FL H0459

Creates s. 119.07135, F.S., establishing that any contract or agreement to which a government agency is a party is a public record, and specifying that the parties, payment amounts, payment structures, types of commodities/services purchased, unit prices, and deliverables cannot be designated as confidential or exempt under any circumstances.

Systematically removes "trade secret" as a basis for public records exemptions across dozens of state agencies, boards, commissions, and programs, including the Department of Environmental Protection, Department of Health, Department of Agriculture, Department of Citrus, Office of Financial Regulation, Public Service Commission, and Office of Insurance Regulation.

Fully repeals several standalone trade secret confidentiality statutes, including s. 252.943 (Florida Accidental Release Prevention Act), s. 381.83 (Department of Health), s. 403.73 (DEP), s. 499.931 (DBPR drug regulation), s. 502.222 (dairy businesses), s. 581.199 (plant industry), and s. 624.4213 (insurance trade secret procedures).

Removes trade secret protections from economic development entities including Enterprise Florida, Space Florida, the Florida Opportunity Fund, the Florida Development Finance Corporation, the Florida Export Finance Corporation, and the Institute for Commercialization of Public Research, while generally retaining exemptions for other proprietary categories such as financial statements, methods of manufacture, and patentable material.

Eliminates trade secret exemptions for regulated utilities and telecommunications providers overseen by the Public Service Commission, including electric, water/wastewater, natural gas transmission, and telecommunications companies, while retaining exemptions for internal auditing controls, security measures, and competitive interest information.

Removes trade secret designations from post-investigation confidentiality provisions for the Office of Financial Regulation's oversight of mortgage lending (s. 494.00125), securities (s. 517.2015), retail installment sales (s. 520.9965), consumer collection practices (s. 559.5558), and money services businesses (s. 560.129).

Authorizes the Office of Insurance Regulation to make collected information available on an aggregate basis by line of business and by county, even if marked as a trade secret under s. 688.01, while otherwise maintaining trade secret confidentiality for non-aggregated data.

Updates numerous statutory cross-references from the criminal trade secret definition (s. 812.081) and civil trade secret definition (s. 688.002) to the Uniform Trade Secrets Act (s. 688.01), and removes multiple scheduled sunset/repeal dates that had been set for October 2, 2019 and October 2, 2021.

Deletes the entire trade secret exemption for Space Florida, including provisions for written notice to requestors, public meetings exemptions for discussing trade secrets, and confidentiality of records generated during closed meeting portions.

The act takes effect upon becoming law, contingent on CS/CS/HB 461 or similar legislation being adopted in the same legislative session and becoming law.