A horde of golf execs made the rounds in the Capitol to show some love for Gov. Rick Scott and legislators on Florida Golf Day, which happens to coincide with a somewhat better-known Feb. 14 holiday.

Among those meeting with lawmakers is Joe Steranka, CEO of Palm Beach Gardens-based PGA of America.

The duffers came to Tallahassee to “build relationships” with elected officials and remind politicians that golf is one of the state’s leading economic engines, even in a down economy, Steranka said.

“Florida is the number one golf economy in the world,” Steranka said before the golf envoys ducked into an early-morning meeting with Sen. Mike Bennett, R-Bradenton. The group will participate in a press conference with Scott at 3 p.m. this afternoon.

The $7.5 billion industry employs more than 160,000 workers, Steranka said.

“Our industry is at the heart of small businesses,” he said.

Joe Louis Barrow, CEO of The First Tee, was on hand to talk about the “Golf Capital of the World” Florida license plates. Money from the vanity tags goes to the Florida Junior Golf Council and helps pay for golf education and get kids hooked on “a good walk spoiled” early on.

Proceeds from the plates have helped fund golf programs in 640 elementary schools for more than 300,000 school kids, Barrow said, and helps instill “values, focus, integrity and drive” associated with the game.

Scott drew fire last year for a plan to hire Jack Nicklaus to design golf courses for state parks, including one in Jonathan Dickinson State Park in Martin County. State Rep. Patrick Rooney, R-West Palm Beach, sponsored a measure last year that would have created the “Jack Nicklaus Golf Trail” throughout the state. But environmentalists said the proposal was way off the mark, and it ended up in the legislative equivalent of a sand trap.

A key senator who helped kill an amendment that would have stripped a controversial prison privatization measure and replaced it with a study said he will vote against the measure on Tuesday in what opponents predict will be a tie vote.

“I liked the concept of the study. But I like the idea of just killing the bill better,” said Sen. Dennis Jones, R-Seminole, one of a gang of nine Republicans who have joined with all but one Democrat whose coalition would kill the measure on a 20-20 vote.

Sen. Paula Dockery, one of the leading GOP senators opposed to the privatization plan (SB 2038), insisted after the 21-19 vote on the amendment late Monday that her coalition will put the issue to rest on the Senate floor on Tuesday.

“We do not lose anybody who’s going to be here to vote. My only concern is does somebody get sick, does somebody whatever. But our 20 are solid, 100 percent, anti-, don’t want this to happen. Twenty very solid votes,” Dockery, R-Lakeland said.

The Senate was originally scheduled to be in session in the morning, but late Monday Senate Rules Chairman John Thrasher announced on the floor the session had been postponed until later in the afternoon. Sen. Jeremy Ring, a Margate Democrat, was originally slated to be out of town tomorrow afternoon.

Later Monday evening, Senate Democratic Leader Nan Rich said Ring’s travel plans were changed so he could be in the Capitol for the vote.

“He’ll be here,” Rich, D-Weston, said.

In his weekly newsletter to constituents, U.S. Rep. Allen West, R-Plantation, begins with his personal recollection of hearing Whitney Houston‘s 1991 Super Bowl rendition of The Star-Spangled Banner as he returned from combat in Iraq. West then occasionally revisits the themes of 1991 and the late pop diva while blasting President Obama‘s contraceptive insurance mandate and accusing Obama of failing to “understand the ideals of American exceptionalism or a Constitutional Republic.”

Read West’s newsletter after the jump…

Read the rest of this entry »

With a 21-19 vote, a sharply divided Senate rejected an amendment that would have done away with a sweeping prison privatization effort, but doubts remain over whether GOP leaders =have the support to pass the outsourcing on its own.

After nearly two-and-a-half hours of questions and heated intra-partisan debate, Sen. Mike Fasano failed to muster enough votes for his amendment that would have stripped the controversial bill (SB 2038) and replaced it with a cost-benefit analysis. Eight Republicans joined 11 Democrats in voting for the measure.

