It has been a GREAT year. We truly appreciate the support of our loyal listeners and our sponsors. Now its time for us to get even better. On this website we have launched the new "Dining Guide", which we are very excited about...and expanded the forums to include updates from the Tax Reform battles and from the Downtown Partnership. We are expanding the background information on our re-occuring topics...like consolidation, workforce housing, economic development and visioning. We are also creating a page that will allow you to "tap into" some of the news feeds that I use each morning for show prep. ALL of this will allow us to dig into the topics together...and dig into them deeper when you call.

More than anything, I want to personally thank you for listening and invite you to continue to participate in making a difference in this fine community that we all call home.

It just gets better and better. If you think Health Care is something everyone should have access to...or you are concerned about indigent care costs...or you think that Quality Health Care is a priviledge only for the priviledged...BE VERY CONCERNED because the credit agencies are being driven by medical care providers who want to complete the process of turning you into a statistic. The Dallas Morning News reports: Mortgage lenders aren't the only ones showing more interest in your credit score these days - the health industry is creating its own score to judge your ability to pay. The new medFICO score, being designed with the help of credit industry giant Fair Isaac Corp., could debut as early as this summer in some hospitals. Healthcare Analytics, a Waltham, Mass., health technology firm, is developing the score. It is backed by funding from Fair Isaac, of Minneapolis; Dallas-based Tenet Healthcare Corp.; and venture capital firm North Bridge Venture Partners, also based in Waltham. Each kicked in $10 million for the project. The score is already raising questions from consumer advocacy groups that fear it will be checked before patients are treated. People with low medical credit scores could receive lower-quality care than those with a healthy medFICO, they argue. Could? That implies the possibility that they won't. Of course they will. Because the health insurance industry only cares about making money. Because the health insurance industry believes that medical care is not supposed to about the medical or the care, but about squeezing the suffering for every last desperate dollar. If you can't pay, you die. Hyperbole?

Gov. Charlie Christ is out in front waving the banner of his "Vote YES on 1" campaign...although he is having some trouble raising money from his long-time supporters. His voice is being used on automated phone calls, he is Crist-Crossing the state in the Governor's Jet, and Talking, Talking, Talking about the largest Tax Cut in Florida history.

What do YOU think?

Do YOU understand what will be on the Ballot?

Have YOU decided how you are going to Vote?

We want to know...

The Question of whether it is appropriate for a teacher to call a parent in order for the parent to come to school and discipline a child.

A Jacksonville gym teacher accused of calling a parent to bring a belt to the school to discipline his unruly child has been charged. Paxon Middle School gym teacher Aaron Cesar Jackson, 52, was charged Thursday with encouraging an act that could result in injury to a child, according to the Sheriff's Office arrest report. Several students told police they heard a teacher call the parent of a 13-year-old boy and told him to bring his belt because he was out of control, according to the report. When the stepfather arrived, he was provided a room where the boy was hit several times. The school resource officer said the teen had a swollen, reddish right arm, large contusion above the right eye, swollen and bruised right side area and was shaking, the report said. Then the boy was sent to the gym teacher to apologize. The stepfather, 41-year-old Henry Lee Crimes, was arrested Monday at the school and charged with child abuse. He told police a similar version about what happened. Jackson was reassigned to another location and ordered to have no contact with students while the investigation was ongoing, the school district had said. When arrested, he told police he wanted to talk with his lawyer, the Sheriff's Office said.

WE WANT TO KNOW...what is YOUR opinion?

Oh My...Wake Up Daytona! Host Doug Kosarek will be amoung Daytona's Most Eligible Bachelors & Bachelorettes who are all Up For Bid!



Join us December 18 for the Hunks & Hotties for Hounds Bachelor/ette Benefit 100% of the auction proceeds will support the Halifax Humane Society THE DE"TAILS" Who: The Halifax Humane Society & Buy Me Love Benefits What: Hunks & Hotties for Hounds Benefit, a Bachelor / ette Charity Auction When: Tuesday, December 18, 2007, 7pm - 11pm Where: Museum of Arts & Sciences - 352 South Nova Road, Daytona Beach, 32114 Why: Help raise funds and awareness for the local animal shelter and to provide resources, programs, education and services for the humane treatment of animals. Cost: $20 advance; $25 door; $50 VIP - Available at www.BuyMeLoveBenefits.com or (760) 412-0055. VIP admission includes complimentary "Mutt"inis from 7pm-8pm and premiere seating. Space is limited, reserve your tickets today!

