A new report from a nationwide campaign watchdog shows spending by shadowy independent political organizations has spiked in Florida, with one Tampa address serving as home for many of these cash machines.

The National Institute on Money in State Politics found that political spending by electioneering communications organizations (ECOs), sometimes dubbed 527 committees, has climbed 53 percent from 2006 to 2010 in Florida.

During last year’s elections, $48.2 million was spent by groups, with the largest being Gov. Rick Scott’s own Let’s Get to Work ECO, which poured $17.5 million into helping him defeat Democrat Alex Sink.

In federal races, the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision last year in the Citizens United case helped kick the door open for corporate spending. Florida already allowed business interests to contribute in state races, so the ruling hasn’t directly affected elections for the Legislature, governor or Cabinet posts.

But Florida corporations are increasingly anteing up big bets in state races — behind the cover of vaguely named organizations, the institute report shows.

“Nearly 300 independent spending committees have been created since 2005, with innocuous names like ‘Let’s Get To Work,’ ‘Florida’s Working Families,’ and ‘Floridians for Truth and Integrity in Government,’ with little or no identifying information,” according to the report. “Yet many of these committees are registered to a small group of people. Of the $96.8 million of total independent spending during the study period, $38.8 million, 40 percent of the overall total, was routed through ECOs controlled by just four individuals.”

Nancy Watkins is one of those guiding the cash. The Tampa accountant’s office at 610 South Boulevard is the address for 88 different political committees.

The institute’s report is here: http://bit.ly/sjK3Gj

Democrat Alex Sink has opened an electioneering committee that can receive unlimited donations, but she is still deliberating on whether to accept taxpayer money to help pay for her campaign.

“The campaign has not made a decision on whether we’ll be accepting public funds,” Sink spokeswoman Kyra Jennings said.

By our quick math, Sink is eligible for about $4 million in tax dollars to supplement her campaign for governor.

She accepted about $1 million from the state for her CFO campaign in 2006. But this year her Republican opponent, Rick Scott, has turned the public financing program into a political issue. Scott, a wealthy Naples businessman, doesn’t need any help from taxpayers. He poured $50 million of his own money into his primary race.

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Republican gubernatorial candidate Rick Scott poured $12 million into his campaign from Aug. 9-18, according to final primary campaign finance reports filed last night. That brings he and his wife’s total investment in the campaign effort to $49.9 million.

Scott’s primary rival, Bill McCollum, is not anywhere near that kind of money. But the state’s Attorney General hardly running a mom-and-pop operation. McCollum’s team expects they and their supports will spend more than $20 million.

While Scott writing checks to his own campaign, the electioneering committee directly tied to McCollum took $1.6 million from a host of special interests during the same time. The Florida First Initiative, has raised nearly $6 million this cycle. McCollum’s own campaign committee raised $7.7 million.

From Aug 9-18, McCollum’s 527 committee took money from insurers, real estate companies and health care interests, including $500,000 from the secretive League of American Voters, $256,000 from Florida Senate Republican Mike Haridopolos’ fund-raising committee, $250,000 from The Villages holding company $10,000 from the Gunster Yoakley law firm and $10,000 from Continental Motorcars of Merritt Island.

Democratic Attorney General candidate Dan Gelber last month opened his own fundraising group, known as Common Sense, that — like several other statewide candidates — will help him avoid the contribution limits and spending caps of his own campaign.

Gelber’s raised about $45,000 for the group and those contributions are listed on his website, as required by state law.

But official documents filed with the Division of Elections didn’t include the URL of that website until today when supporters of Gelber’s primary opponent, fellow state Sen. Dave Aronberg, called foul.

“That’s an infraction of Florida election law,” said Rep. Joe Abruzzo, D-Wellington. “It’s illegal.”

A spokeswoman for the Division of Elections said there was no penalty for that omission, although someone could file an elections complaint over it. We were also referred to Chapter 7 of the state Campaign Treasurer Handbook. The handbook shows that the document a candidate is required to file when he is associated with a 527 group, a document known as a “statement of solicitation,” must include some basic information. The URL of the website is not part of that basic info, but must be reported to the elections division within five days.

The website must also be updated within five days of any contribution or expenditure.

The first donation reported by the group was on July 26. Network Solutions, a company that tracks domain names, shows the Common Sense website was created on July 28.