Monday’s actions leave Senate President Mike Haridopolos and other GOP leaders poised to bring up the bill tomorrow. But it’s unclear whether Monday’s vote indicates that Haridopolos, who twice yanked the bill from the floor because it appeared Fasano had the votes to pass his amendment, has enough support for his bill that would die on a tie vote.

Critics of the privatization include Sen. Paula Dockery, who Monday morning released data provided by the Department of Corrections showing that just four of the seven private prisons currently operating in the state are cheaper to run that similar public institutions.

But Senate budget chief JD Alexander insisted the proposal – that would outsource all DOC operations, including more than two dozen prisons and work camps, in an 18-county region in the southern portion of the state – would have to save at least 7 percent, or $16.5 million annually, of the $232.3 million the state now spends on Region IV.

“You can’t get more information than we have. It’s going to be disputed any way you go. The only way you get better information is you privatize a region and find out exactly what the savings are,” Alexander, R-Lake Wales, said, urging a “no vote” on Fasano’s amendment.

Fasano later took umbrage at criticism from incoming Senate President Don Gaetz over the Fasano faction’s refusal to agree to take up a late-filed amendment. Haridopolos, R-Merritt Island, kicked Fasano off as chairman of a budget committee because of his public objections to the privatization.

“Just because I disapproved of a policy I was removed as a chairman. Is that process? All this is is a study. Why are we so afraid of a study?” Fasano, R-New Port Richey, said.

Fasano also disputed proponents’ arguments that many of the 3,800 state workers who would be impacted by the privatization could find jobs elsewhere within the system or be hired by the private vendors because the department is shutting down nearly a dozen work camps or prisons.

“Let’s not play those games. That’s not going to happen. People are going to be without a job. Veterans are going to be without a job,” Fasano said.

Miffed at the lack of hometown candidates for the newly drawn Palm Beach-Treasure Coast congressional District 18, retiring Martin County Sheriff Robert Crowder says he’s considering a GOP primary challenge to U.S. Rep. Allen West, R-Plantation.

“It looks like at the present time all the interest in running for that seat is coming out of Broward County with people relocating. First, I found that strange because I think we’ve got some good people up here who would be capable of representing their neighbors,” Crowder said this morning.

Crowder, 66, has been elected sheriff five times in Martin County and has a history of ruffling feathers in his own party, including his 2010 endorsement of and TV ad for Democrat Alex Sink in the governor’s race against GOP nominee Rick Scott.

His interest in the congressional seat was first reported by Treasure Coast political columnist Eve Samples on Saturday.

West announced Jan. 31 that he would leave his Palm Beach-Broward district to run in the newly drawn district. Democrat Patrick Murphy of Fort Lauderdale has also announced he’s following West to run for the seat. U.S. Rep. Tom Rooney, R-Tequesta, lives in the district, but is running for a newly drawn seat to the west that includes many of his current constituents.

The Florida legislature approved the new districts last week. The map is already the subject of legal challenges.

Read the rest of this entry »

The Florida Supreme Court scheduled arguments Monday for the redistricting maps approved by lawmakers — but positioned the event closer to the Legislature’s finish than what many leading lawmakers had hoped.

The court slated a Leap Year’s presentation — a Feb. 29 hearing. But it comes only 10 days before what is expected to be a March 9 end of the two-month regular session.

The Senate had kept its work to redraw House, Senate and congressional boundaries on a fast pace — with the strategy clearly hinged on the prospect that lawmakers could get a second chance at drawing districts during the regular session, if justices or another court rejected the Legislature’s first proposal.

But the House, by contrast, moved more slowly on redistricting. The Legislature completed its work only last week, sending the redrawn legislative districts, according to law, to Attorney General Pam Bondi. The attorney general wasted no time, sending the maps to the Supreme Court on Friday evening — about 24 hours after the Senate took final action on the plans, send back to it from the House.

Gov. Rick Scott gets the congressional plan. He could act on the proposal as early as this week.

With the Supreme Court’s scheduling, the stage may be set for any additional work ordered on the district maps to settle into a future special session.