We want to wish all our listeners and all our sponsor's a Happy Thanksgiving and a GREAT start to the holiday season. At WakeUpDaytona! we are truly thankful for each and every one of you.

WakeUpDaytona! is supporting a number of FOOD DRIVES in Volusia County. Here are locations to drop off your food items.

115 N. Palmetto St. (WNDB Studios) 7-5 pm daily (*except Thanksgiving Day). 386-257-1150

201 University Blvd. (Our Lady of Lourdes Catholic Church) 386-255-0433 Contact: Luke Miller.

Halifax Urban Ministries Harvest Food Drive (together with Regions Bank and PODS of Daytona Beach). WEEKENDS ONLY.

- Regions Bank, 607 Dunlawton Ave., Port Orange

- Regions Bank, 100 Corsair Dr., Daytona Beach

- Regions Bank, 555 Ridgewood Ave., Holly Hill

- Regions Bank, corner of Highway 17 and Wal-Mart Dr., Deland at 1699a Woodland Blvd.

Also, the City of Ponce Inlet is taking food contributions for both pets and people on Wednesday November 21st all day.

Any additional Food Drive drop locations will be updated here. We also encourage your comments.

It has been my yearly tradition and something I highly recommend to take a few minutes to look back once a year and take note of what you are thankful for.

I do this at Thanksgiving for obvious reasons, but not everyone celebrates this holiday so whatever you are doing and how ever you celebrate take a second or two to reflect on positive moments that have made your life better in the past year. Not only does it make you realize any progress you have made to this point, it makes you feel good to count your blessings.

So, the question is..."What are you THANKFUL for????"

While the state's voters scratch their heads over the proposed property tax amendment now winging its way onto a Jan. 29 ballot, a powerful group called the Taxation and Budget Reform Commission is about to begin feverish consideration of even broader budget and tax proposals, one or more of which are likely to end up on November 2008 ballots.

The 25-member state-appointed group, which can put an amendment directly onto the November ballot by a two-thirds vote, meets today, its first meeting since the Legislature passed its proposal.

Does the Legislature's amendment eliminate the need for the commission to look at tax reform? 'Absolutely not,' said John McKay, a Bradenton resident and a commission member. 'I've been saying for Lord-how-many-years, the structure is just held together with bailing wire and chewing gum,' said McKay, a former president of the Florida Senate. 'We cannot continue to keep depending on ad valorem taxes to fund the state because they are so unstable, and it is having a huge detrimental influence on businesses and on second-home property sales.' He cites a document that is likely to become a centerpiece of the commission's attempts at budget and tax restructuring: 'State of Florida Long-Range Financial Outlook Fiscal Year 2008-09 through 2010-11,' which counts the Senate, the House and the Legislative Office of Economic and Demographic Research as co-authors.

The upshot of the 95-page study is that the state has to cut $2.3 billion in spending before it even starts the next fiscal year, not counting the further negative impact of the proposed amendment. This is because government has relied too heavily on real estate-related taxes and fees. To some extent these are nonrecurring sources of revenue, being used to fund recurring expenses. 'In good times that is OK, because people buy a lot of houses, but in bad times it is not good, which is what we are in now,' said McKay. 'So you've got to find a second source of revenue. 'That only leads you to one thing, which is sales tax.'

Meanwhile, another commission member, Lee County Tax Appraiser Kenneth Wilkinson, is also working on a fresh property tax initiative of his own, commission spokeswoman Kathy Torian confirmed. Wilkinson is generally recognized as the father of the Save Our Homes amendment, and has been engaged in a lengthy quest to make accrued Save Our Homes benefits portable as homeowners downsize or upgrade from one Florida residence to another. The Legislature's amendment seeks to do that, but in a limited fashion. Someone who moves to a more expensive house would be able to carry forward up to $500,000 in Save Our Homes accrued benefits, which would go to reduce the taxable value on the new home. If the person downsizes, the exemption would be proportional to the savings on the old house.

These proposals and others by commission members are already being vetted by lawyers and prepared for public display, Torian said. 'One could be completed as early as tomorrow,' Torian said Wednesday. Talk about open access...

Quite of a bit of the process will be accessible to the public. Committee meetings considering the ideas will typically take place in airport meeting rooms. Torian said that at least a week before a committee takes up a given proposal or set of proposals, she will post the meeting site. There probably will be opportunities for public comment at most of the committee meetings, she said, but it is not guaranteed. Staff members will post detailed minutes of each committee meeting on the Web site.

