Sen. Mike Fasano, R-New Port Richey, filed a bill that would continue the crackdown on “pill mills,” pain management clinics dealing prescription drugs that law enforcement officials say are worse than crack cocaine.

Fasano’s bill would enhance penalties for pill mill operators that don’t comply with state laws and require the Prescription Drug Monitoring Program (PDMP) to conform with national standards.

The drug database has been on hold because of a lack of funding and a bid dispute.

Attorney General Pam Bondi is launching a new assault on the pill mills with a team led by state drug czar Dave Aronberg. Bondi called Florida “the epicenter of the country” for prescription drug abuse because busloads of drugsters travel to the state from Kentucky, Ohio and other places to get prescriptions from the rogue clinics.

Seven Floridians each day die from overdoses of prescription drugs.

Florida Supreme Court Chief Justice Charles Canady ordered that all future district court building construction must be scrutinized by the state courts administrator in response to a lavish Tallahassee appeals court dubbed the “Taj Mahal.”

Canady issued the order this morning after state Sen. Mike Fasano pilloried First District Court of Appeals judges Paul Hawkes and Brad Thomas for pushing a new courthouse, accusing them of “the epitome of arrogance.

Thomas and Hawkes apologized to Fasano, chairman of the Senate Criminal Justice Appropriations Committee, for their roles in the construction of the $48.8 million courthouse in Tallahassee that is estimated to ultimately cost taxpayers $70 million because of bond payments. Florida has been in a budget crisis for the past three years and lawmakers are now grappling with an anticipated $3.62 billion spending gap.

In November, Hawkes was forced to resign as chief judge but he remains on the court.

The courthouse features such opulent amenities as private soundproof bathrooms and kitchens for each of the 15 judges, miles of African mahogany trim, granite counter and desk tops, etched glass windows, a glass dome and massive columns inside and out.

“To the extent that any expenditures were made on this building and any construction done that exceeds the legislative intent and has offended you and this committee then I sincerely apologize,” Thomas told Fasano at a committee hearing last week.

“Don’t apologize just to us, judge,” Fasano, R-New Port Richey, snapped. “Apologize to every taxpayer in the state.”

Canady today ordered that the state courts administrator must approve any appellate court projects in the future.

“Courthouses should be dignified, durable and functional,” Canady wrote in a statement. “They should not be grandiose, monumental and luxurious.”

The Florida Senate unanimously approved a measure aimed at getting rid of the pill mill plague spreading from South Florida to the West Coast.

Under the bill (SB 2272), doctors in good standing and others except felons could own the pain clinics, they would not be allowed to advertise and would have to register with the Department of Health and submit to inspections.

More than seven Floridians die every day from overdoses of prescription drugs, bill sponsor Sen. Mike Fasano said.

“This year we want to make sure those pain management clinics are registered and inspected so they stop the killing,” Fasano, R-New Port Richey, said.

The proposal is one of Palm Beach County’s priorities. The House has yet to vote on its version.

GOP Senate leaders refused to sign off on two of Gov. Charlie Crist’s appointees to the Public Service Commission and the likelihood of the pair getting confirmation from the Senate required for them to stay on the job is dim.

Committee chairman J.D. Alexander, who is also the Senate’s powerful budget chief and has long been at odds with Crist, abruptly called an end to the meeting this morning with three minutes left on the clock as the panel was in the midst of interrogating Commissioner David Klement.

That drew the wrath of Sen. Mike Fasano, a Crist supporter who has been a vocal critic of the PSC but praised Crist’s latest appointees. An irate Fasano, R-New Port Richey, said Alexander was “rude” and “inappropriate” to cut off the meeting before voting on the appointees.

Alexander denied that the failure to confirm Crist’s appointees was political retribution against Crist, who alienated GOP leaders with his veto of SB 6 and increasing speculation that he is going to break away from the Republican Party and run as independent in the U.S. Senate race against primary opponent Marco Rubio.

Alexander’s committee isn’t scheduled to meet again before the session ends on April 30, and the budget chief doesn’t appear interested in keeping Crist’s picks on the panel.

He said that Klement, a former editorial writer, and Benjamin “Steve” Stevens, a Panhandle bar owner and accountant, are unqualified to regulate billions of dollars in utility rate because they lack financial expertise.

The committee unanimously approved nearly four dozen other gubernatorial appointees before taking up the PSC appointments but left Klement and Stevens for last.

