District 90 doesn't run on big corporations. It runs on the shops on Atlantic Avenue, the restaurants near Boynton Beach Boulevard, the contractors, the salons, the freelancers working out of a spare bedroom in Lake Worth Beach. I've spent 20 years building and modernizing businesses' systems from the inside. I know exactly what gets in their way — and most of it is fixable from a seat in Tallahassee.
No slogans here. Just the numbers, what's driving them, and what I'd actually do.
Start with how much of our economy this is. Florida has 3.5 million small businesses — 99.8% of all businesses in the state — employing 3.8 million people, or 39.6% of the workforce. Small businesses drove 77.4% of Florida's net job growth from March 2023 to March 2024 (SBA Office of Advocacy, 2025 Florida profile). When a small business in this district closes, that's not a statistic. That's your neighbor's job.
Now the squeeze:
The good news — and I'll say it plainly, because honest accounting means reporting the wins too — is that some of the biggest costs are finally moving the right way. The question is who keeps the pressure on.
Two of a small business's biggest fixed costs are set, or heavily shaped, in Tallahassee: taxes and insurance. Here's the recent record.
The business rent tax is gone. Until last year, Florida was the only state in America that charged sales tax on commercial leases. The Legislature repealed it effective October 1, 2025 (HB 7031), saving Florida businesses roughly $1 billion or more every year statewide (Holland & Knight; Florida Realtors). If you rent your storefront, your landlord's tax bill just got smaller. My question for District 90 business owners at every door: did your rent reflect it? Part of my job would be making sure that saving reaches the tenant, not just the lease.
Insurance reform is working — for businesses too. This campaign has made the case on homeowners insurance; the same litigation reforms are now reaching commercial policies. In January 2026, the Florida Office of Insurance Regulation reported surplus-lines commercial business rates down about 10%, commercial windstorm and hail coverage down about 47%, and 17 new insurers entering Florida since the 2022–23 reforms. It's the same lever we talk about on the homeowners side — Florida's outsized share of insurance litigation (roughly 79% of the nation's lawsuits against about 9% of claims) was baked into every premium, and attacking it is bringing carriers back to compete.
But the big licensing overhaul didn't make it. In the 2026 session, HB 607 — a rewrite of Department of Business and Professional Regulation licensing that would have moved authority from boards to the department and cut continuing-education requirements for real estate licensees — died in the House Commerce Committee on March 13, 2026 (Florida Legislature bill history). The bill history carries a "companion bill(s) passed, see CS/CS/CS/SB 290" note; that is a false lead — SB 290 is a Department of Agriculture bill containing no DBPR licensing, real-estate or continuing-education provisions, and no other 2026 vehicle enacted them. Professional trade associations opposed the elimination of their licensing boards; the FICPA publicly credited itself with saving the Board of Accountancy. A local business tax repeal (HB 103/SB 122), worth roughly $185-189 million a year back to Florida businesses, also failed — HB 103 passed the House 82-26 and then died in Senate Appropriations (the Revenue Estimating Conference scored the filed repeal at $188.6M and the narrowed committee substitute at $184.2M). Research cited by the Institute for Justice estimates licensing burdens cost Florida about 130,000 jobs and $460 million in direct economic losses. Florida made a real start with the 2020 Occupational Freedom and Opportunity Act — the follow-through is still waiting.
That's the pattern: the wins and the unfinished items alike are decided in the committees the majority controls. That's where the work is.
An engineer's approach: identify the biggest cost drivers, target them, and measure the results in public.
1. Finish the insurance job — for storefronts, not just homes. My first-90-days insurance relief package targets the litigation and fraud costs behind premiums. Commercial windstorm down 47% proves the lever works; I'll push to extend and lock in that progress so shop owners see it at renewal. 2. Carry the licensing-modernization bill that died this year. A license shouldn't take longer to get than the job takes to do. I've spent two decades modernizing exactly these kinds of systems — permitting, processing, service delivery. I'd champion the DBPR streamlining that stalled in 2026, with a simple metric: measured, published turnaround times for permits and licenses. 3. Cut the recurring taxes and fees that hit small operators hardest. The rent-tax repeal was the model — a fixed cost, eliminated. I'd back the failed local business tax repeal (~$189 million a year statewide) and push savings like the rent-tax repeal to actually pass through to tenants. 4. Connect owners to help that already exists. The Boynton Beach CRA runs an active Commercial Rent Reimbursement Grant Program right now. A district office that holds monthly open hours — which I've committed to — should be a working referral desk for programs like this, not just a place to file complaints.
This is a record-and-arithmetic argument, not a personal one. Florida is #1 in the nation for new business formations — about 698,000 in 2025 (Registered Agents Inc. data, reported by the Business Observer) — and Palm Beach County unemployment is a healthy ~4.4% (May 2026, FRED series FLPALM2URN). The engine works.
But every lever that lowers a small business's costs — insurance law, licensing reform, tax repeal — runs through committees controlled by a Republican supermajority that holds 83 of the House's 120 seats, against 34 Democrats, with three seats vacant (official House roster, August 2026). Rep. Long, elected in the December 9, 2025 special election for this seat, sits in that minority. In the 2026 session he was first-named sponsor on seven bills; one became law — CS/HB 851, on professional learning for instructional and school administrative personnel, enacted as Chapter 2026-109 after passing 108-0 in the House and 38-0 in the Senate — and the other six died in subcommittee or committee without a hearing. That's not a knock on his effort — it's the arithmetic of the chamber, and it's the same arithmetic that decides whether a rent-tax or licensing bill gets a hearing.
If you own a business in this district, or work for one: send an engineer to the room where these bills are written. I'll publish the results — costs, turnaround times, every vote — so you can check my math. That's the deal.
Every figure on this page is sourced. Find an error? Send me the source and I will fix it.
Updated: 2026-09-04