 

The state’s private prisons aren’t costing the state less than their state-run counterparts, according to Department of Corrections data released this morning by Sen. Paula Dockery, one of the leaders of a gang of GOP senators opposed to a prison privatization plan set for floor action this afternoon.

Dockery’s data reveal that the four of the private prisons cost less than similar public institutions, but one of those prisons – Gadsden Correctional Institution, which houses female prisoners – achieved its cheaper rate in part because it was compared to Lowell Correctional Institution which also includes a more expensive reception center and Death Row inmates. Read the data here and here.

The private prisons are supposed to save taxpayers a minimum of 7 percent of what it costs to run equivalent state-run facilities.

Among the more expensive private prisons is Palm Beach County’s South Bay, operated by Boca Raton-based GEO Group, with a $48.11 per diem rate for its 1,856 prisoners. That compares to a daily rate of $37.91 per inmate at nearby Okeechobee Correctional Institution which houses 1,619 prisoners. Both have minimum, medium and close custody adult male prisoners.

Overall, the private prisons average $46.73 per prisoner per day, compared to $42.36 per day for public prisons, Dockery found. Those on both sides of the issue say it is difficult to compare the costs for the prisons because of differences in the types of inmates they house. That’s one reason Senate budget chief JD Alexander wants to privatize an entire Department of Corrections region in the southern portion of the state. He says that will make it easier to compare costs with other state-run regions after the privatization is complete.

Senators will take up amendments this afternoon on a proposal (SB 2038) that would privatize all DOC operations – including more than two dozen prisons and work camps – in an 18-county region in the southern portion of the state. Backers of the plan, including Gov. Rick Scott, say it will save taxpayers money. Alexander, R-Lake Wales, estimates the savings at between $14.5 million to $44 million annually.

Dockery and Sen. Mike Fasano, whom Senate President Mike Haridopolos stripped of a budget committee chairmanship because of Fasano’s public opposition to the proposal, insist taxpayers will ultimately lose in the deal.

“In an effort to privatize our state’s prisons, Senate leaders are acting like politicians at their worst – twisting arms in backrooms and giving contracts to special interest donors,” Dockery, R-Lakeland, said in a statement. “They need to start acting like any business in the private sector would and stop using imaginary numbers.”

Meanwhile, the statewide chapter of the NAACP came out against the plan – also opposed by labor unions – this morning. Dale Landry, chairman of the organization’s criminal and civil justice committee, accused Scott and GOP lawmakers of being influenced by the private prison companies’ campaign donations

GEO and Nashville-based Corrections Corporation of America, or CCA, have contributed at least $2 million to candidates or political parties since Scott’s election in 2010. GEO contributed at least $336,000 to the Republican Party of Florida in the past year. The two vendors would be the primary bidders on the plan, which would give contracts to at least two companies to participate.

“One only has to look at contributions by the two primary candidates for operating the private prisons in Florida, CCA and the GEO Group, and we can understand the power of these corporate masters over the Republican leadership,” Landry said. “As a result, they are calling for a redemption of their investments.”

Attorney General Pam Bondi sent the Legislature’s redistricting plans to the Florida Supreme Court on Friday — a move that will start justices’ review of the maps.

Under state law, Bondi had 15 days to act. But she sent the proposals to the court about 24 hours after they earned final approval from the state Senate.

Justices will have 30 days to examine the plans.  The court is asked to determine if the plans for redrawing the state’s 40 Senate districts and 120 House seats complies with state law, including new constitutional standards requiring that boundaries be drawn without concern for incumbents or either political party.

The Florida Democratic Party has already filed suit in Leon County Circuit Court against the congressional map, also approved Thursday.

Gov. Rick Scott is expected to sign the plan into law next week. Scott’s action is expected to bring another lawsuit by the League of Women Voters, La Raza and Common Cause of Florida, which contend the Legislature’s ruling Republicans designed the plan to help the party maintain its majority in the congressional delegation.

 

 

 

Sen. Mike Fasano insists he and opponents of a sweeping prison privatization measure slated for a Senate vote on Tuesday still have enough votes to kill the bill.