“I think we need more time to consider whether these folks are qualified. I don’t think these folks are qualified,” Alexander, R-Lake Wales, said.

The Senate quietly approved a measure designed to clean up the Public Service Commission with a 39-1 vote this afternoon.

The bill (SB 1034) would make public all communications between the utilities the panel regulates and the commissioners or their advisory staff.

It would also bar commissioners or high-level staff from going to work or lobbying for the utilities for four years after they leave the PSC, double the current two-year limitation, aimed at stopping the “revolving door” between the commission and the utilities they make billion-dollar decisions about.

The bill will make certain that former commissioners and staff “will not be able to continue what they’ve done in the past and for a change our consumers will be represented,” the bill’s sponsor Sen. Mike Fasano, R-New Port Richey, argued.

The changes come from a 1992 grand jury report that lawmakers largely ignored designed to keep regulators and utility representatives at arm’s length.

This year’s proposal came about in the wake of reports that PSC staff and a Florida Power & Light Co. lawyer were swapping secret BlackBerry messages. Other details about questionable relationships between FPL and the commission were revealed during Juno Beach-based FPL’s proposed $1.2 billion rate hike hearing.

On the opening day of FPL’s rate increase hearing last year, Commissioner Nathan Skop revealed that the PSC’s lobbyist, Ryder Rudd, had attended a Kentucky Derby party at the Palm Beach Gardens home of FPL Vice President Ed Tancer. Rudd later quit.

Since then, the agency has struggled through investigations into BlackBerry messages exchanged between the PSC and an FPL attorney, a myriad of ethics complaints and allegations of interference from political leaders, including Gov. Charlie Crist, who threatened to not reappoint any commissioners who voted in favor of the rate hike.

The bill would also require that the commissioners behave more like judges by applying the canons of judicial conduct, including refraining from inappropriate political activity and avoiding the appearance of impropriety.

Public Service Chairwoman Nancy Argenziano is backing the proposed changes.

A sweeping rail bill narrowly passed its first committee in the Senate by a 5-4 vote after being approved by the House earlier today.

The Senate Transportation Committee approved the measure after two hours of testimony and questions and a lot of distancing by Senate sponsor Jeremy Ring on what the bill is not about.

It’s not about SunRail, he repeatedly asserted. SunRail is the controversial Central Florida commuter rail project that the Senate failed to approve twice before, most recently in May.

It is unclear yet whether Ring has the votes in the Senate to pass the bill (HB 1). Republicans in the Senate are split over the bill in part because of the SunRail deal in which state transportation officials have already agreed to pay CSX Inc. $641 million for 61 miles of track around Orlando. In exchange, the transportation giant can continue to run its freight cars on the line for $1 a year.

A last-minute addition to the committee made Friday secured its passage.

Senate President Jeff Atwater placed Sen. Mike Fasano, chairman of the Senate Transportation and Economic Development Appropriations Committee and a SunRail supporter, on the committee late Friday to replace Sen. Larcenia Bullard, who was hospitalized.

Without Fasano’s “yes” vote today, the bill would have died.

Two more Senate committees will vote on the bill tomorrow before it goes to the floor for debate tomorrow afternoon.

Here’s the latest installment in the seemingly perpetual Public Service Commission drama.

Sen. Mike Fasano today shot back at Associated Industries of Florida president Barney Bishop who yesterday publicly accused Fasano of interfering in the utility regulators’ business as the PSC considers three cases that could collectively cost Floridians up to $3 billion a year in extra energy costs.

Fasano yesterday asked Commissioner Lisa Edgar to resign because of an ethics complaint about her communicating with an FPL executive during a hearing. The ethics commission found no probable cause that Edgar, reappointed by Gov. Charlie Crist to the PSC last year, did anything wrong.

AIF supports Florida Power & Light Co.’s proposed $1.3 billion rate hike, and yesterday evening Bishop called out Fasano by name for trying to influence the outcome of that case and a proposed $500 million Progress Energy Florida rate increase.

“Any attempt by anyone to influence “due process”, whether they are an elected official or not, is inappropriate,” Bishop said in a statement.

That got to Fasano, who issued a statement demanding his own due process.

