Florida SB 264: Higher Education

Bill Text

264 
Official State Bird 
2025-10-23T04:20:55Z 
Requiring the Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission to develop and conduct a certain survey; requiring the commission to provide the survey and certain website information to specified persons during a specified timeframe; requiring that the survey include specified bird species, etc. 
Original Filed Version 
2026 
S 
GB 
General Bill 
__ 

 Florida Senate - 2026 SB 264 

 By Senator Polsky 

 30-00125-26 2026264__ 
 1 A bill to be entitled 
 2 An act relating to the official state bird; requiring 
 3 the Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission to 
 4 develop and conduct a certain survey; requiring the 
 5 commission to provide the survey and certain website 
 6 information to specified persons during a specified 
 7 timeframe; requiring that the survey include specified 
 8 bird species; requiring the commission to submit the 
 9 results of the survey to the Legislature by a 
 10 specified date; providing an effective date. 
 11 
 12 WHEREAS, in 1927, the Florida Legislature designated the 
 13 northern mockingbird (Mimus polyglottos) as the official state 
 14 bird, and 
 15 WHEREAS, dating back to the 1998 Regular Session, the 
 16 Legislature has, on a number of occasions, reviewed and 
 17 considered legislation to replace the northern mockingbird as 
 18 the official state bird, and 
 19 WHEREAS, Florida is one of five states that has designated 
 20 the northern mockingbird as the official state bird, and 
 21 WHEREAS, in 2008, the Fish and Wildlife Conservation 
 22 Commission held a vote among 78,000 Florida schoolchildren which 
 23 coincided with the general election, and the schoolchildren 
 24 voted to recommend the American osprey (Pandion haliaetus 
 25 carolinensis) as Florida’s new official state bird, and 
 26 WHEREAS, the time has come to allow the next generation of 
 27 Floridians to make their voices heard and to have the 
 28 participants in the Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission’s 
 29 Florida Youth Conservation Centers Network summer camps hold a 
 30 vote on the official state bird, with the possibility of a new 
 31 bird species being presented to the Legislature for 
 32 consideration as the official state bird, NOW, THEREFORE, 
 33 
 34 Be It Enacted by the Legislature of the State of Florida: 
 35 
 36 Section 1. (1) The Fish and Wildlife Conservation 
 37 Commission shall develop and conduct a survey of this state’s 
 38 youth to determine whether the state should select another bird 
 39 species as the official state bird. 
 40 (2) The Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission shall 
 41 provide the survey to the participants in the Florida Youth 
 42 Conservation Centers Network summer camps during the summers of 
 43 2026 and 2027. The survey must include the northern mockingbird, 
 44 American osprey, Florida scrub jay, American flamingo, and 
 45 American white ibis as selections. In addition to the survey, 
 46 the commission shall provide the participants with the 
 47 information available on the commission’s publicly available 
 48 website related to such birds. 
 49 (3) No later than December 31, 2027, the commission shall 
 50 submit the results of the survey to the President of the Senate 
 51 and the Speaker of the House of Representatives. 
 52 Section 2. This act shall take effect upon becoming a law.