Six former elected officials have applied so far for one of the seats on the new five-member county ethics commission approved by Palm Beach County commissioners last month as part of a sweeping package of reforms.
The ethics legislation calls for the Palm Beach County League of Cities to fill one of the seats by appointing a former elected official. The league plans to make its choice Wednesday, Jan. 27, so Executive Director Jamie Titcomb has set a deadline of 5 p.m. Monday to submit applications.
Applicants so far: former county commissioner Ken Adams, former county commissioner Dennis Koehler, former Jupiter councilman Tom McCarthy, former Delray Beach commissioner Alberta McCarthy, former Delray Beach mayor David Schmidt and former Haverhill Mayor Chuck Stoddard.
Other seats on the ethics panel are to be filled by county police chiefs, the local chapter of the Florida Institute of CPAs, the president of Florida Atlantic University and a coalition of minority lawyer groups.
Atwater contradicted questions about how to close what could be up to a $3 billion spending gap this year, saying the premise was incorrect.
Florida will not spend more than what it brings in, Atwater, R-North Palm Beach, said.
“The people of Florida do not have one more dime to send us. So let me be clear. When it comes to constructing a state budget to meet the critical needs of the people in this state, I am not starting in a hole. I am starting from scratch,” said Atwater, who is running for chief financial officer. “We will not extract one more dollar from the small business owner of the state or from any Floridian’s wallet to accomplish the task.”
Atwater delivered his campaign-sounding remarks to a Ways and Means Committee meeting that he asked each of the Senate’s 40 members to attend. Most of them showed up.
“We should not allow the shrieking cacophony of special interests to drown out this simple fact. We have faced up to and made the difficult decisions. What we have not done and what we will not do is leave our sons and our daughters and future generations of Floridians with an intolerable burden of taxes and debt,” Atwater said, drawing the applause of the GOP members in attendance.
The committee is now hearing from university of Florida economist David Denslow and will hear from the legislature’s economist Amy Baker later.
Wednesday, January 20th, 2010 by Michael C. Bender
From Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Maurice Ferre:
“Of course I am for healthcare reform, but this is not the right plan for the working families of Florida.
“This plan was arrived at with unacceptable compromises. It is a special interest plan that raises taxes and favors insurance and pharmaceutical companies. I fear the President has lost sight of his original goal of extending healthcare to all Americans and at the same time controlling healthcare costs.”
Wednesday, January 20th, 2010 by Michael C. Bender
Palm Beach County Elections Supervisor Susan Bucher wants to make sure that her office is reimbursed more than $1.1 million it has spent on special elections to fill the seats of departing state and federal politicians.
Bucher has asked the county’s legislative delegation for help securing state money she says her office is owed for holding elections to fill the seats left by former state Sen. Ken Pruitt, R-Port St. Lucie, former state Rep. Priscilla Taylor, D-West Palm Beach, and former U.S. Rep. Robert Wexler, D-Boca Raton.
Find the link to that story and more from the print edition of The Palm Beach Post in the “Today’s Paper” box on the right hand side of page.
Wednesday, January 20th, 2010 by Michael C. Bender
From Democrat Alex Sink‘s gubernatorial campaign manager Paul Dunn:
“Every single Floridian should be deeply troubled about Bill McCollum’s effort to have health care declared unconstitutional because, by McCollum’s logic, programs like Medicare and Social Security could also wind up being labeled unconstitutional. And with Bill McCollum’s track record during his 20 years in Congress, where he voted over 20 times to cut or reduce funding of Medicare by billions of dollars, that may well be McCollum’s objective here.”
On Tuesday, McCollum campaign manager Matt Williams labeled his boss “courageous” for threatening to sue the federal government over a proposal to require Americans buy health insurance and criticized Sink forwhat he said was a “continued refusal to weigh in on critical issues like federal health care reform.”
Wednesday, January 20th, 2010 by Michael C. Bender
UPDATE:McCollum’s chief of staff Joe Jacquot called to say the estimate of 200 hours put in on the legal analysis was off. He did not give a new number, but said it was largely the work of two attorneys in the office along with McCollum.
Florida Attorney General Bill McCollum on Tuesday threatened to sue the federal government if Congress approved a proposal requiring Americans to buy health insurance.
“We’ll be ready if the time comes,” McCollum said. “We would want to file suit very quickly if we could.”
McCollum, a Republican candidate for governor, denied the announcement was a political ploy. But hours after the press conference, his campaign released a statement citing the proposed lawsuit and criticizing the likely Democratic gubernatorial nominee.
