Florida's move towards permanent Daylight Saving Time: 5 things to know

RELATED: Florida lawmakers approve year-round Daylight Saving Time 

Florida lawmakers are pushing for permanent Daylight Saving Time. It's possible that Florida could become the third state -- after Arizona and Hawaii -- to forego setting clocks back every fall.

Here's five things we know about law and its effects:

1. The change won't happen right away. 

People have been changing their clocks twice a year -- for 100 years. As the New York Times noted, Florida doesn't have the authority to adopt daylight saving time year-round.

States do not control Daylight Saving Time. Congress does. Even if Florida Gov. Rick Scott approves, Congress would need to override existing federal law to allow the change.

2. If Florida did move to Daylight Saving Time, schoolkids could be walking in the dark. 

Sunrise in December, January and February would be well after 8 a.m., with the latest being at 8:24 a.m. in mid-January.

3. Your afternoon commute would likely be in the light year-round. 

The sunset, at worst, would be around 6:30 p.m. in late December and early January.

4. Year-round Daylight Saving Time would seriously change your TV habits. 

Think about it: Everything will start an hour later. The New Year's Eve ball drop would take place at 1 a.m. Florida time. That flight you booked to Boston? It would arrive an hour earlier. The Stock Market Exchange would open at 10:30 a..m. Florida time, not 9:30 a.m.

Ed Kenney, a Nassau County resident, said he doesn't care about the different TV times.

"If I want to watch it, I'll stay up," Kenney said.

5. Basically, we could call it "Florida Time," more accurately, "Atlantic Standard Time." 

“I think it’s a question of whether the federal government will approve having essentially a 5th continental time zone,” Michael Downing, author of the 2006 book “Spring Forward: The Annual Madness of Daylight Saving Time,” told the Palm Beach Post. “Most of the semi-serious proposals at the federal level have been to collapse time zones to three so there is less confusion.”

Spring Forward: Daylight Saving Spring Forward: Daylight Saving

Cox Media Group