“Barney Bishop is a highly paid representative for utility companies throughout Florida. Mr. Bishop states that I am interfering in the due process that Progress Energy and Florida Power & Light are entitled to as the Florida Public Service Commission considers billion dollar rate increase requests. As anyone versed in the most elemental aspects of law should know, due process entitles one to face his or her accuser. Since Mr. Bishop, and Associated Industries of Florida, has stated that my involvement in this case is inappropriate, I challenge Mr. Bishop to publicly debate me on this issue,” Fasano, R-New Port Richey, wrote.
(more…)

Public Service Commission lawyers are checking into whether Gov. Charlie Crist has any standing in asking for a temporary halt to two utility rate cases until his two new regulatory commissioners take over on Jan. 1.

Crist this morning asked Chairman Matthew Carter, one of the two current commissioners whom Crist passed over for reappointment, to delay the Florida Power & Light Co. $1.3 billion rate hike hearing and the Progress Energy Florida $500 million request until David Klement and Benjamin “Steve” Stevens take over.

Carter ordered his legal staff to figure out how to handle the governor’s request because he is not one of the intervenors in the case and may have no legal standing to ask for a delay.

(more…)

Florida Power & Light’s proposed $1.3 billion rate hike hearing will resume Wednesday as planned despite a powerful GOP senator’s request that that case and another be put on hold.

But Sen. Mike Fasano’s letter asking for the delay went into the case files, Public Service Commission general counsel Booter Imhof responded in a letter sent to Fasano today.

“It’s laughable. It’s laughable. You would think it would be a joke or a hoax if this wasn’t so serious,” Fasano, R-New Port Richey, said of Imhof’s response.

Fasano’s district is almost exclusively served by Progress Energy Florida, which is seeking a $500 million base rate increase.

“I think that’s a sad response when you hear about the coziness they have with the utility companies but they can’t respond in a better way to a sitting senator who has concerns about his citizens and the rate increase,” Fasano said.

Imhof is the latest PSC employee to jump ship. He resigned on Friday and is going to work for the Florida House. The PSC’s lobbyist Ryder Rudd resigned last week after an internal investigation could not prove he violated state laws or rules by attending a Kentucky Derby party at the Palm Beach Gardens home of FPL executive Ed Tancer.

Since then, the commission has fended off conflict-of-interest concerns concerning communications, conferences and dinners.

(more…)

Not even the governor should tell utility regulators whether to give the thumbs up to a proposed $1.3 billion Florida Power & Light Co. rate hike, Public Service Commission Chairman Matthew Carter said today.

“I don’t think anybody should tell us how to vote on a rate case. We have to make our decision based on the facts presented. Each case has to stand on its own merit. To do otherwise would be violating the statute,” said Carter, appointed by Gov. Jeb Bush in 2006 and up for reappointment by Gov. Charlie Crist next month. “I’m not going to do that for anyone.”

Earlier today, Crist said that the commissioners’ vote would impact whether he picks them for the panel. Two commissioners – Carter and Katrina McMurrian – are among the six finalists given to Crist by a nominating council.

“Let’s see what the commissioners want to do. Then I can have a better handle on who I want to appoint or reappoint,” Crist said.

The FPL rate hearing is scheduled to resume on Wednesday.

On Friday, Sen. Mike Fasano asked that it be indefinitely delayed until investigations into possibly too-cozy relationships between the regulators and the utilities they oversee are complete.

Carter hasn’t made up his mind yet on whether to halt the hearing and said Crist’s comments won’t sway him.

“I make my own independent decision. And I’m not intimidated nor am I persuaded by anyone else. I have to stay focused on the law,” he said. “I’m not going to g o into a war of words with the governor.”

The future of two utility regulators depends upon their vote in a proposed $1.3 billion Florida Power & Light Co. rate hike, Gov. Charlie Crist said this morning.

Crist has until Oct. 1 to reappoint two commissioners – Chairman Matthew Carter and Katrina McMurrian – whose terms expire Jan. 1.

Crist said he wants them to just say no to the Juno Beach-based utility.

“Let’s see what the commissioners want to do. Then I can have a better handle on who to appoint or reappoint,” Crist told reporters this morning.

A reporter asked Crist if he heard the governor correctly – that the commissioners’ vote would affect their appointments.

“You did,” Crist answered. “I think it would be nice to reject the increase. I’m trying to appoint members that would be sympathetic to the people and the economic challenge that they’re facing. So that’s a factor.”