Senate President Mike Haridopolos yesterday put the bill on Monday’s calendar after twice yanking it from the floor because Fasano had enough support to strip the privatization effort and replace it with a year-long study of the outsourcing’s cost-effectiveness.

Haridopolos said he intends to have an up-or-down vote on the measure, one of his priorities also being pushed by Gov. Rick Scott, on Tuesday, and hinted he may have the support to pass it although the vote will be close.

But Fasano this morning said nothing’s changed, and he and eight other Republicans along with 11 Democrats – Sen. Gary Siplin of Orlando is the lone hold-out – will vote against the measure, meaning the bill (SB 2038) could die on a 20-20 tie vote.

“I have spoken to the eight Republicans that have said they opposed the bill and they are still firmly opposing the bill,” said the veteran New Port Richey Republican, a veteran lawmaker and outspoken critic of the plan to privatize more than two dozen prisons and other Department of Corrections operations – the largest prison privatization plan in the country – in an 18-county region in the southern portion of the state. Haridopolos kicked Fasano off as chairman of the budget committee that oversees prison spending in retaliation for his opposition to the privatization.

The tie vote assumes that the Fasano coalition sticks together and that all members show up for the vote on Tuesday.

Republican Broward County Commissioner Chip LaMarca, a former chairman of the Broward County GOP, is considering running for the Palm Beach-Broward District 22 congressional seat despite heavy Republican establishment backing for former state House Majority Leader Adam Hasner of Boca Raton.

“I clearly want to look at it and see what the feel of the voters is,” LaMarca said this morning. “I count Adam as a friend, but I need to look at this.”

U.S. Rep. Allen West, R-Plantation, holds the seat now. But with the legislature redrawing District 22 with a Democratic tilt, West announced he’ll run instead in more balanced Palm Beach-Treasure Coast District 18. After West’s announcement, Hasner dropped his Republican U.S. Senate bid to run in District 22, bringing nearly $700,000 in campaign cash and endorsements from West and House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va. Hasner has also been designated an “on the radar” candidate by the National Republican Congressional Committee.

LaMarca says he’ll probably decide within a week whether to pursue the congressional bid.

Democrats Lois Frankel and Kristin Jacobs are also running in District 22.

A ban on Internet cafés poised for a House floor vote appears to be dead in the Senate, which likely won’t do anything about regulating the so-called “casinos on the corner” either.

A Senate committee approved a measure regulating the cafés, and would have killed a bill to ban them despite the support of Gov. Rick Scott who said they should be outlawed.

“Candidly, the Internet cafés are not a major pressing issue in our world. We’re focused on the budget,” Haridopolos, R-Merritt Island, said.

Haridopolos pointed out a proposal to ban the cafés would not have made it through its first committee stop and said his chamber would “take a look” at the measure (HB 3) if the House passes it.

“In the grand scheme of things, it’s not our major focal point. I guess some people are really excited about taking that issue on. It’s pretty low on our totem pole,” Haridopolos said.

A pair of competing legal opinions – one from the Seminole Tribe’s lawyers and another from lawyers for the cafés – say that SB 390 that would regulate the cafés would nullify a compact with the tribe potentially losing the state $233 million a year, or that it wouldn’t.

Senate President Mike Haridopolos will next week resurrect a prison privatization plan he set aside twice, indicating he may have garnered enough support to pass the controversial measure.

Haridopolos said today the Senate will take up the privatization plan (SB 2038) and amendments on Monday, including a proposal that prompted Haridopolos last week to put the brakes on the bill that would privatize all Department of Corrections operations – including prisons and work camps – in an 18-county region in the southern portion of the state. Haridopolos stopped debate before an amendment that would have stripped out the privatization and instead ordered a study of the outsourcing.

When asked if putting the bill on the calendar meant that he now has the votes to pass the plan, Haridopolos, R-Merritt Island, smiled.

“We’ll see,” he said.

