The Senate at mid afternoon Tuesday passed the commuter rail bill 27-10. It now goes to the Governor to be signed.

It’s been a day of vote counting and deal making in Tallahassee. The Florida Senate. It took some arm twisting, but legislative leaders got what they wanted quicker than expected.

One question that has haunted the SunRail deal for the past three years is ‘who pays if an accident hurts or kills someone on the tracks?”

Angel Palank knows the scenario all too well. Her husband was killed on CSX tracks in 1991. Angel turned down a one million dollar settlement agreement and was eventually awarded 50 million dollars. Angel says it’s not about the money.

“I’m not lobbying to make widows rich, I’m lobbying to make passengers safe.”

The current legislation requires the state to buy a 200 million dollar insurance policy, but opponents say the money could be tapped dry early in the year. Others, like Brian Pitts, are raising concerns the state pitching in 15 million dollars to bailout TriRail.

“Don’t throw good money after bad. We’ll you are definitely doing that with the TriRail system.”

Despite the outcry, the legislation was predetermined to pass through committee.

Senate leadership stacked the committees with yes votes to make sure the SunRail legislation wasn’t derailed before if could be heard on the Senate floor.

Senator Paula Dockery was quickly quieted in the bills last committee stop in an attempt to speed up the vote. And when the bill got to the floor the debate began all over again.

“We can’t afford to do this.”

While the debate raged arms were being twisted. Objections from organized labor threatened to kill the SunRail bill, but a compromise between the AFL-CIO and CSX saved 184 union jobs and cleared the way for many Democrats to vote for the legislation.

The bill finally passed on a 27 to 10 vote.