I (we) did a Florida residency (50%+1 time) for a year during COVID-19 because California did not open anything (2020-2022). Year 2 was a slog for a 9% tax bonus.
Perhaps our paths crossed, though I suspect you were not in Florida June 8 - August 28, 2020 when Liz and I were living with her mother in Belleaire Bluffs just south of Clearwater by the Gulf. My other visits were first week of February 2020, 2 weeks around Thanksgiving 2020, late April/early May 2021 and the last week of June 2021.
Florida does have beautiful, accessible beaches. However, the Panhandle/Gulf Coast likely has the best ones.
I disagree. I was able to bodysurf at Playalinda, Cocoa Beach and Singer Island on the Atlantic side. The Gulf at Clearwater/Belleaire is like a lake, rideable one foot waves maybe 3x in the 3 months there. Interestingly there were waves at Orange Beach, AL on 4th of July 2021; maybe I got lucky there.
Scuba Diving is decent/pretty good. The reefs are trashed but still have decent sea life.
Yes and those reefs like the one we dived off Palm Beach are on the Atlantic side; none of that on the Gulf side AFAIK. The Gulf Stream has a moderating effect on the Atlantic side: water temps are warmer in winter and not quite as hot in summer.
Now for the politics.
I did not find Pinellas County (very high senior population) in summer 2020 to be much different from SoCal in the spring. Newsom and DeSantis both did a lot of posturing in 2020 but both of them usually deferred to the counties in their states. After all I was skiing Mt. Baldy in San Bernardino County in April 2020 when Liz had to sneak past police tape to swim in the Gulf. Newsom shut down Orange County's beaches during that April heat wave but let them reopen 4 days later under the same rules as Ventura/San Diego (no sitting on the beach but you could walk, run, swim or surf).
Restaurants in L.A. County were limited to takeout while Pinellas allowed 25% dine-in, but that is usually uneconomic so most places were takeout only. Pinellas but not L.A. had one way aisles in grocery stores.
DeSantis made two key decisions that were among the best during COVID. He shut down visitation to Florida nursing homes on March 2, this while New York was discharging sick patients from hospitals into nursing homes. Florida to this day has had a lower proportion of COVID deaths in nursing homes than most states, impressive considering the obvious higher nursing home population. De Santis also made the schools reopen in-classroom in September 2020. In retrospect this was a big plus for educational development in the youth population with very low COVID risk.
In winter 2021 DeSantis had the COVID vaccine distributed via Publix grocery stores, which are so ubiquitous in Florida that I occasionally see them across the street from each other. That spring is when he started pandering to the anti-vax crowd, figuring IMHO that nearly all of Florida's seniors were vaxxed so there was little downside risk. As of 3/31/2021 Florida's cumulative COVID death rate was 1554 per million, probably better than the 1488 in California considering Florida's high age demographic. Unfortunately the Delta variant upset that situation and killed 1311 per million in Florida vs. 403 in California over the next 6 months. Going forward from then the Trumpy population is less likely to be vaxxed so the cumulative death rates as of 9/30/2023 were 4225 per million in Florida (similar to Croatia or Slovakia) vs. 2656 in California (similar to Spain or France).
Now, Florida is the nation's escape valve.
For decades that was SoCal. I've read a few articles commenting that westward migration in the US was mostly within similar latitudes. SoCal was the one growing place that got lots of 20th century immigration from both north and south. In the 21st century that's Florida getting immigration from all over the US.
In 2018, he barely won by around 32,000 votes against Democratic nominee Andrew Gillum.
Yes but DeSantis won by 1.5 million votes in 2022 vs. Charlie Crist, so I'll say most Floridians liked the way DeSantis handled COVID.
A big part of that 21st century immigration is boomer retirees. I'll speculate that the slice of that demographic that decamps to Florida skews more right wing than seniors overall and is the major driver of Florida not being the almost exact swing state that it was in 2000.
Cubans, Venezuelans, and Nicaraguans—those guys LOVE Trump! They love 'The Apprentice' and think everything else is 'Socialista.'
Logical considering the way their home countries are governed, so another reason Florida is redder than in 2000.
And his political instincts are awful. Ready to get dirty after hurricane Ian - white boots? C'mon. There is just something 'off' about him - he is not a natural politician. Driven - yes!
Yes indeed. After Trump lost in 2020 DeSantis got presidential fever and decided to pander to the worst instincts of Trump's base. But if you actually like Trump, you're going to vote for the real thing instead of DeSantis' ersatz imitation.
But I doubt anyone pays attention to what is happening at the school board level.
I agree here too. Florida has this eccentric libertarian streak, think the "Florida Man" meme. That seems inconsistent with the censorship drive. True conservatives don't like a nanny state.
