Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
Scott leaves indicted leaders in office
If everything was on the up and up, as their lawyers insist, why did board members at Broward Health secretly meet at a hotel, a restaurant and over the phone with attorneys dishing dirt on their interim CEO?
And why, if everything was above snuff, did they act as though they’d never met the Alabama lawyer whose report at an impromptu board meeting led them to suddenly fire CEO Pauline Grant?
And why, with a Broward County grand jury having indicted two sitting board members (and others) for breaking the Sunshine Law on public meetings, are they still in office?
Florida governors typically suspend public officials who face criminal charges related to their public duties, until they’ve had their day in court. But not Gov. Rick Scott. In fact, Gov. Scott refuses to address the indictments handed down Tuesday by 12 Broward citizens, serving as grand jurors, who found probable cause to believe that five Broward Health officials violated the Sunshine Law in the walk-up to Grant’s dismissal last December.
“We’re reviewing it,” a governor’s spokeswoman said of the indictment that accuses board chairman Rocky Rodriguez, interim CEO Beverly Capasso, general counsel Lynn Barrett, board member Christopher Ure and former board member Linda Robison of conspiring to violate the state’s open-meetings law.
Up the road in Martin County, the governor is doing the same thing.
About three weeks ago, two Martin County commissioners were charged with breaking the public records law by failing to disclose emails about public business. Earlier this year, the commission paid $500,000 — in taxpayer funds — to settle a lawsuit that alleged the county destroyed, altered and delayed producing public records about a rock mine, reports Treasure Coast Newspapers.
“Our office will review it,” the governor’s spokeswoman told their reporter. What’s the hold up? You’d think Gov. Scott would have learned lessons from his run-ins with the laws on public records and open meetings.
Two years ago, Gov. Scott spent $700,000 in taxpayer money to settle lawsuits alleging he and several staff members created personal email accounts to hide their communications, in violation of state public records laws.
That same year, Gov. Scott and the Cabinet spent $55,000 in taxpayer money to settle a lawsuit accusing them of violating the open meetings law. In that case, Scott’s general counsel visited Gerald Bailey, the head of the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, and suggested that the governor and Cabinet wanted him gone. Problem was, no such thing had been discussed — let alone voted upon — at a public meeting.
Though Florida prides itself on its government-in-the-sunshine laws, the consequences for violating them are peanuts. The charges are misdemeanors. The fine is only $500. Other than ego or pride, violators have little to lose — aside from being suspended or removed from office.
Also, state attorneys are reluctant to pursue Sunshine Law violations, given their low-level status and the difficulty in proving them beyond a reasonable doubt. Last year, a group of University of Florida students surveyed every state attorney’s office in Florida and found virtually none pursuing such cases.
So kudos to Broward State Attorney Mike Satz for asking his public corruption unit to investigate the events of Dec. 3, 2016, when Broward Health’s board convened a spur-of-the-moment meeting to fire the interim CEO.
Those of us in the audience that day sat in shock. We wanted to hear what Grant had allegedly done wrong, but no one ever said. Not a single specific was offered. And not a single commissioner asked.
It was like they already knew.
Then, without any discussion, board members voted to hire a management company — despite being down to three finalists in their search for a permanent CEO. Florida’s Sunshine Law prohibits board members from talking to one another outside of public meetings. It also prohibits someone from serving as a back-channel conduit to help them avoid public discussion of matters in the public interest, matters on which they will vote.
Yet as we said at the time, there was former Commissioner Beverly Capasso saying: “We all know what the right thing is to do.” Really? What all did they know?
And former Commissioner Linda Robison saying Broward Health could not have its interim CEO “be under criminal investigation and still be in charge of the facilities.” Under criminal investigation? By whom?
In truth, this incident was one of several we’ve witnessed at Broward Health that led us to call for Satz to investigate.
For doing so, Satz was slammed by the district’s legal team, including former Attorney General Bob Butterworth, who’s been a champion of open government.
A statement — listing Butterworth’s name first — called the indictments “the most misguided prosecution we have ever seen.” It said Satz’s office was manipulated by people who left Broward Health “because of their mismanagement and corruption.” And it said the investigation “was predetermined, biased and manipulated from the start.”
Satz said he could not discuss the case or what happened in the grand jury room.
In an interview, Butterworth says he’s convinced no two board members met together at the Westin Hotel, or Mario’s Catalina Restaurant, or spoke together on the phone. “This is crazy. They were never, ever together in the same room with people who had information they had to look at.”
“I believe it’s appropriate for the general counsel to — or other people with the general counsel to — individually talk to the commissioners about what’s going on in the district. Not to tell them, ‘OK, I’ve already spoken to two or three board members and this is what they’re going to do,’ ” he said.
“It appears everything they did was in accordance with the law and that, as one lawyer has stated in the review, they they were operating on the advice of lawyers,” Butterworth said.
Speaking of lawyers, someone should audit how many millions of dollars Broward Health is spending on legal fees. From what we see, you’d think the public trough had a bottomless pit.
Broward Health leaders deserve their day in court, no question.
But leaving them in place until then creates too much uncertainty and disruption.
And it’s unfair to ask taxpayers to trust an organization led by people under criminal indictment.
Last year, Gov. Scott suspended two Broward Health board members based on a letter from his inspector general, who feared they might interfere in an investigation.
That citizens on a grand jury found probable cause to believe two board members broke the law is sufficient cause for suspension, too.