When the full commission starts debating proposals that have emerged from committee -- mostly in the first quarter of 2008 -- staff members will arrange for full transcripts on the Web.

Commission chairman Allan Bense has set a soft deadline of Nov. 30 for members to submit their proposals either for a statute or for a constitutional amendment. The first of these proposals could show up as early as today on Bense's desk, said deputy staff director Torian. 'There could be 20 or 30 different proposal ideas out there right now,' Torian said. 'Everything will begin hot and heavy now.'

Within a few days, she expects to add a button marked 'Member's Proposals' to the group's Web page, www.floridatbrc.org. Unlike a citizens' initiative, which would require 611,000 signatures by the beginning of February to get onto the November ballot as a proposed amendment, the commission simply needs to agree on a proposed amendment by a two-thirds vote, which means 17 out of 25 members. A simple majority, 13 out of the 25, can send a proposed bill to the Legislature for consideration starting in March.

The commission met for the first time in 1990. An amendment adopted by voters in 1998 changed the panel's next appointment to 2007-08 and established that it will meet every 20 years after this.

One commission member whose constituency is really hurting these days is Nancy Riley, president of the Florida Association of Realtors. She would not talk about specific proposals, but she indicated that what the Legislature has wrought for the Jan. 29 ballot is more of a start to tax reform than a finish. 'It certainly wasn't as much as I hoped for, but at least it was something,' said Riley. 'It will be a base, and from there we are hoping to expand into other areas.'

The commission is supposed to consider a broad range of budgetary and tax-related topics such the need for more roads, the state's education system, and so on. But tax reform has so far dominated the public hearings. 'They didn't talk about the structure of government, or did we need better roads,' said Bill Levison, a snowbird who flew down from his home in Lexington, Mass., to attend the Fort Lauderdale hearing and speak his piece. 'They talked about whether government is getting too much revenue or not enough, whether we should have caps or not on revenues or spending, whether we should keep Save Our Homes or make it portable,' he said. Levison founded a tax-cutting group called Broward Activists for Tax Equity that now has 80 members. Its plan, which he provided to the commission in a three-minute speech, focuses on limiting government revenues. 'Once you limit revenues, you've already prevented runaway taxation, so Save Our Homes wouldn't be necessary, so you could phase it out,' Levison said. 'We'd try to avoid some sticker shock by phasing it out gradually.'

In the build-up for this month's special session, Gov. Charlie Crist's office requested a legal brief from FSU law professor Nat Stern over whether its plan to create Save Our Homes portability could hold up in court.

Now it could be one of the hottest legal questions in Florida.
Two groups have already tried to challenge SOH in court as an affront to the federal constitutional rights to travel and commerce. Other groups are lining up to join the fray, including one where the nation of Canada may be the plaintif.

Last spring, noted tax lawyer Walter Hellerstein concluded portability could convince a judge that the 'locked in' disparity between new and longtime homeowners was unconstitutional. He also noted the repercussions could be forcing homeowners or the government to give back billions of dollars to make amends.

In his 10-page memo to the governor's office, Nat Stern concluded that while he doesn't think portability was 'infirm' legally, including a 25 percent assessment discount for new home buyers 'remediates as closely as possible any penalty that new purchasers would suffer for not having established a Florida homestead sooner.'

Only problem: lawmakers left that out, in part, because it didn't poll well with voters.

Professor Stern commented that while he hasn't studied the entire bill, 'I see that inclusion of the first-time home buyer discount bolsters the state's case' against a commerce clause challenge.

Other lawyers think the whole system is ripe for a challenge.
University of Florida local government lawyer Michael Allan Wolf says Florida loses one of the arguments courts have recognized in upholding SOH so far -- that it promotes stability in communities. Portability promotes mobility, he says.

"Now the justification for Save Our Homes in the first place we lose once we have portability."

House Speaker Marco Rubio, R-West Miami spoke candidly, We may not know the unintended consequenses of this thing for years, I believe that someone's going to challenge this, and it's going to have to work it's way through the federal court system.'

The Governor's office is still comfortable with his legal counsel's view that portability will withstand a legal challenge. Gov. Crist is criscrossing the state promoting the plan.

But there is widespread agreement among lawmakers- even those who drafted and voted for the amendment - that this plan will ultimately end up getting its day in court.