In July of this year, Florida enacted the Occupational Freedom and Opportunity Act, which included language requiring many of Florida’s professions, including contractors, to stake steps towards advancing reciprocity with other states. Recently, the Construction Industry Licensing Board published a short statement regarding states and licenses that currently meet Florida’s requirements for reciprocity.
The statement, in its entirety is as follows:
The CILB does not currently have reciprocal licensing agreements with any other state.
The following is a list of states with exams previously found to be substantially similar to Florida’s exam.
California General Contractor
California Building Contractor
Georgia Pollutant Storage Contractor
* The NASCLA General Contractors Exam (2009 forward) is accepted by many states and is substantially similar to all Florida Division 1 license trade knowledge exams (GC, BC, RC and related specialties). Applicants should refer to the NASCLA Endorsement application requirements, which include passing the Florida Business & Finance exam.
You can view the original document containing the statement on the DBPR website by clicking here.
Currently, there appear to be no efforts to further amend Chapter 489, Florida Statutes, or the administrative codes governing contractors to provide additional guidance on reciprocity. In the meantime, if you’re looking for additional information on the reciprocity changes introduced by the Occupational Freedom and Opportunity act, you can click on the links below to view changes by profession:
Those with licenses in other states interested in using their existing license to make the move into Florida easier should still consider making the transition because prior experience is still evaluated as part of the licensing application and you may have sufficient experience to make the lack of formal reciprocity guidance meaningless.