Focus on Florida:
Governor Scott: "Politicians turned their back on jobs today"
By William Patrick of Watchdog.org
Florida Capitol committee rooms aren’t often standing room only on Wednesday afternoons, much less a full month before the annual state legislative session gets fully underway.
But when scores of millions of public dollars are on the chopping block, interested parties come from far and wide.
Such was the case in room 212 of the Knott Building in downtown Tallahassee this week.
Economic development and tourism marketing beneficiaries from across the state packed the committee room to implore lawmakers to keep the taxpayer-funding flowing – often to enthusiastic applause.
More than 100 speakers were scheduled for public comment. Many others were in attendance. A few expressed support for the “corporate welfare” crackdown, but most came to oppose the bureaucratic sounding PCB CCB 17-01, a bill that would eliminate funding for Enterprise Florida and Visit Florida.
Enterprise Florida is the state’s chief business recruitment organization. It uses taxpayer-funded incentives to entice private companies and nonprofits to relocate to Florida or expand within the state. Visit Florida spends tens of millions of public tax dollars annually on marketing the Sunshine State as a tourist destination.
Gov. Rick Scott, a Republican, wants $184 million for the quasi-state agencies in fiscal 2018.
Despite reports of low return on investment, underperformance in comparison to other states and high-profile missteps such as paying rapper PitBill $1 million for a “sexy beaches” commercial, one-by-one opponents of the House bill made their case.
First came the agency heads.
Ken Lawson, president, and CEO of Visit Florida said he came to fight.
“In the past, we dropped the ball. We failed to be transparent. We were in the newspapers,” Lawson said, vowing change.
“Right behind me are my partners who stand with me,” he added. “Don’t pass this bill, because you’ll kill Florida.”
Cissy Proctor, executive director of the Department of Economic Opportunity, and Chris Hart, president, and CEO of Enterprise Florida, followed with appeals for incentive funding centering on jobs and interstate competitiveness.
Then, Roger Dow, president of the U.S. Travel Association, stepped forward and warned committee members against widespread economic devastation.
“I can guarantee you the loss of tens of thousands of jobs and billions of dollars,” Dow said.
“I moved here because it’s a no income tax state,” he said. “If you pass this bill, you are going to go to an income tax or increase sales taxes or cut services. That’s not acceptable.”
Other petitioners recounted positive experiences.
“Following Hurricane Matthew, within days the CEO of Visit Florida and the Florida Restaurant and Lodging Association made it a priority to visit us,” said Amy Lukasik, director of tourism marketing for Flagler County.
“They viewed our damage and had conversations on how they could help immediately overcome national attention stating our destination was closed for business,” she said.
Keith Overton, president of TradeWinds Island Resorts, said that eliminating Visit Florida would eliminate the voice of independent hoteliers.
“What happens when tourists get shot like the Germans?” he asked, referencing an incident from two and a half decades ago. “What happens when we have Zika Virus? What happens when we have an oil spill? Who’s there to defend us? Are we going to leave that to the national media,” asked Overton.
Representatives from the Central Florida Development Council of Polk County, the Economic Development Authority for Citrus County, Pinellas County Economic Development, the North Florida Economic Development Partnership, and many other development groups made funding appeals.
About an hour and a half into the two-hour meeting, chairman Halsey Beshears, R-Monticello, said he had about 100 public comment cards that he still hadn’t called to speak.
It didn’t matter.
The panel approved the bill to eliminate funding for the two agencies on a vote of 10-5.
The vote was along party lines with two exceptions. Rep. Joe Gruters, R-Sarasota, opposed the bill, saying he was open to reform but was concerned that eliminating the public-private partnerships would hurt job creation. Rep. Roy Hardemon, D-Miami, voted in favor of the measure after expressing outrage that incentive and tourism funding overlooked his low-income district, which includes Liberty City. Hardemon said his community was “deemed unmarketable.”
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Despite the passionate pleas of interested parties, lawmakers continued to question whether publicly funding a small number of private businesses was a proper function of government and if the funding could be better spent elsewhere.
“The problem with economic incentives are multi-fold,” said Rep. Paul Renner, R-Jacksonville, the bill’s presenter.
“It takes from the many and gives to the few,” he said. “When we spread hundreds of millions of dollars in economic development for a few companies, we steal money from core critical priorities.”
If successful, the bill would divert funding for all eliminated incentive programs to the state’s general revenue fund.
Rep. Jay Trumbull, R-Panama City, the committee’s vice chair, supported the measure while stressing the need to let the legislative process unfold.
“Ninety-five percent of the time, a bill that gets introduced in committee is not what it looks like in the end,” Trumbull said.
Rep. Mike La Rosa, R-Lake Wales, said his supporting vote was “to continue to have the conversation.”
Beshears was more direct. Before calling a vote, he spoke of “spending that has run rampant,” and of “holding those with the purse strings accountable.”
“In order to get where we need to go sometimes, we need to reset the budget to zero. That’s what we’re proposing,” Beshears said.
The bill has several more committee stops before a full House vote. It would then meet a skeptical Senate, and wouldn’t become law without Scott’s signature, a highly unlikely prospect.
After the bill passed, Scott tweeted: “Politicians in @MyFLHouse turned their back on jobs today by supporting job-killing legislation.
William Patrick is a Florida reporter for Watchdog.org. His work has been featured on Fox News and the Drudge Report, among other national sites, and in Florida news outlets such as the Bradenton Herald, Florida Politics, Florida Trend, Saint Peters Blog, Sayfie Review, and Sunshine State News. William is a member of the Investigative Reporters & Editors network and the Florida Press Association.