Sen. Mike Fasano on Friday asked Carter, appointed to the panel by Gov. Jeb Bush, to indefinitely delay the FPL hearing and a $500 million Progress Energy Florida rate case until a storm of controversies surrounding the regulatory panel clears.

Crist disagreed.

“I don’t know why we should postpone it,” he said.

Carter said this morning that he hadn’t seen Fasano’s letter because he was on bed rest Friday recuperating from two back surgeries earlier this year.

(more…)

Public Service Commissioner Nancy Argenziano snapped back at state Rep. Carlos Lopez-Cantera for criticizing her critique of his questions of Public Service Commission Chairman Matthew Carter.

Argenziano, a former lawmaker who served in both the House and the Senate, sent a heated letter to Lopez-Cantera late this evening in which she expounds on her repeated complaints that lawmakers with too close of ties to utilities have too much influence over the regulatory panel on which she sits.

Lopez-Cantera sits on the council that selects nominees for the governor to appoint to the regulatory agency. He wasn’t happy with the answers Carter gave at the Sept. 1 nominating council meeting although Carter did make the list of six finalists for Gov. Charlie Crist to consider.

Her letter is a response to one Lopez-Cantera sent to her yesterday criticizing her reaction to his dissatisfaction with the PSC’s unanimous decision to force Florida Power & Light officials to release the salaries of all its employees that earn more than $165,000 per year. He advised Argenziano she could have found the information in the Juno Beach-based corporation’s federal filings as he and his office staff did in less than an hour.

“This same information would have saved the PSC time and taxpayer money,” Lopez-Cantera, R-Miami, wrote in a letter sent yesterday.

The federal information does not include bonuses and other perks that boost some of the salaries by up to 500 percent, Argenziano responded tonight.

“Your apparently gullible acceptance, Representative Cantera, as the FERC document reflects, that the salary of FPL’s Executive Vice President is $23,000, is flabbergasting. The ‘less than an hour’ which you and your office spent producing this useless information is perhaps the true waste of time and taxpayer money,” Argenziano wrote.

(more…)

Public Service Commissioner Katrina McMurrian offered what appears to be a simple solution to the troubled regulators and staff caught in a web of secret messages with utility company execs and lawyers.

Put it in writing.

McMurrian issued a proposal late Friday evening suggesting that the quasi-judicial panel should act more like…judges to restore the public’s trust.

In 1992, a statewide grand jury found that “the manner in which utilities communicate with the PSC is in need of reform.” That was long before Blackberries and text messages revolutionized communications, but, to McMurrian at least, the shoe still fits.

McMurrian proposed that no commissioner or staff “shall engage in communications with parties, interested persons, or stakeholders except in writing.” That would include “all procedural matters, docketed matters, rulemaking proceedings, declaratory statements, workshops, non-docketed matters and matters for deliberation at Internal Affairs,” she wrote.

And, she suggested, all the communications should be posted on the PSC’s website for the public to read.

Today Sen. Mike Fasano asked that a Florida Power & Light $1.3 billion rate increase hearing scheduled to resume Wednesday and a Progress Energy Florida $500 million rate increase case set for the following Monday be delayed indefinitely.

McMurrian and Chairman Matthew Carter are both included in a list of six nominees give to Gov. Charlie Crist earlier this month. He has until Oct. 1 to pick one and the Senate Ethics and Elections Committee, on which Fasano sits, must confirm his choice.
“Respectfully, I ask my fellow commissioners for their support of this proposal. I would also like to let the public know that we hear you and want to earn back your trust,” McMurrian’s proposal concluded.

Public Service Commission spokeswoman Cynthia Muir gave this response to Sen. Mike Fasano’s request today that Chairman Matthew Carter indefinitely delay rate hearings now underway for FPL and Progress Energy Florida.

“The Chairman is on bed rest today due to his recent back surgery and the strain caused from the long hours of sitting during the hearings. I can tell you that there are statutory time lines that must be followed for each rate case filing. If a Commission decision is not made within the required time frame, the rates requested by the company in its filing can be implemented, at the discretion of the company.

Florida Statue 366.06 provides detail on this.

Thanks,
Cindy”

Progress is requesting a $500 million rate hike. That hearing is scheduled to resume Sept. 21, and the FPL – which is seeking a $1.3 billion rate increase – case is slated to resume on Wednesday.

