Beach Peanuts

"As You Would Expect," Bad Week For Rick Scott In Power Struggle With Judges

This hasn't been a good week for Florida Governor Rick Scott and judges.

Earlier in the week a Leon County court judge ruled against Scott over his cut to state employee salaries to offset pension expenses, saying it was an unconstitutional breach of contract:

The ruling leaves a $1 billion budget hole in the state budget for the 2011-12 budget year and another $1 billion hole for the 2012-13 budget year. It also has a $600 million impact on county governments whose employees are in the Florida Retirement System.

“The 2011 Legislature, when faced with a budget shortfall, turned to the employees of the State of Florida and ignored the contractual rights given to them by the Legislature in 1974,’’ wrote Circuit Court Judge Jackie Fulford, who also relied on a 1981 state Supreme Court ruling favoring public employees.

She said the Legislature’s decision to cut public employee salaries three percent, without renegotiating their contracts, was an "unconstitutional taking of private property without full compensation" that violated the rights of public employees "to collectively bargain over conditions of employment."

Vowing to appeal, Scott issued a statement, saying this:

“As you would expect, I believe this decision is simply wrong.

"The trial judge has ignored thirty years of Supreme Court precedent in a decision that refuses to allow Florida to have common-sense pension reform. This is another example of a court substituting its own policy preferences for those of the Legislature.  The Court’s decision nullifies the will of the people and leaves Florida as one of the only states in the country in which public employees contribute nothing towards their retirement, leaving working Floridians with100 percent of the tab.

"The State plans to file a swift appeal to reverse this decision.  Nonetheless, the Court’s order should be stayed throughout the appellate process, which will avoid an immediate impact on the 2012-2013 budget."

"As you would expect?" An odd way to begin a formal statement, but a statement just the same I suppose. More like Scott substituting his policy preferences for laws in Florida, because we've seen this movie before.

So we can add the appeal to the list of taxpayer funded court fights from Mr. Fiscal, Rick Scott.

Meanwhile, another case in the power struggle between Rick Scott and Florida's judicial system appears to be over at least for this year:

 A proposal to give Gov. Rick Scott more power over the courts appeared dead Wednesday amid a disagreement whether Scott should have the power to fire people appointed by former-Gov. Charlie Crist to a panel that helps select judges.

The panels, known as Judicial Nominating Commissions, screen potential judicial nominees for the governor. A House bill, HB 971, would allow Scott to fire Crist’s appointees and replace them with his own.

Sponsor Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fort Walton Beach, said the proposal would allow voters to hold Scott more accountable for the decisions made by state judges.

Sponsor Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fort Walton Beach, said the proposal would allow voters to hold Scott more accountable for the decisions made by state judges.

But the Senate amended the provision Wednesday so that it would not apply retroactively to Crist’s appointees. Senate sponsor Sen. David Simmons, R-Altamonte Springs, said Scott had no intention of terminating Crist’s appointments anyway. “Gov. Scott agreed to it without any hesitation,” Simmons said.

But Gaetz said the change defeats the purpose of the bill and that he would not bring the amended measure back to the House floor before the session is scheduled to conclude Friday.

“The Senate bill preserves the dead hand of Charlie Crist,” Gaetz said. “So the issue’s dead.”

The Senate bill passed 24-14, with Republican Sens. Paula Dockery, R-Lakeland, and Mike Fasano, R-New Port Richey, joining Democrats in opposition.

Democrats said they wouldn't be in favor of such a thing regardless of which party held the Governor's office, and for good reason.

For now at least, we can breathe a sigh of relief over what would have been disastrous: Giving Rick Scott even more power over Floridians and the law than any other Governor in the state's history.

High Priced Firm Defending Rick Scott's Pension Law Has Ties...To Scott

For someone who says we have to be really careful how we spend "our" money, Gov. Rick Scott is running up quite a "bill" for taxpayers who will have to pick up the tab.

We're already on the hook for fighting against our own access to health care, fighting to keep our right to vote from being taken away, not to mention all the legal bills Scott is running up thanks to his being sued for various actions taken since he became the governor.

Now we can add to that $400,000 (so far) which is going to a law firm hired in order to defend a state law that requires Florida state employees to contribute to their own pension funds.

