduled to present re-opening guidelines during a May 28 meeting of the Board of Governors. Universities will present their individual plans, based on those guidelines, to the Board of Governors at a meeting on June 23. The universities have been closed since mid-March as the state worked on ways to slow the spread of Covid-19. “As we move forward with a framework for the fall, we will be mindful that a healthy campus environment and academic rigor remain paramount," Criser said in a news release. The state university system includes University of South Florida.
