Florida is seriously considering ethics reform--and a Democrat opposes.

[The Backlash Cometh]

Spoonful of ethics helps Florida Legislature's business agenda go down

Last month, a statewide grand jury formed to examine public corruption released a final report blasting Florida's failure to police its public officials, singling out the Broward School District for being riddled with corruption and "reckless" with public funding.

Now it looks like a lot of those recommendations will at least get a hearing this spring. One bill sponsored by Sen. Mike Fasano, R-New Port Richey, to increase the penalties for public corruption got off to a rocky start.

<snip>

"You can't legislate morality, and this isn't going to do anything to stop people from doing something wrong," said state Sen. Chris Smith, D-Fort Lauderdale, who voted against the steeper penalties because he said they weren't needed.

The public corruption bill, SB 532, is just the opening salvo. Fasano has also filed SB 1484, which would institute many of the grand jury reforms. It would boost the cap on civil penalties for public officials from $10,000 to $100,000, and impose a new $5,000 fine for lobbyists who fail to disclose clients and fees. Also, it would give the Florida Ethics Commission a real hammer by allowing the agency to initiate its own investigations instead of waiting until complaints are filed.



http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/politics/legislature/os-capview-column-deslatte021311-20110311,0,815921.column

[hobbit709]

1. Self-interest maybe?

[The Backlash Cometh]

2. No maybe about it.

And he's wrong. Very wrong. These crooked networks are persistent precisely because none of the decision makers ever get reprimanded. If there is no public reprimand, there is no damage to their reputation. No damage to their reputation means that they continue the crooked networking.

[aSpeckofDust]

3. I agree with everything in sb 532 except..

.. "it would give the Florida Ethics Commission a real hammer by allowing the agency to initiate its own investigations instead of waiting until complaints are filed." This looks like a tool to do witch hunts.

[The Backlash Cometh]

5. Maybe. But in Florida, if you want to find a crooked politician, all you have to do is point.

I suspect it will be that way for a while since both parties tend to collude with each other.

[Overseas]

4. There's a lot of corruption in Republican privatization.

We need anything we can get to strengthen laws against it.