Gelber’s campaign manager dismissed the complaint from Abruzzo. “It would be nice if Rep. Abruzzo explained why funds he promised would be spent to help elect Democrats were funneled to a GOP front group,” Christian Ulvert said in an e-mail.

After agreeing to not air television ads in the Democratic attorney general primary because of its potentially misleading name, a fund-raising committee known as Florida Mainstream Democrats has shifted much of its money to a predominately Republican group, which has paid for a TV spot scheduled to air Wednesday in West Palm Beach.

The ad supports state Sen. Dave Aronberg of Greenacres in his Democratic primary race against fellow Sen. Dan Gelber of Miami Beach.

Aronberg has helped Mainstream raise more than $242,000 in the past eight weeks, according to state election records and the group’s website. On Monday, the group transferred $180,000 to another political committee, known as Voters Response, which will pay for the ad.

More here.

Here’s one way: Give $1.4 million $1.6 million to the committee slamming Rick Scott, Bill McCollum’s Republican gubernatorial rival.

That’s the total so far that Republicans Mike Haridopolos and Dean Cannon, the likely next Senate president and House speaker, have pumped into McCollum’s Florida First Initiative group, which is airing the above TV ad right now. Haridopolos gave the group another $100k on Monday, the same day he and Cannon joined McCollum and former Gov. Jeb Bush on a made-for-TV campaign swing through Miami, Jacksonville and Tampa.

In the good old days before Scott cannon-balled into the deep end of Florida Republican politics, the GOP establishment was successfully mowing down McCollum’s primary challengers. It doesn’t take too much imagination* to think that at that point Haridopolos and Cannon were probably planning to spent their money protecting the GOP majorities in the state House and Senate or maybe even trying pick off a handful of Democratic seats that Republicans need to own veto-proof majorities in both chambers.

Instead, the money is being used to defeat Scott, who is campaigning on all the same issues — reforming Medicaid, cutting taxes, ending teacher tenure, making abortions harder to get — that Cannon and Haridopolos want to pass in the next two years. But instead they’re helping fund a primary fight so nasty that Democrat Alex Sink is virtually tied in the polls with either GOP candidate without having spent a dime on TV and Republican voters are practically begging the campaigns to disarm.

So watch for plenty of second-guessing of the two Orlando area lawmakers if Sink topples the bloodied Republican nominee in November and leaves Haridopolos and Cannon with little more than to recycle the same stinging quotes they used when Gov. Charlie Crist vetoed their bills this year.

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Florida will not appeal a federal court ruling that put a temporary hold on a program that offers taxpayer assistance to statewide candidates competing against wealthy, self-funded competitors.

“In analyzing our options and with the desire to have some finality on the issue, we felt it was the best choice not to take any further steps,” Secretary of State spokeswoman Jennifer Krell Davis told The Palm Beach Post.

It sounds like the state sees little chance to win a rehearing from the same judges in the U.S. 11th Circuit Court of Appeals. It’s other option would be to appeal to a Supreme Court that last year dismantled much of the McCain-Feingold campaign finance laws.

A couple interesting offshoots:

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Rick Scott’s Republican gubernatorial campaign has another $3 million from his wife, Anne. The couple have now put at least $33.9 million of their own money into the primary race against Attorney General Bill McCollum, shattering all kinds of money records in the state.

Scott’s political advocacy group, Let’s Get to Work, which he is a 527 group he’s using to avoid triggering a flood of taxpayer matching dollars for McCollum, also picked up a few big contributors in the past week: Robert L. James, Fort Lauderdale, $25,000; Jack Anderson, Vero Beach, $25,000; and the co-founder of Columbia Hospital Corp., Richard Rainwater, Fort Worth, $100,000.

We detailed in this post on Wednesday some big donations McCollum recently picked up.

The Freedom First Committee, the political advocacy group run by Merritt Island Republican Mike Haridopolos, collected $100,000 from Progress Energy on Wednesday. Hedge fund manager Paul Tudor Jones gave another $100,000. In recent weeks, Haridopolos has also taken $50,000 checks from FPL, the Florida Association of Realtors and the Florida Medical Association.

