Banning sex ‘gifts,’ selective outrage — another week in Tallahassee
On the heels of accusations of sexual harassment in the Florida Legislature, Tallahassee has been a city full of indignation and calls for action.
One moment, Politico reported anonymous accusations against state Sen. Jack Latvala. The next, House Speaker Richard Corcoran called for his resignation. A few hours later, Senate President Joe Negron announced an investigation.
It was a swift response. Florida journalists revealed a potential problem — and the politicians sprang to action.
If you only read headlines from the past few weeks, you might think it always works that way. It does not. Not at all.
Florida journalists uncover and spotlight scandalous, troubling and even deadly issues with great regularity. Often, legislators simply yawn.
Last month, in its “Fight Club” series, the Miami Herald exposed corruption in the juvenile-justice system — sexual and violent misconduct by staff who sometimes organized fistfights, beatings and sexual exploitation among teenagers. Legislative leaders are taking their time in demanding reform. In its “Bias on the Bench” series last year, the Sarasota HeraldTribune revealed records that prove that blacks consistently get harsher punishments than whites in Florida’s court system — often getting longer sentences for the exact same crime, sometimes before the exact same judge. A proposal to study the issue never even got a full vote. Just last month, the Orlando Sentinel’s “Schools without Rules” series revealed systemic flaws in Florida’s voucher system — schools forging safety reports, stealing tax dollars and hiring teachers and administrators with criminal records. Corcoran’s immediate response was to tweet out the talking points from the group paid to administer the vouchers.
And gobs of Florida newspapers wrote about problems in Florida’s nursing homes long before the corpse count got so high.
So why the difference? Why, when media reported largely anonymous allegations against Latvala, did legislators quickly act on that report when they so often shrug? Maybe because legislators had personal or political reasons for wanting to pile on Latvala — who had been campaigning against Corcoran in a possible showdown for next year’s governor’s race and who had mounted a failed campaign against Negron for Senate president.
I suppose the non-cynic could argue that these men genuinely care about a harassment-free workplace — and that they just never knew such an environment existed before now.
It’s good they are taking these serious accusations seriously. But it’d be nice if these same politicians acted just as quickly in response to media reports about problems that don’t serve their personal political interests.
Is sex a ‘gift’?: Speaking of sex in Tallahassee, Politico also reports that some legislators are talking about classifying sex, offered by lobbyists to legislators, as a “gift” subject to the state’s “gift ban.” The fact that this is even an issue says a lot about the people who love to call themselves “public servants.”
Flori-Duh: And finally, we have this week’s only-in-Florida headlines: “Florida man fighting to keep his emotional support squirrel” … “After 8-hour standoff, man says he was shooting at rats” … “Melbourne man stabs friend in chest over pizza” … “Florida woman bites husband for changing password.”
OK, obviously the pizza-stabber should be convicted. But I think many jurors would be sympathetic to the password-biter. I mean, if he chose one that had both capital letters and numbers, that’s just evil.
Orlando Sentinel columnist Scott Maxwell can be reached at smaxwell@orlandosentinel.com.