Haridopolos may have garnered more support for his priority issue since stripping outspoken critic of the plan Sen. Mike Fasano, R-New Port Richey, of his committee chairmanship after Fasano’s privatization study amendment appeared to likely to pass and gut the bill. Haridopolos, Gov. Rick Scott and other GOP leaders have urged senators to go along with the plan because of an estimated minimum $16.5 million annual savings.

The Senate will likely have an up-or-down vote on the privatization plan on Tuesday, Haridopolos said.

“I think some people have been impressed by the facts,” he said.

Sen. Ronda Storms’ bill that would make it harder for doctors to put foster kids on mind-altering drugs passed another milestone in the Senate today, but its future is bleak.

The Senate Health Regulation Committee unanimously approved Storms’ measure (SB 1808) and sent it on its way to its final committee this afternoon. But the House has yet to hear a similar proposal and, with the 2012 session midpoint approaching, appears unlikely to budge.

“The House is killing it,” Storms, R-Valrico, said. “It’s a source of extraordinary frustration and a disservice to the children of Florida.”

Storms’ launched her psychotropic drug crusade after the 2009 death of 7-year-old Gabriel Myers, a Broward County foster child who hanged himself while under the influence of several psychiatric drugs. Storms’ bill includes many of the recommendations given by a Department of Children and Families workgroup in the aftermath of Myers’ death.

A 2008 Congressional report found that children in foster care in Florida were far more likely to be on mind-altering drugs than children in the general population. With 12 percent of the state’s foster children 17 and younger on at least one psychotropic medication, a drop of 10 percent three years ago, DCF officials say they have improved protocols for monitoring foster kids’ prescription drug use.

Palm Beach County Circuit Judge Krista Marx told PostOnPolitics this afternoon that she will not run for state attorney or seek the interim appointment to replace incumbent Michael McAuliffe.

Marx, a former assistant state attorney, was entertaining the idea after McAuliffe announced last month that he would not seek reelection this year. McAuliffe later announced he’s leaving office in March to take a job with West Palm Beach-based Oxbow Carbon, which means Gov. Rick Scott will appoint a replacement to serve the last nine months of McAuliffe’s term.

Former Democratic state Sen. Dave Aronberg is the only candidate to open a 2012 campaign for McAuliffe’s job.

Scott’s office says it has received one application for the state attorney appointment, from Wesley Forrest White, an assistant state attorney in Nassau County near Jacksonville. White said he would move to Palm Beach County if he got the appointment. He said he is not interested in running for a four-year term.

Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson disagrees with President Obama‘s decision to require religious schools, hospitals and other non-church institutions to provide employee health plans that cover contraceptive services.

Says Nelson spokesman Dan McLaughlin: “The federal government already is making an exception for churches. And Sen. Nelson thinks there should be an exception for church-affiliated organizations. It’s a matter of religious freedom.”

The policy has created a firestorm of opposition from the Catholic church and Republicans, with Florida Sen. Marco Rubio emerging as a leading critic. Some Democrats have also expressed unease. Rubio and Democratic West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin are cosponsoring a bill to repeal the rule.

Nelson, who is up for reelection this year, wants a compromise solution, McLaughlin said.

“(H)e wants to make sure women’s health is protected,” McLaughlin said. “He feels there has to be way to do both of these things. One state, for instance, allows religious employers to enroll workers in a plan with a reduced premium, and then employees who want contraception can pay for the extra coverage.”

A proposed $69.2 billion state budget, which pulls millions of dollars from health care programs and pours them into public schools, cleared the House on Thursday over opposition from outnumbered Democrats.

 A year after slashing classroom spending by $1.3 billion, the House is making an election-year reversal — looking to replenish $1 billion. But where ruling Republicans find the money fractured the House along partisan lines.

The measure was approved 79-38. With the Senate expected to complete its budget next week, the two sides are poised to spend the session’s closing month hammering out differences.

The Senate follows a similar course as the House – proposing $1.3 billion more for public schools, while sharply scaling back health and human services spending. But the approach frustrated Democrats, who said cuts ran too deep, and the school money is not enough.

