Marco Rubio tied to another secret legislative deal during Florida House Speakership in 2007

[seafan]

Well, well.

Another secret deal Marco Rubio oversaw during his tenure as Florida House Speaker.







St. Petersburg Times Senior Correspondent Lucy Morgan has examined it in great detail.


August 31, 2010:

TALLAHASSEE — A preliminary review of funding for the "Taj Mahal'' courthouse indicates the 1st District Court of Appeal may have spent money initially appropriated for other purposes and got $16 million in a raid on the state's Workers' Compensation Trust Fund, Chief Financial Officer Alex Sink said Monday. ---LINK

While most state courts face harsh budget cuts, the 1st District Court of Appeal gets a $48 million 'Taj Mahal', August 9, 2010

'Taj Mahal' courthouse takes heat from officials, August 11, 2010

A monument to all that is wrong in Tallahassee, August 15, 2010

Alex Sink orders audit of 'Taj Mahal' courthouse finances, August 31, 2010




On the last day of the Florida legislative session in 2007, a secret budget item found its way into a 142-page transportation bill. It was for a behemoth new courthouse for 15 judges sitting on the 1st District Court of Appeal in Tallahassee. Splendid in its construction, it gives each judge "...a 60-inch LCD flat screen television in chambers (trimmed in mahogany), a private bathroom (featuring granite countertops) and a kitchen (complete with microwave and refrigerator)."

Two of the 1st District judges were heavily involved in lobbying the legislature in 2007 for this project.

Chief Judge Paul Hawkes and Judge Brad Thomas, lobbied furiously for the new building. The two spent so much time walking the halls of the Legislature that some lawmakers wondered when they had time to be judges.

How's that for breach of judicial protocol?


These two judges have quite an interesting history:

Hawkes and Thomas made use of their legislative and budget experience. Hawkes, a former House member, was once the GOP point man on the budget and helped write House rules. (His son, Jeremiah Hawkes, was general counsel for the House (under Marco Rubio) when the construction bond issue was approved.)

Thomas, a longtime Senate staffer, was staff director for the Senate's Criminal Justice Committee when (Senator Victor) Crist (of Tampa) was chairman. Thomas also worked in Gov. Jeb Bush's budget office.

Bush appointed Hawkes to the appellate court in 2003 and Thomas in 2005.

....

Now, a key legislator has raised new questions about how that happened. Sen. Charlie Dean, R-Inverness, was chairman of the House committee that oversaw court expenditures. Dean says he rejected a plea from Hawkes and Thomas to fund the courthouse after Dean toured the existing courthouse. He said he rejected it because the state was slashing budgets, and he said the courts had more important needs than the construction of a new courthouse for the appellate court.

Dean said Hawkes and Thomas indicated they would go around him to get the funding they needed.

"He (Hawkes) just looked at me and grinned and said, 'I got friends,' '' Dean said.

Dean said the two judges had help from Richard Corcoran, then chief of staff for House Speaker Marco Rubio, and from Hawkes' son Jeremiah, who was general counsel for Rubio.

In final budget negotiations that year, Dean said the decision about money for the courthouse was bumped up to then-Appropriations Chairman Ray Sansom and Rubio. The final budget included $7.9 million to begin planning and construction.

"The next thing I knew, they were going to build a building,'' Dean said. He said he didn't know about the last-minute bond issue amendment until he read about it this month in the St. Petersburg Times.

Corcoran, now a Republican nominee for the House from Pasco County, has denied helping Hawkes and Thomas get the project funded. Rubio said the project was a Senate priority that was not controversial at the time, and he said it never would have passed had lawmakers known how the money would be spent.

Is that why the lawmakers weren't informed of this secret deal when you were Speaker, Rubio? So you could get yet another pet project underway for your friends, using public money before anyone found out about it? And while the rest of Florida's court system rotted in neglect?



Wait, there's that name Ray Sansom again....he was former House Speaker Marco Rubio's Budget Chief.



Well, I'll be.



I would be remiss if I didn't point out Sansom's criminality:


Sansom, former House Speaker Marco Rubio's hand-picked Budget Chief, is currently one of three defendants in a corruption case, in which he secretly obtained a $6 million legislative appropriation for two of his Panhandle buddies for a private airplane hangar, in return for a lucrative kickback. So far, Rubio has escaped giving testimony about his right-hand man.

Very recently, Sansom had the chance to enter into a plea deal in his corruption case, but he rejected it because in addition to repaying the state $310,000 (paid to the architect who designed the airplane hangar), he and his co-defendants would have been required to complete 1-6 months on a sheriff's work detail, picking up trash along the roadsides while wearing striped prison garb.

