The statewide grand jury looking into public corruption issued its preliminary report today and called on the legislature to beef up Florida’s ethics laws.

The 127-page preliminary report suggests that lawmakers take a page from Palm Beach County’s anti-corruption measures enacted after three county commissioners wound up behind bars for misusing their office.

The statewide grand jury, at work for nearly a year and set to expire in February, report recommended requiring employees at private businesses that have government contracts to be subject to the same ethics laws as public employees.

Other recommendations include:
- Tougher sentences for officials who use their public office to commit crimes;
- Creating an independent Inspector General to oversee agency inspectors general;
- Expanding bid-tampering laws to include bid-rigging schemes;
- Giving the Ethics Commission the power to initiate investigations.

The Florida Supreme Court rejected Gov. Charlie Crist’s request for a statewide grand jury to look into corruption.

Crist’s request did not meet the “minimal requirements” necessary to determine that a grand jury is needed, the high court ruled today, by failing to specify what crimes or wrongs occurred and where they took place.

Crist last month petitioned the court to empanel a statewide grand jury to focus on public corruption in Palm Beach, Broward and Miami-Dade counties and the judicial circuit that includes Charlotte, Collier, Glades, Hendry and Lee counties.

The assignment – that the panel investigate public corruption from bribery to other seemingly unrelated crimes such as child pornography and drug offenses – sets forth a “monumental task” so broad as to possibly be untenable, former Florida Supreme Court Chief Justice Gerald Kogan, a veteran of anti-corruption efforts in Miami-Dade County, said when Crist filed the petition.
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