Haridopolos has been sending the money to other so-called 527 groups. Since the beginning of the month, he’s given $190,000 to the Florida First Initiative, a group run by GOP gubernatorial candidate Bill McCollum. Haridopolos has also given $50,000 each to Floridians for Conservative Values, a stealthy political attack group that operates out of a West Palm Beach, and Truth Matters, Inc.

Truth Matters appears to be operated by Richard S. Cole of Miami. In June, the group took $73,000 from a state Senate leadership committee known as Alliance for a Strong Economy (it’s managed by Palm Beach Gardens council candidate Howard Rosenkranz) and sent nearly all of it — $69,800 — to Citizens Speaking Out Committee, another group run by Alachua County Republican Chairman Stafford Jones that is aiding McCollum.

Haridopolos’s House counterpart, Dean Cannon, withdrew $70,000 from the Florida Republican Party on Monday and tucked it into his Florida Liberty Fund. The same day, Cannon used the fund to send $65,000 to Florida Citizens for Change, a 527 run by Harold Wise of Miami.

Don’t look now, but Attorney General Bill McCollum is doing a decent job collecting money for his Republican gubernatorial race.

Nearly all of the money-related headlines have gone to Naples businessman Rick Scott, who, along with his wife, have poured at least $31 million of their personal fortune into the Republican gubernatorial primary.

But by spending his own money, Scott has given McCollum the entire field of the traditional Republican donors, who helped Charlie Crist and Tom Gallagher raise nearly $30 million in 2006.

McCollum and his allies have spent nearly $14 million so far, about $1 million more than Crist spent in the 2006 primary.

On the collection side, McCollum has received $1.3 million from Florida taxpayers as part of the state’s public campaign financing program, which Scott is trying to get a court to dismantle.

And we reported Tuesday that McCollum’s political advocacy group, a 527 known as Florida First Initiative, brought in $500,000 from the U.S. Chamber (the Florida Chamber endorsed him today). McCollum has helped his 527 collect $1.5 million since July 8. Broken down that’s an average donation of $45,000. Or about $77,000 per day.

Meanwhile, McCollum’s campaign has made another big TV purchase, peppering $1 million across the state for the next month. The buy is mostly — if not all — on Fox News and focuses on Orlando, Tampa and Jacksonville TV markets.

Scott, however, continues outspend McCollum about 3-to-1 on TV. A report from ad buyers show’s Scott’s 527 group, Let’s Get to Work, will spend another $1.8 million in the next week. Most of that money is spent in Tampa, Orlando and Miami markets.

Former House Speaker Allan Bense called us back this afternoon after he said his e-mail inbox filled up with messages about our post earlier today that reported he held a private meeting late Sunday with GOP gubernatorial candidate Rick Scott. Bense is a top fundraiser for the other guy in the primary: Attorney General Bill McCollum.

“I’m a strong Bill McCollum supporter,” said Bense.

Bense provided proof that Scott’s campaign requested the meeting and said he accepted to be polite.

“I guess in today’s hardball politics that’s not the way to be,” he said

Bense, the chairman-elect of the Florida Chamber of Commerce, said he doesn’t have any inside knowledge on who the chamber might endorse and that he’s not pushing for either candidate. The group is conducting some candidate interviews for other races today in Miami today and could make their announcement in the governor’s race this week.

We’ve heard the race has caused some hand-wringing within the chamber.

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Down to only $800,000 in his Republican gubernatorial campaign account, Bill McCollum is doing the heavy lifting with his 527 political advocacy fund.

McCollum, who has agreed to limit his personal campaign spending in return for matching funds from taxpayers, he is free to raise unlimited amounts of cash with his group, The Florida First Initiative.

McCollum’s fund took in another $50,000 from Mike Haridopolos, a Merritt Island Republican who is expected to take over the Senate president’s office next year. Haridopolos’s group, the Freedom First Committee, has now invested about $450,000 in McCollum’s bid.

Haridopolos most recently raised $40,000 from Sen. Don Gaetz’s political committee, $50,000 from the Florida Association of Realtors and $30,000 from the Florida Association of Insurance Agents.

McCollum’s political fund has taken in nearly $400,000 in the past week.

While attorneys for the top two Republican gubernatorial candidates debate the merits of campaign spending caps, the candidates themselves are still spending and collecting money at a feverish pace.

Rick Scott will air $2.2 million in television ads starting today and for the next week, a source told The Palm Beach Post. That total brings the amount of television spending for Scott’s campaign and his 527 political advocacy group, Let’s Get to Work, to an astonishing $23.2 million over the past three months.

