Beirut memorial to be added at capitol


  • June 13, 2015
  • /   News Service of Florida
  • /   government

Gov. Rick Scott has approved a plan that will lead to adding a memorial in the Capitol Complex to 241 members of the military who were killed more than three decades ago in a bombing in Beirut, Lebanon.

Scott on Thursday signed a bill (HB 801), sponsored by Rep. Dwayne Taylor, D-Daytona Beach, that calls for the memorial.

U.S. forces were sent to Lebanon in 1982 as part of a multinational peacekeeping force during a civil war, but the bombing occurred on Oct. 23, 1983, when a truck carrying 2,000 pounds of explosives drove into a headquarters and barracks area and exploded.

In another military-related issue, Scott signed a bill (HB 277), sponsored by Rep. Bill Hager, R-Delray Beach, that will ensure young service members are able to rent hotel rooms in Florida.

Some hotels and other lodging establishments have minimum age requirements.

But the bill would require hotels, motels and bed-and-breakfast inns to waive age restrictions for active-duty service members with valid military identification cards.

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