By MICHAEL C. BENDER
Palm Beach Post Staff Writer

TALLAHASSEE — A controversial college construction project in the Panhandle followed a similar initiative at Indian River State College, according to e-mails assembled in the criminal case against former state House Speaker Ray Sansom.
But the building in Fort Pierce has one important difference, former Senate President Ken Pruitt recently said in sworn pre-trial testimony:

“There is no airport hangar there,” Pruitt, R-Port St. Lucie, told state investigators.

An alleged scheme to use $6 million in state tax money to build a private jet hangar in Destin has resulted in criminal charges against Sansom, R-Destin, former Northwest Florida State College President Bob Richburg and state Republican Party fund-raiser Jay Odom.

The $6 million, according to 2007 budget documents, was supposed to pay for an emergency operations center at Northwest Florida State. But a grand jury said the building was constructed as a home for Destin Jet, which Odom owns. A trial for Sansom is scheduled to start Sept. 29.

In a 2007 e-mail, Richburg said the “history of the project” began with a 2005 tour he, Sansom and Odom made at Indian River Community College, as the Treasure Coast school was then known. The e-mail does not elaborate.
Pruitt, who accompanied the tour, testified that the visit focused on the Indian River college’s Treasure Coast Public Safety Training Complex.

The safety complex “was in the planning stages at the time,” Pruitt said. “In fact, it will be opened on 9/11 of this year, the official structure will be. But there is no airport hangar there.”

Pruitt said he knew Odom as a GOP fund-raiser and assumed Odom participated in the tour because of his role as a “community leader.” Pruitt said he first met Richburg during Pruitt’s 2003 bus tour to promote Bright Future scholarships.
Pruitt, who secured millions of dollars for the Indian River college during his two decades in the legislature, testified during a 12-minute interview Aug. 4 with Leon County State Attorney’s Office investigator Jim Anderson in private attorney Ron Meyer’s Tallahassee office.

Anderson asked Pruitt about a 2007 e-mail from Richburg to Sansom that referred to “the Pruitt visit.”
Richburg wrote that Odom had “suggested the Pruitt visit and then we both agreed that the timing on that would be a problem and that we may not need to go in that direction.”

Pruitt said, “I have no idea what they meant.”

Pruitt, who cited personal reasons when announcing his resignation in May, said he could not remember whether he ever spoke to Sansom or Richburg about the proposed emergency center in Destin.

“I can’t represent to you that a conversation never took place,” said Pruitt. “But I don’t remember that in terms of an EOC facility. I can’t adamantly represent that they never discussed it with me.”

Pruitt said the Indian River college security building was not funded the same way as Sansom’s emergency building.
Pruitt, however, said it was possible for projects, like Sansom’s, to receive state dollars with little documentation involved.

“It is not common, but it is possible,” Pruitt said.

Tags: indictments, Ken Pruitt, Ray Sansom

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