Meanwhile, McCollum’s campaign was down to just $800,000 on Saturday. But McCollum’s 527 group, the Florida First Initiative reported two big new checks: $100,000 from Progress Energy and $50,000 from Florida Phosphate, a political advocacy group run by Mosaic Fertilizer lobbyist Mark Kaplan.

(On potentially related a side note, incoming Senate President Mike Haridopolos, R-Merritt Island, has sent $15,000 to the Committee for Responsible Representation, a political committee controlled by Stafford Jones. Jones, who is running the Florida First group, did not return a call for comment.)

One of the two 527 committees that Republican gubernatorial Bill McCollum is raising money for, The Florida First Initiative, has reported $175,000 in contributions.

Most of the cash — $100,000 — is from Vero Beach-based RC Stork aviation companies. Hobe Sound venture capitalist Robert C. McCormack also $25,000.

Meanwhile, The Buzz is reporting that McCollum has just $800,000 in his campaign account heading into the final six weeks of the primary campaign against Naples businessman Rick Scott.

Some Democrats are crying foul over a group Democrat Dave Aronberg has used to raise $128,000 for his attorney general primary: “Florida Mainstream Democrats.”

Aronberg

It was first coined in 2004 for a group founded by 18 Democratic state lawmakers – including Aronberg, who served as chairman for about three years – to attract conservative voters to the party and support pro-business, moderate candidates seeking political office outside the traditional liberal enclaves in South Florida.

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A measure in the Florida constitution that has funneled nearly $22 million in taxpayer money to statewide political candidates in the past 10 years is the target of a lawsuit from Republican gubernatorial candidate Rick Scott.

Scott is asking a federal judge to throw out Florida’s public financing law, saying it has “significantly chilled” his First Amendment rights.

Scott has spent $21 million on his campaign since April 9, which means he’s drawing perilously close to the $24.9 million trigger on the state’s so-called Millionaire’s Amendment. Scott’s political opponents will be eligible for a dollar-for-dollar match from the state for whatever Scott spends beyond that limit.

Republican lawmakers support repealing the measure. Sen. Mike Haridopolos, who is supporting Scott’s primary opponent, Bill McCollum, helped write the constitutional amendment on the November ballot (Amendment 1) that asks voters to reverse their 1998 decision to put it into the state constitution.

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Investment bankers, private investors and health care companies are betting heavy on Republican gubernatorial candidate Rick Scott.

Scott collected $98,300 from 12 contributions on June 28, records show. The money went to his political committee, known as Let’s Get to Work. The so-called 527 committees help Florida political candidates avoid state campaign contribution laws.

Scott’s primary opponent, Attorney General Bill McCollum, is affiliated with a pair of similar committees. Those groups have received $1 million that track back to a pair of South Florida doctors, Gerald Glass and Paul Zimmerman.*

Scott, who has already spent more than $20 million of his own money, received a chunk of his latest contributions from Palm Beach sources:

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The political committee set up to help Republican Rick Scott avoid state spending caps in his gubernatorial race will air $1.5 million in television ads starting Friday, The Palm Beach Post has learned.

Nearly $1 million will be spent in the Tampa and Orlando markets, with another $165,000 in West Palm Beach.

Scott’s own campaign already has spent $16.1 million on television alone, which means he’s approaching the $29.4 million cap under state law. If Scott exceeds the cap, his opponents, like fellow Republican Bill McCollum, will get a dollar-for-dollar match from Florida taxpayers. Scott told reporters last week that the “Let’s Get to Work” political committee was being set up to help him avoid the spending cap.

McCollum, who has spent $1.9 million on television, has a pair of so-called 527 groups supporting him. Alliance for America has invested $1.9 million in TV spots and the Florida First Initiative has spent another $1.9 million.

Meanwhile, Scott’s out-of-nowhere, self-funded campaign is ruffling some feathers in state GOP circles. First was this ambush at the state party meetings last week.

Now, a pair of McCollum supporters — Washington County Republican Chairwoman Jennifer Bau and Gulf County Republican state committeeman Allen Cox — are circulating a letter complaining that Scott’s campaign staff “verbally and physically assaulted” Bau and another Republican during a recent meeting in her Panhandle county.