{"id":335505,"date":"2026-07-10T09:20:19","date_gmt":"2026-07-10T09:20:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/335505\/"},"modified":"2026-07-10T09:20:19","modified_gmt":"2026-07-10T09:20:19","slug":"longtime-state-senator-jack-latvala-dies-at-74","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/335505\/","title":{"rendered":"Longtime state senator Jack Latvala dies at 74"},"content":{"rendered":"

PINELLAS COUNTY, Fla. \u2014 A longtime Florida senator who represented Pinellas County for several years has died.<\/p>\n

Jack Latvala was 74.<\/p>\n

His son, Pinellas County Commissioner Chris Latvala, announced his father\u2019s death on Wednesday.<\/p>\n

In a statement, Chris Latvala said, “We are grateful for the outpouring of love, prayers and support during this difficult time. Jack dedicated a lifetime to public service and was honored to serve the community he loved. We appreciate everyone\u2019s kindness as our family mourns this tremendous loss.”<\/p>\n

Born in Oxford, Mississippi, and raised in Bartow, Jack Latvala graduated from Stetson University before becoming a well-known name in Florida politics.<\/p>\n

A Republican, the elder Latvala served two stints in the state Senate, once from 1994 to 2002 and then again from 2010 to 2018.<\/p>\n

Latvala stepped down from his state Senate position in 2018, and a gubernatorial bid, following allegations of sexual harassment from female staffers and lobbyists.<\/p>\n

He denied any wrongdoing. In July 2019, a state prosecutor said there was insufficient evidence<\/a> to prove that Jack Latvala, who had been budget chairman before the scandal broke, engaged in any misconduct.<\/p>\n

Information from the Associated Press was used in this report.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PINELLAS COUNTY, Fla. \u2014 A longtime Florida senator who represented Pinellas County for several years has died. Jack…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":335506,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[274,28,2287,115,596,275,202,204,203,199,201,200,135,278],"class_list":["post-335505","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-st-petersburg","tag-app-top-stories","tag-florida","tag-local-politics","tag-news","tag-pinellas-county","tag-spectrum-news-staff","tag-st-pete","tag-st-pete-headlines","tag-st-pete-news","tag-st-petersburg","tag-st-petersburg-headlines","tag-st-petersburg-news","tag-tampa","tag-top-stories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/335505","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=335505"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/335505\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/335506"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=335505"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=335505"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=335505"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}