Restrictions for licenses eased, but at what cost?

It just got a lot easier to work in many professions in Florida, from accountants to architects, barbers to boxing announcers, inspectors to interior designers,

Gov. Ron DeSantis signed a bill Thursday that reduces or eliminates licensing requirements and fees for dozens of professions regulated by the state.

State leaders say the move will reduce red tape and unemployment for workers. But some industry experts are skeptical. They say the new rules could lower quality and safety.

The Occupational Freedom and Opportunity Act allows workers in some professions to easily transfer their out-of-state licenses to Florida and cuts down on the training required to receive or renew a license.

Some jobs will no longer require licenses at all, including interior designers, labor representatives, boxing announcers and timekeepers, hair braiders, hair wrappers, body wrappers, nail polishers and painters and makeup applicators.

The changes will save state workers about $1.3 million in license fees, officials said. They said the changes will help Florida improve from being the fourth-most stringent state for licensing requirements, according to a recent study by the Institute for Justice, a conservative legal organization based in Arlington, Va.

“Florida is now taking bold steps to reduce the regulatory burdens facing hardworking Floridians,” said Halsey Beshears, secretary for the Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation.

DeSantis said the law “will save thousands of Floridians both time and money for years to come.”

But not everyone is celebrating. Lauren Donald, the owner of Bond Street Salon in Delray Beach, is concerned that some salon jobs no longer require licenses

What the law allows

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■ and that cosmetologists will now need only 10 hours of training every two years, down from 16, to renew their licenses.

“It raises concerns [about] the quality of work that’s going to be produced by people who now have to have a lesser amount of hours,” she said. “And with some people not being required to have licenses, it’s sort of devaluing our industry.”

An easing of requirements for some in the construction fields, including architects and building inspectors, troubles Becky Blackwood, a retired building supervisor for the Broward School School District. The new rules reduce the amount of experience needed to be a building code inspector or plans examiner from four years to three. And an inspection license can be easily transferred without having to pass a Florida exam.

“You can come from another state that doesn’t have hurricanes, and that’s where you’re going to have problems,” Blackwood said. “A lot of states are not as stringent as we are. But we need to be stringent. We’re the third-most populous state, we have a large elderly population and we have hurricanes.”

The new rules don’t change Florida’s strict building codes, which were strengthened after Hurricane Andrew in 1992.

State leaders downplay the notion that consumers will be less protected with fewer regulations.

“Researchers have found little evidence consumers are safer in states with more licensing,” State Rep. Blaise Ingoglia, R-Spring Hill, who sponsored the bill, told the State Legislature in January.

A 2015 report by the U.S. Council of Economic Advisers and the Labor and Treasury departments gave a mixed review.

“When designed and implemented carefully, licensing can benefit consumers through higher quality services and improved health and safety standards,” the report found, also noting that current licensure rules impose burdens on workers, employers and consumers and “too often are inconsistent, inefficient, and arbitrary.”