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Florida signs hospital education requirement and expands child swim voucher; related Senate measure stalled
Summary
Sen. Carlos Guillermo Smith said Senate Bill 428 — requiring hospitals and childbirth educators to include drowning‑prevention education and expanding the child swim voucher to ages 1–7 — was signed into law; a separate bill (SB 658) that would extend pool‑safety requirements for rental properties passed the Senate but failed to advance in the House this year.
At a water‑safety event hosted by the Children’s Safety Village of Central Florida, state Senator Carlos Guillermo Smith reported two recent legislative developments aimed at reducing child drownings and described a remaining statutory gap in residential pool safety.
Smith said the state enacted Senate Bill 428, a bipartisan measure he co‑introduced, which requires hospitals, birthing centers and childbirth educators to include drowning‑prevention and safe‑bathing procedures in postpartum education before discharge. The law also expands the child swim‑lesson voucher program’s eligibility to ages 1 through 7, a change Smith said lawmakers and advocates are working to fully fund.
Smith described a separate change he said remains unaddressed: the 2000 Residential Pool Safety Act requires at least one water‑safety feature for new pools built after 2000 but exempts pools built before that date and many residential rentals. He said Senate Bill 658 passed the Florida Senate unanimously but “was not adopted in the Florida House” this year, and sponsors plan to return to the issue next session.
The senator framed the reforms as part of a broader strategy — along with community prevention programs and first‑responder training — to reduce what he and other speakers called a preventable epidemic of child drowning in Florida.
The event itself did not take formal legislative action; Senator Smith said budget and funding decisions remain pending as he returns to Tallahassee to press for full funding of the expanded swim‑voucher program.