“As Florida’s next governor, Bill McCollum isn’t afraid to take a stand on behalf of Floridians,” McCollum campaign manager Matt Williams said.
McCollum acknowledged problems with the health-care system, but told reporters earlier in the day that he had no proposed solutions. McCollum said he recently assembled a health care advisory board for his campaign.
“During the course of the campaign I may well lay out something, I may not. I don’t know yet,” said McCollum, a former chairman of the Healthy Florida Foundation.
Former Gov. Jeb Bush is supporting Senate President Jeff Atwater in his statewide run for chief financial officer, even though Atwater has a Republican opponent in the primary.
Atwater’s campaign released the announcement Wednesday, along with a link to a YouTube video in which Bush, still influential in GOP politics in Florida, says of Atwater, “It’s his life experience of being a committed family person, of being a successful businessman and also having served in positions of increasing responsibility in the Florida Legislature that have made Jeff uniquely qualified to handle this job.”
Republican Scott Brown’s epic special election upset victory in liberal Massachusetts has some GOPers dreaming of an upset win in the April special election for “fire-breathing liberal” Robert Wexler’s heavily Democratic congressional seat.
PALM BEACH — Former President Bill Clinton knows a little something about voter backlash.
During the 1994 midterm elections, Republicans capitalized on voter dissatisfaction with Clinton and congressional Democrats to take control of the House and Senate.
“I find a lot of the rhetoric in this election season largely irrelevant to what’s going on,” Clinton told an audience of about 500 Jewish Federation of Palm Beach County donors. “….My experience is when people are frustrated and angry and they act on their frustration and anger, they’ve got about a 75 percent chance of making a bad decision — not just in politics, but in life.”
Democratic congressional candidate Ted Deutch’s campaign says former President Bill Clinton’s appearance at this afternoon’s fund-raiser at St. Andrew’s Country Club in Boca Raton raised $175,000 and pushed Deutch’s overall campaign total above $1 million.
Deutch, a Boca Raton state Senator, and former Broward Mayor Ben Graber are running in a Feb. 2 Dem primary for the seat of former Democratic U.S. Rep. Robert Wexler, who stepped down this month to head a Middle East think tank. Three Republicans and a no-party candidate are also running. The general election is April 13.
Clinton will speak tonight in Palm Beach at a Jewish Federation of Palm Beach County dinner at The Breakers.
State Sen. Dan Gelber, D-Miami Beach, told supporters in an e-mail today that he was been endorsed by Palm Beach County Commissioner Priscilla Taylor at the Palm Beach Martin Luther King Breakfast on Monday.
Gelber is in a Democratic primary for state attorney general with fellow state Sen. Dave Aronberg of Greenacres.
Florida Tea Partiers accuse Orlando political activist Doug Guetzloe and his cohorts of hijacking the “Tea Party” brand in a lawsuit filed in federal court today.
Florida Tea Party Chairman Fred O’Neal, Guetzloe and Nicholos Egoroff registered the minor political party with the Department of State in August. Since then, the Tea Party and Guetzloe have backed state Sen. Paula Dockery in her GOP primary bid for governor.
But the suit, filed by activists throughout the state unassociated with O’Neal or Guetzloe, accuses the two of being johnny-come-lately’s to the Tea Party movement and now they want their name back.
“We believe the identity of the Florida Tea Party has been hijacked by cynical forces,” South Florida Tea Party chairman Everett Wilkinson said. “We are especially concerned the group is improperly leveraging
the tea party movement to support the gubernatorial campaign of Sen. Paula Dockery.”
A group of Haitian orphans, whose orphanage was destroyed by last week's massive earthquake, stand bundled together Tuesdayas they wait to be loaded onto to a bus after arriving in Pittsburgh. The orphans initially landed in Sanford, Fla. on Monday. (AP)
Since the earthquake seven days ago, Florida has been the destination for more than 4,500 Haitians in the process of repatriation, state emergency operation officials said today.
State officials said about 45,000 American citizens are still in Haiti. But officials could not say how many were from Florida or how many intended to return to the United States.
“The state is focused on returning U.S. citizens to their families and supporting our federal partners,” Gov. Charlie Crist said.
After arriving in Florida, many Haitians will continue on to other parts of the country. For example, 53 orphans landed in Sanford on Monday, but have since been relocated to Pennsylvania.
Florida Attorney General Bill McCollum said today a proposed mandate to require Americans buy healthcare coverage was unconstitutional and would sue if the bill passes.
McCollum, a Republican candidate for governor, said his office put in about 200 hours to determine the proposal was unconstitutional.
“We want to be ready if the time comes,” McCollum said.