When asked specifically whether Chairman Carter would postpone the hearings and what the pertinent dates were in both cases, Muir gave the following reply:

“Florida Statute 366.06 spells out the time frame. The Chairman has not responded to the Senator’s letter yet, so there’s no way of knowing what he intends,” she wrote.

Under Florida law, the PSC must give a final order in the FPL case by Nov. 20 or the new rates can go into effect Jan. 1. The utility would have to pay customers back if the panel then rejected the rate hike.

Florida Power & Light Co. officials had this to say about a top GOP senator’s request to halt utility rate hearings until investigations into what could be too cozy connections between regulators and utilities.

“We believe it is in our customers’ best interest for the PSC to proceed with its evaluation of our request – on its merits and the facts – so that it can make a timely decision that will allow us to move forward with investments in the electrical infrastructure that benefit our customers and the communities we serve,” FPL spokesman Mark Bubriski said in an e-mail.

Sen. Mike Fasano asked Public Service Commission Chairman Matthew Carter to postpone rate hearings currently underway – including a $1.3 billion rate hike sought by FPL scheduled to resume Wednesday – indefinitely.

Fasano wants several current investigations wrapped up before the hearings continue. He also wants them suspended until the Senate confirms Gov. Charlie Crist’s two nominations for the panel. Crist received a list of six finalists – including two current commissioners – earlier this month and has until Oct. 2 to make his picks.

(more…)

Sen. Mike Fasano wants a halt to all utility rate hearings – including a proposed $1.3 billion Florida Power & Light Co. hike – until investigations into alleged coziness between the Public Service Commission and the utilities they regulate.

“The integrity of the Commission has been brought into question due to the recent resignation of the PSC’s lobbyist, the firing of a commission aide and the placement of two others on leave due to the question of ex parte communications, as well as sharing of Blackberry PINs, with utility executives of the two companies seeking the rate increases. With the possibility of the Florida Senate Ethics & Elections Committee holding a hearing to look into the serious allegations regarding the operation of the PSC, any decision made while under the cloud of controversy would forever plague all parties in the case,” Fasano, R-New Port Richey, wrote in a letter to PSC Chairman Matthew Carter today.

Fasano is asking for the Senate investigation and the Florida Department of Law Enforcement is also looking into possible wrongdoing at the commission.

Read Fasano’s letter after the jump.
(more…)

The panel that regulates utilities seems like “it’s about to implode,” Sen. Mike Fasano said today.

Fasano, who chairs the Senate Transportation and Economic Development Appropriations Committee, asked Senate President Jeff Atwater to order an ethics investigation into whether the Public Service Commission and its staff are too cozy with the industry it regulates.

“You have a regulatory body that can’t even regulate themselves let alone regulate a multi-billion dollar utility company that’s asking for a 30 percent rate increase,” Fasano, R-New Port Richey said.

Attorney General Bill McCollum earlier today said his office is “looking into” problems at the regulatory agency and the Florida Department of Law Enforcement is currently conducting an informal investigation.

The PSC is considering rate hikes for both Florida Power & Light Co. and Progress Energy and a proposed FPL natural gas pipeline that would altogether raise customers’ rates by more than $3 billion.

PSC staffer Ryder Rudd was pulled off all FPL cases after it was learned that he attended a Kentucky Derby party at the Palm Beach Gardens home of FPL VP Ed Tancer. An internal investigation found that he may have broken the agency’s ethics rules but could not prove it.

This weekend, The Miami Herald reported that other PSC aides had given secret Blackberry PIN numbers to an FPL attorney, prompting Commissioner Nancy Argenziano to fire her aide and Commissioner Lisa Edgar to put hers on leave.

‘From the Commission’s chief lobbyist attending a party with executives from Florida Power & Light, to the sharing of Blackberry PINs between commissioners, staff and utility executives, the appearance of impropriety has become impropriety itself.

‘If you throw into the mix the fact that two of the five sitting commissioners are up for possible reappointment in the midst of the rate case it becomes evident that disaster is in the making. I have publically asked the governor to not reappoint the two sitting commissioners until the rate cases have been disposed of,” Fasano wrote to Atwater asking for the Senate Ethics and Elections Committee investigation. The committee has to confirm Gov. Charlie Crist’s nominations for the commission.

PSC Chairman Matthew Carter last week denied the regulators were too close to the utilities.

Read Fasano’s entire letter to Atwater after the jump.

(more…)