HB 1521 is a broad criminal justice bill that combines several unrelated policy changes affecting housing, voting rights, sentencing, juvenile justice, prison data, and inmate cost liability. In the housing section, it creates a “conditional offer” process for rental applicants and bars landlords from asking about criminal history before making that offer, while also limiting what kinds of records may be considered afterward and requiring individualized review, written notice, and an appeal opportunity if an offer is withdrawn. The bill also prohibits landlords from considering arrests not leading to conviction, expunged or sealed records, juvenile adjudications, vacated convictions, and certain out-of-state conduct that would not be a felony in Florida.
The bill would change Florida’s voting-rights restoration rules by removing the requirement that all financial obligations be fully paid before rights are restored for most people with felony convictions, and it would provide automatic restoration of citizenship rights to the extent that federal elected officials receive automatic restoration after a felony conviction. It also revises Florida’s drug-trafficking sentencing laws to apply lower or revised thresholds and penalties retroactively for certain hydrocodone, codeine, and oxycodone trafficking offenses, and it creates a resentencing process for eligible people already serving mandatory minimum terms or awaiting sentencing. In addition, it expands sentence-review treatment for juvenile offenders by making concurrent and consecutive sentences count as a single sentence and stating that the review statute should apply retroactively to all juvenile offenders.
The bill further requires the Department of Corrections to provide inmate data to the Legislature for redistricting every decade beginning in 2030, including last known residence information, race, ethnicity, and incarceration location, and directs the Legislature to count incarcerated people at their last known residence rather than at the prison. It also removes statutory provisions that impose fixed incarceration-cost liabilities on convicted offenders, eliminating the $250,000 and $50-per-day liquidated damage framework. Finally, it changes juvenile direct-file rules by narrowing and restructuring when prosecutors may transfer youth to adult court, requiring a judicial finding that adult sanctions are in the public interest, adding factors the judge must consider, and allowing a circuit judge to return a juvenile case to juvenile court if adult sanctions are no longer appropriate.
Overall, the bill appears to reflect a reform-oriented approach to criminal justice, with multiple provisions that reduce collateral consequences, expand retroactive relief, and add procedural protections for tenants and juveniles. Because the bill text includes both sentencing relief and limits on landlord criminal-history screening, the general policy direction is more lenient and rehabilitative than punitive. The bill died in the Criminal Justice Subcommittee, and there is no recorded committee transcript or vote history in the provided materials, so no formal floor or committee sentiment is available beyond the bill’s content and its failure to advance.
The main points of contention likely would have centered on the housing restrictions, retroactive resentencing, and juvenile direct-file changes. Landlords and housing advocates may disagree over how much criminal-history screening should be allowed and whether the bill unduly limits tenant-selection discretion. Prosecutors, victims’ advocates, and some public-safety stakeholders may object to retroactive sentence reductions for drug trafficking offenses and to the added judicial gatekeeping for transferring juveniles to adult court. Supporters would likely emphasize fairness, rehabilitation, voting access, and reducing the long-term consequences of criminal convictions.
HB 1521 would substantially amend Florida law across several chapters of the Florida Statutes. It would create new tenant-screening rules in chapter 83, revise voting-rights restoration in chapter 98 and civil-rights restoration in chapter 940, add retroactive resentencing procedures and penalty changes in chapter 893, modify juvenile sentence-review provisions in chapter 921, create a new inmate-data redistricting requirement in chapter 944, repeal or narrow inmate liability for incarceration costs in chapter 960, and revise juvenile direct-file procedures in chapter 985. The bill would affect landlords, applicants with criminal records, people with felony convictions seeking rights restoration, incarcerated people eligible for resentencing, juvenile offenders, the Department of Corrections, and courts handling criminal and juvenile cases.
The bill’s overall sentiment appears generally reform-minded and pro-rehabilitation. Its provisions favor expanded rights restoration, limits on criminal-record barriers to housing, retroactive sentencing relief, and greater judicial oversight before juveniles are prosecuted as adults. At the same time, the bill is sweeping and touches several sensitive criminal-justice issues, so it likely drew mixed reactions from stakeholders even though no committee transcript or vote record is provided. Its failure to advance out of the Criminal Justice Subcommittee suggests it did not secure enough support to move forward.
Likely points of contention include whether landlords should be barred from asking about criminal history before a conditional offer, whether criminal records should be limited to felonies after an offer is made, and whether the bill goes too far in restricting housing-screening discretion. Another major dispute would be the retroactive resentencing of hydrocodone, codeine, and oxycodone trafficking cases, which could be viewed by opponents as reducing punishment for serious drug offenses. The juvenile justice changes, especially the requirement for a judicial finding before direct file and the ability to return a case to juvenile court, may also have been controversial among prosecutors and public-safety advocates. Voting-rights restoration without full payment of financial obligations and the automatic-restoration language could likewise have raised concerns among opponents who favor stricter completion requirements.