Sen. Greg Evers meets with residents in Jay

Senator Greg Evers took a trip west on Highway 4 to visit the Town of Jay Friday night and talk with constituents.

During Evers two hour town hall meeting the topic varied from the three percent cut state employees have taken, to education, redistricting, independent pharmacies, and so forth.

Around 30 gathered at the Jay Community Center to hear how Evers felt and voted on issues that concerned them.

His major concern was state employees and those who have been affected by the three percent cut mandated for state employees.

“I don’t think there is a state employee who would object to paying into their retirement if it was a state match like most of us have with our 401K’s,” Evers said. “But this is not even going into their retirement. All of this money is going into the general fund.

“There were several things I didn’t like this session and now I hope we can get things going in the right direction and back fill cuts.”

Jim Reynolds felt this was okay until he learned from Evers this was not going for their retirement.

“Right now we have employees who have not had a raise in six year,” Evers said citing correctional center workers like the one in Century and the state ran facility in East Milton. “Now they got their pay cut by three percent and their benefits cut as well.

“The folks here want to know they have a secure retirement and have some money for gas in their truck and fish bait when they sit on the river.”

With some of the cuts Evers pointed out they were expecting to see some cuts and changes as some things might go to court.

“I am expecting to see a lawsuit filed due to some of the state medical cuts,” Evers said. “In the past people have used Medicaid and Medicare to work and help but that won’t be the case anymore.”

Another change Evers point out many will face is how the state will fill prescriptions and are actually trying to take some prescriptions out of state to be filled.

“The state has pretty much taken the independent pharmacy out of the equation,” Evers said. “With these mail order scripts the mail order group said they would fill them for the costs of two refills, while the independent pharmacies said they would fill them for one and a half refills.

“Now the state will be getting our refills from a Rhode Island Company owned by CVS.”

Evers pointed out how they tried to save money with Medicaid back in 2003 and it lasted about three days and resulted in six to nine deaths because insulin got hot in the mail box when it should have been refrigerated.

The senator noted how important a local pharmacist is to him as he went to get some sinus medicine and the pharmacist alerted him it could do harm in conjunction with his blood pressure medicine.

“With mail order prescriptions you don’t get that kind of care.”

Evers did point out one of the big issues is the mindsets they face in Tallahassee.

He pointed out the millions upon millions of dollars to clean up the water in Florida’s everglades and all of this has made the water cleaner than the bottled water he was drinking at the meeting.

“There are very different mindsets and they all are very diverse,” Evers said. “We just have to find a way to work together to help the state the best we can.”

Evers was also questioned about Jack Floyd’s interest in becoming the next FWC Commissioner in the state of Florida.

The senator stated he had already spoken with the Governor’s office about Floyd’s interest and supported it.