“Florida may be a great place to visit,” said Rep. Mark Pafford, D-West Palm Beach. “But if you’re in the middle class, it stinks to live here right now.”

Everglades lovers should probably chill out over the lack of funding for river of grass clean-up in the Senate budget.

Senate budget chief JD Alexander said this morning he’s “seriously considering” matching the House’s $35 million line-item for Everglades restoration. Gov. Rick Scott tucked away $40 million for the clean-up, and the money will almost certainly show up late in negotiations between the two chambers over their spending plans.

“We’re looking at it. We’re trying to figure out if we can afford it this year,” Alexander, R-Lake Wales, said, adding that he’s supported that and the Florida Forever land-buying program for his 14 years in the legislature soon coming to an end. “So it’s something I’d love to see us be able to do.
I would hope we’d be able to eventually get there…If we can do something it won’t be a lot, but we’d certainly like to provide some funding for preservation of Florida’s ecological needs.”

Alexander said he doesn’t foresee much trouble reconciling the two spending plans. The Senate’s proposal includes deeper health and human services, more spending on schools and road projects and dips into state universities’ reserves.

“There aren’t a lot of differences. It should be fairly easy to get to something we both can agree to,” Alexander said.

Florida will get $8.4 billion of a $26 billion nationwide foreclosure settlement reached following what U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder called “disturbing practices” at the country’s biggest banks.

Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi, a top negotiator for the states involved in the lawsuit, said prosecutors and banks had reached a deal that “provides Floridians with much-needed relief and reforms the mortgage-servicing industry.”

Under the agreement:
* Florida borrowers will receive an estimated $7.6 billion in benefits from loan modifications, including principal reduction and other debt relief.

* About $170 million will be available for cash payments to Florida borrowers who lost their home to foreclosure from Jan. 1, 2008 through Dec. 31, 2011 and suffered servicing abuse.

* The value of refinanced loans to Florida’s underwater borrowers would be an estimated $309 million.

* The state will receive a direct payment of $350 million.

“This settlement will provide substantial relief to struggling Florida homeowners, and ensures that our state gets its fair share of the relief being provided nationally,” Bondi said in a statement this morning. “This agreement holds banks accountable and puts in place new protections for
homeowners in the form of strict mortgage servicing standards.”

Read more from The Palm Beach Post‘s Kimberly Miller here.

It’ll be more of a candidate forum than a back-and-forth debate this month when the Florida Federation of Republican Women hosts the first meeting of Republican U.S. Senate candidates since Rep. Connie Mack, R-Cape Coral, got into the race.

Mack, former appointed Sen. George LeMieux and businessman Mike McCalister are scheduled to participate in the Feb. 19 event in Tallahassee. The three are vying to run against Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson in November.

Candidates will appear together and make brief opening statements, then appear individually for 15 to 20 minutes apiece to answer questions from the audience and a moderator, said Federation 3rd VP Kim Carroll. While one candidate is answering questions, the others will be offstage and won’t hear the exchange with the audience, Caroll said. The candidates will then appear together at the end for a brief wrap-up.

“We don’t want to set it up so it’s a bash-my-fellow-candidate debate,” said Carroll, who said debates with all the candidates on stage together tend to devolve into “name-calling sessions” that distract from the issues.

The Associated Press reported that state Sen. Miguel Diaz de la Portilla is facing an ethics charge that he failed to properly report his finances.

Diaz de la Portilla, R-Miami, is chairman of the Senate Ethics and Elections Committee.

The AP story:

The Florida Ethics Commission on Wednesday released findings from its closed-door meeting held last Friday.

The commission found probable cause that the senator violated ethics laws because he did not list his checking account on forms he initially filed. Diaz de la Portilla, R-Miami, is chairman of the Senate subcommittee that deals with ethics and election laws.

The commission also concluded the senator failed to timely disclose retirement accounts. But the commission said there was no reason to pursue that charge any further.

Diaz de la Portilla said he unintentionally left his checking account off his forms because he had listed his income elsewhere on the forms.