*Updated at 2:47 p.m. to include Democratic response.
Florida Attorney General and Republican gubernatorial candidate Bill McCollum said today that it was a mistake to oppose making a Martin Luther King Day a federal holiday. He said his 1983 vote was based on giving goverment workers a paid holiday.
“It was adding to the cost of the budget,” McCollum said. “At that time I was very concerned and probably a little naïve, because I think Martin Luther King was a great leader. And I’ve said numerous times at town hall meetings and other places as I was a Congressman that was a mistake.”
McCollum, a Republican candidate for governor, was forced to answer the question after the Florida Democratic Party blasted him on Monday. And Democrats have been getting some mileage out this 27-year-old vote.
Democrats questioned his spokeswoman’s claim that McCollum has “said in the past” that the vote was a mistake. McCollum said today that he realized it was a mistake “in the ’80s after the vote.”
“Shortly after the vote. I couldn’t tell you the exact year, but this is what? Twenty-five years later?,” McCollum said. “It was very apparent to me upon reflection soon after that that it was not a good vote even though it does cost a lot of money.”
But now Democrats question that timing, pointing to a 1989 vote McCollum cast to oppose a commission to promote the observance of MLK Day. The bill, which gave the commission a five-year budget of $1.5 million, passed by large margins in the House and Senate.
No children younger than 16 could get a tattoo and tattoo artists would need licenses from the Florida Health Department under a bill proposed by state Rep. Mary Brandenburg, D-West Palm Beach.
“It’s not just sailors and bikers getting tattoos anymore,” said Brandenburg, a Palm Beach Countt Commission candidate.
The bill (HB 729) is aimed at rogue artists offering tattoos at flea markets or in their garages. It has support from the Florida Medical Association and the 110-member Florida Tattoo Artists Guild, including Tom Meyer, owner of Ink Addiction Tattoos in Jupiter.
“If it puts anyone out of business, they probably deserve it,” guild President Mark Longenecker said.
The Senate sponsor is Eleanor Sobel, D-Hollywood, who is also pushing a bill that requires parental consent before minors can visit a tanning bed.
Democratic congressional hopeful Ted Deutch expects to raise more than $100,000 today when former President Bill Clinton drops by St. Andrews Country Club in Boca Raton for a late-afternoon fund-raiser. The event is closed to the press.
Deutch’s campaign says he has already raised more than $800,000 for his special election bid to replace former Democratic Rep. Robert Wexler. Deutch and Ben Graber are competing in a Feb. 2 Democratic primary. The winner runs in an April 13 general election.
Clinton tonight is scheduled to speak at The Breakers to major Jewish Federation of Palm Beach County donors.
Once upon a time (three months ago), Republican Marco Rubio was considered a long-shot contender for the U.S. Senate race. Now, he’s apparently got some political capital to spend.
Rubio’s camp tells us that the former state House speaker has used e-mails and Facebook pleas to raise $42,000 for upstart Massachusetts Republican Scott Brown in the past five days. That’s about 12 percent of what Rubio collected for his own campaign in his first three months as a formal candidate.
Meanwhile, Gov. Charlie Crist is using his own capital to raise money for victims of the Haiti earthquake.
By the way, no official word yet about the much-anticipated fourth-quarter fundraising numbers from Rubio or Crist for their own Senate primary campaigns. Reports are due Jan. 31.
Republican U.S. Senate candidate Marco Rubio penned an editorial in the National Review this morning laying out his opposition to President Obama’s bank tax, which we wrote about here and here.
Rubio has said he opposes the federal stimulus program, which the bank tax is supposed to help recoup. But Rubio has also said that he, like Gov. Charlie Crist, would have used the state’s share of stimulus to help fill budget holes. From the column:
No one should be fooled by the spin. President Obama’s bank tax is not about recouping money for the American taxpayer. If President Obama were truly serious about that, he would call on Congress to repeal his failed stimulus program tomorrow so that future generations won’t be saddled with its crippling debt.
Boca Raton attorney Robert Weinroth is considering a challenge of Republican Palm Beach County Commissioner Steven Abrams and spent $5,000 on a poll with questions linking Abrams to Fort Lauderdale Ponzi schemer Scott Rothstein, whose imploded law firm employed Abrams in its Boca office.
Read about it this week’s Politics column.
State Sen. Dan Gelber, D-Miami Beach, told supporters in an e-mail today that he was been endorsed by Palm Beach County Commissioner Priscilla Taylor at the Palm Beach Martin Luther King Breakfast on Monday. 
Where's the money? Use The Post's interactive database of who wants and who's getting federal dollars.
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