House & Senate Bill Resources
About the Bills
For years, the NICA Board of Directors has discussed the need for legislation to address the program’s funding gap. This year, two members of the Florida Legislature agreed to sponsor bills in the Legislature to help close that gap, along with making several other changes to the NICA statute.
The bills:
- Ensure adequate funding
- Make existing benefits permanent
- Add the agreement with the Agency for Health Care Administration (AHCA)
- Provide timeframes to health insurance requirement
- Address fraud
- Clean up current law
You can read more about the bill content in the emails sent by NICA’s executive director to families.
Because legislation moves through the House of Representatives and the Senate at the same time, it is filed as two separate bills—one in each chamber. SB 1668, sponsored by Senator Burton, was filed in the Senate, and HB 1291, sponsored by Representative Anderson, was filed in the House of Representatives. If both the House and the Senate pass their versions, the bills are ultimately combined into one law.
On this page, you’ll find information about the process for the bills to become law, what part of the process the bills are in, and links to other helpful information like the actual bills, bill information webpages, and a link to ask questions about (and get answers on) the bills.
Questions about the Bill? Contact Us.
Ask NICA! Send your questions to NICA about the bills. Answers will be included in the FAQ’s.
Overall Process
How Does a Bill Become Law?
Each bill must be examined closely by committees–smaller groups of lawmakers who examine the bill’s details and vote on whether the bill should move forward. The bill must successfully pass through all assigned committees before it can be voted on by the entire Florida House of Representatives and Florida Senate.
The bills (SB 1668 and HB 1291) will each be voted on by 3 different committees or subcommittees.
- SB1668 will be voted on in these committees in the Florida Senate: Banking and Insurance Committee; Appropriations Committee on Agriculture, Environment, and General Government; and Rules
- HB1291 will be voted on in these committees and subcommittees in the Florida House of Representatives: Insurance and Banking Subcommittee, State Administration Budget Subcommittee, Commerce Committee
Each bill moves through committees in order, so each committee or subcommittee must vote to advance the bill before it moves to the next committee or subcommittee, until all 3 have voted on the bill. The bill can be amended (changed) in any committee or subcommittee.
After all committees and subcommittees have voted on the bill, it can be voted on by an entire chamber (either the Senate or House of Representatives). After one chamber passes the bill, then it goes to the other chamber for a vote. If both the House of Representatives and the Senate vote to pass the same bill, it goes to the Governor for a final decision on whether to become a law.
Current Status of the NICA Bills
SB 1668 and HB 1291: At this point, only SB 1668 is being voted on, as both the Senate and the House have to pass the exact same bill, and the Senate ended up passing its NICA bill first. The Florida House of Representatives voted on SB 1668 on Tues., March 10. The House passed an amendment that moved almost all of the original bill language to increase funding back into the Senate bill (the Senate had taken out most of the original language on increasing funding in one of the committee hearings). So now the bill as passed by the House is the Senate bill with some of the original funding language added to it.
The bill now goes back to the Senate. It’s now what’s known as a “returning message” since it was sent as a “Senate message” to the House. It will need another vote by the full Senate, which will decide whether to agree to the House amendment or not. We don’t know exactly when the Senate will hear the NICA bill again—usually there’s not much, if any, notice about that.
Updated on March 10, 2026
Below are links to information about these bills and the Legislative process, as well as a way to contact NICA with questions. The Legislative process moves fast, so while we’ll update this as quickly as we can, changes may have happened that aren’t noted here yet. The links to the Senate and House of Representatives bill information pages will have the most up-to-date information, so you can always check there.
Current Bills
See the actual wording of the House and Senate bills that the Legislators will vote on. Legislators can change these bills with amendments they vote on during meetings. Both the Senate and House versions of the bill that the links are to are current as of Feb. 3, 2026.
Bill Information
Here are links to the House’s and Senate’s webpages with information about the bills. Here you can get a lot of official information on the bill that is very up-to-date, like what committees and subcommittee it will go to next, which stage of the Legislative process the bill is in, and if any amendments have been filed or voted on.
Legislative Updates
Read the email sent by NICA Executive Director Melissa Jaacks on Thursday, January 15, to tell families about the filed bills.
FAQs
Read NICA’s FAQs about the bill. These include answers to questions sent to NICA through the form on this page.
Further Resources
Learn about the Legislative process to understand what happens with bills.
Track the Bills
Register on the websites for the House of Representative and the Senate to get alerts when things happen with these bills. You’ll need to set up an account and then add the bills to track.