Hell no! That was just TOO humiliating to Rubio's buddy Sansom.

Sansom's case goes on....



Back to the Taj Mahal story:



A monument to all that is wrong in Tallahassee

St Petersburg Times Editorial
August 15, 2010



(LUCY MORGAN | Times)


The new 1st District Court of Appeal building in Tallahassee, at a cost of $48 million, represents everything wrong in the state capital, from insider excesses to under-the-radar funding.

The obscene excess of a new $48 million courthouse in Tallahassee will be a permanent reminder of why voters distrust government to spend taxpayer dollars wisely. It represents everything wrong in a state capital where insider dealing and secrecy, rather than obligations to Floridians, dictate policy.

St. Petersburg Times senior correspondent Lucy Morgan detailed last Sunday how 1st District Court of Appeal Chief Judge Paul Hawkes and Judge Brad Thomas lobbied legislative leaders in 2007 to secure a little-noticed deal for an ostentatious courthouse that even the chief justice of the Florida Supreme Court did not support. As the Legislature in subsequent years slashed courts' operating budgets statewide, forcing layoffs and increasing backlogs, its leaders remained committed to the palatial new home for a few friends and colleagues at the court.

Hawkes and Thomas are longtime Republican insiders, former staffers for the Legislature and former Gov. Jeb Bush. Hawkes had served two House terms representing Crystal River. Clearly, this pair felt entitled to a setting worthy of their lofty status. They sought a courthouse that mimicked the Michigan Supreme Court building. It was to have 60-inch TVs, granite-trimmed bathrooms and private kitchens in each mahogany-trimmed judge's chamber. To help foot the bill in an economy already slowing in 2007, Hawkes and Thomas convinced legislative leaders to borrow $33.5 million for the building and charge the court rent — an unprecedented arrangement.

Sen. Victor Crist, R-Tampa, enabled the deal by tucking an amendment into a transportation bill on the last day of the 2007 session. Crist claimed he was just doing then-Senate President Ken Pruitt's bidding. Now Pruitt and Gov. Charlie Crist, who signed the bill into law, seem to have amnesia. The governor doesn't recall then-Chief Justice Fred Lewis asking him to veto the deal. Then-House Speaker Marco Rubio said he didn't know the details of the courthouse, just that it was a Senate priority.

But such under-the-radar deals were common. In the same session in which the courthouse was approved, Rubio's budget chief, Rep. Ray Sansom, set aside $6 million in the budget for an airplane hangar sought by a political contributor and disguised as a classroom building for a local community college. Sansom now faces grand theft charges.

.....

(bold type added)


Once again, Marco Rubio pleads ignorance of what transpired in his office during his tenure as Speaker.




One thing remains crystal clear with these latest revelations.



Marco Rubio, Jeb Bush's apprentice, must be defeated on November's US Senate ballot.

[Octafish]

1. Jeb's Apprentice.

Deserves a :kick: to the pants and this thread deserves an "R."

Thank you, seafan. Outstanding information.

[seafan]

8. Exposing corruption in Florida is a damn near full-time job plus overtime.

At the root of it all:





Now in the GOP luv-fest road show for the Columbia/HCA Medicare/Medicaid fraudster CEO for governor, at the left of the photo.


Earlier this week:

One of the stars of the show was former Gov. Jeb Bush, who had been barnstorming the state with Bill McCollum just weeks before. Fresh off Scott's victory, and with Disney themes apparently dancing in his head, Bush promised the world to the assembled faithful.

"Your dreams will come true with Rick Scott as governor," Bush told the crowd. ---LINK

Doesn't that just raise your hackles?



It's gettin' deep down here, Octafish, my friend.

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

2. Marco...

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

3. Rubio...

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

4. "Fish out of water!"

[Guy Whitey Corngood]

5. I call him Marc Blonde. nt

[Octafish]

6. Blonnnnnn-deeeeeee! You no-good son of a --

AH EH AH EE YAAAA!!!

[DonCoquixote]

7. that's ok

thanks to democrats for charlie crist, rubio will get this seat.

[seafan]

9. Now, more than ever, Floridians need to take out the trash.

Howard Troxler writes in the St. Petersburg Times:






September 5, 2010

I keep hearing people say, "Oh, well, it's too late to do anything about that fancy $48 million 'Taj Mahal' courthouse in Tallahassee," which insiders got sneaked through the Legislature.

But it isn't too late.

Make 'em move.

That's right.

Kick the entire 1st District Court of Appeal out on its black-robed keisters.

They deserve it. They snookered $48 million from the public.