In short, yes, if you're a public employee, in addition to paying more for your own pension, and a smaller paycheck, you now also have to pay a huge, over priced law firm who is defending the right to force you to do just that in the first place. 

If that's not enough, there's more. We're all familiar with Rick Scott's mantra of job creators and his never ending quest to bring jobs to Florida (just don't hold him to those numbers he promised during his campaign!) While you're drumming your fingers waiting for those jobs to materialize, so are some lawyers, because the law firm the state hired doesn't even have offices in Florida.

That's not all. After Scott hired them, he urged Pam Bondi to approve to pay that law firm $300 more an hour than they normally allowed. If you're getting out your calculator, that would be $450 an hour. Now if the name Pam Bondi rings a bell, but you can't quite place it, yes, she's the Attorney General who, when she's not traveling to places like Israel,  or making speeches, she's been busy not doing much about the Gulf oil spill, and firing the investigators who were actually making progress investigating fraudulent foreclosures in Florida, and came highly recommended by that famous mensa member of the North, Sarah Palin, prior to her election. 

But back to that high priced law firm Scott hired. You can't say that it doesn't have any ties to Florida. It does.

From Gary Fineout and the Associated Press:

The Scott administration and Bondi have defended the hiring of the firm, saying it specializes in the kind of litigation that the state is now involved in.

But the firm's roster also includes a one-time business associate of Scott.

While not working directly on the lawsuit, a senior counsel with the firm's Washington D.C. office is Thomas Scully. Scully is also a general partner with the New York investment firm of Welsh, Carson, Anderson & Stowe. That's the investment firm that this June purchased Scott's shares in Solantic, a chain of urgent care clinics the governor started back in 2001.

Scully, who once led the Federation of American Hospitals, was appointed to the board of directors of Solantic back in 2008.

Scott last year valued his shares in Solantic at $62 million. He initially transferred his ownership interest to his wife's revocable trust prior to taking office in January. But then Scott sold the shares amid questions as to whether he could benefit financially from state efforts to privatize Medicaid and require drug testing for welfare recipients. Scott maintained that Solantic would not seek state contracts and said he was just too busy as governor to spend time overseeing business interests.

Scott, the former head of the massive Columbia/HCA hospital chain, said that he has known Scully for 20 years. But he said on Tuesday that he didn't know that Scully worked for Alston and Bird.

"I knew that he was with a firm in D.C. but I didn't know the name of the firm," Scott told The Associated Press.

Really? No idea? To study Scott's short career in the governor's office so far, one can assume he is either:

1. The most clueless public servant in Florida history (and I use the term "public servant" oh so loosely) or,

2. The great and powerful Oz.

Ask him and he'll tell you he's an expert at running the state "like a business," just don't question how he's running it.

The man sees himself as the "Supreme Executive" with powers of knowledge greater than any court, including the Florida Supreme Court in spite of the fact that he's made his living in health care for one company that broke the record in Medicare fraud and landed him in court where he took the fifth 75 times in just one deposition.  Now he's in a position to judge all judges?

Yet the governor, in all his "business expertise" somehow managed to "lose" nearly every email during his transition from several separate accounts. How did that happen? Who knows, certainly not Scott, but he is conducting an investigation. How's that going? 

Now here's man Scott's known for 20 years who was involved with the investment firm that purchased Scott's shares of Solantic after conflicts of interest arose, and who works for the firm Scott hired to defend his new pension law, and yet Scott says he had no idea the man worked for them? Serioulsy?

Watching this man pretend he knows what he's doing while running the state of Florida into the ground and making us all pay for it in one way or another, actually more like several times over, became old long ago. 

You know the old saying: "Believe that and I've got some swampland to sell you?" 

What would the Scott version be? Maybe something like selling you swampland that cost you much more than it was worth, was polluted due to environmental regulations he cut, making you sick but without affordable health insurance, and after he cut your pay and increased your pension contribution, foreclosed on the house you bought there but could no longer make payments on which forced you into the streets, casuing you to loose your job, and then told you "sorry, no unemployment benefits or food stamps for you, the State of Florida simply can't afford it." 

And Scott hasn't even finished his first of four years yet.

Welcome to the Sunshine State.