They ordered up 60-inch flat-screened TVs for themselves, and private kitchens and bathrooms, and a whole lot of mahogany.

They scrapped their plans for the flat-screens and such once the bad publicity came out, but they still think they are going to get away with stealing the building.

So — make them move.

The Florida Supreme Court should make them move.

The governor should make them move.

The Legislature should make them move. That ought to be House Bill 1 in next spring's session.

I'm sure there is some other part of state government that could use the 112,000 square feet instead.

.....

And the Republican enablers all now claim that **We know noo-thinnk... much less remember anything!**



Marco Rubio thinks he will get away with another obscene example of lavishing his friends with taxpayers' money, while, at the same time, slashing public services and programs.

After all, Rubio declares, while trying to wash his hands, he "didn't know the details of the courthouse, just that it was a Senate priority".

Heh, it was probably Rubio's mentor's priority too. Right up there with gutting public education.



Not so fast, Mr. Rubio. You've got some *priors* to examine.



Troxler continues:

And here is what each member who voted for that 2007 budget, and the sneaky deal, will say:

I didn't know.

Which is even worse.

To say, "I didn't know," is to say, "I am such a sheep who does as I am told that you can't trust me not to blow tens of millions of your dollars."

As my colleague Lucy Morgan reported, the deal was sneaked into the state budget under then-House Speaker Marco Rubio and then-Senate President Ken Pruitt.

The House budget chief at the time was then-Rep. Ray Sansom, later charged with some sneaky budget writing of his own.

The House's general counsel at the time was the son of the 1st District judge — himself a former House member — who was pushing for the courthouse the hardest.

Rubio says hey, don't blame me, it was a Senate "priority."

The Senate's Pruitt says, he don't know nothing about birthin' no courthouses.

The key senator who did the deal was Victor Crist, R-Tampa, now running for the Hillsborough County Commission — who says Pruitt told him to do it.

Let's quote yet again from the report of the Tallahassee grand jury that indicted Sansom over a different project:

Far too much power is given to the legislative leadership on these budget issues which led to this appropriation that was voted on basically hidden in a huge budget. …

Your grand jurors recommend to the Legislature that it clean up this process.

But the Legislature has not lifted a finger. In fact, several leaders of the Legislature sneered after the indictment that the grand jury "doesn't understand how things work up here."

You know what? I think the grand jury understood perfectly well. I think everybody else does, too.

Make them move.

Now, more than ever, Floridians need to take out the trash.

[RockaFowler]

10. I love all of your posts Seafan

I wish the sheeple that vote these idiots in year after year would just wake up. To have an idiot like Rick Scott declare that he is the savior of Florida is laughable, too. All we need are more crooks in Tallahassee

[seafan]

11. Exposing Florida's right-wing corruption has taken on the life of an obsession.

Thanks for your kind words, RockaFowler.


Democratic gubernatorial candidate Alex Sink isn't letting go of GOP opponent Rick Scott's past, as hard as he slathers money at it to keep it buried.


Floridians sent billionaire Jeff Greene packing. We must do the same with Rick Scott.

.....

Speaking to reporters following Thursday’s meeting of the governor and Cabinet, Florida’s Chief Financial Officer (Alex Sink) said she will continue to ask Scott to explain his leadership at health care giant Columbia/HCA and later at Solantic, a Jacksonville-based urgent care company he help found and in which he remains a primary investor.

Three years after he resigned as CEO, Columbia/HCA paid $1.7 billion to settle charges it defrauded Medicaid and Medicare. Scott wasn’t charged with any wrongdoing and left the company, but what he knew about the fraud was a major issue in the Republican gubernatorial primary. Rival Bill McCollum said Scott was culpable on some level, and at least had to explain to people why his company got in so much trouble while he was at the helm. Scott, for his part, has said the company made mistakes and if he had to do it over again, he would have had more control over other company officials and more of a finger on what was going on.

Scott has also refused to release a deposition in a lawsuit filed recently against Solantic by a physician who says the company was overbilling for some services.

“Floridians deserve to know about their candidate’s background and their record,” Sink said ...//..

.....

“I have never been associated with any whiff of scandal or corruption or cheating the government,” Sink said. “The people of Florida need to know my record and they will.”

.....

Earlier this month, Scott said he would not make public a deposition in the Solantic case, saying it is a private legal matter. Another deposition that Scott gave 10 years ago related to Columbia/HCA has been made public, leaked in the waning days of the governor’s race. In that deposition, Scott took the Fifth Amendment 75 times in the course of the deposition.

..... LINK

These highly relevant facts need to be seen by the voters.