Florida Republicans’ Plan to Block Out the Sunshine


Ain't no sunshine when she's gone: photoillustration by Adam WeinsteinAiming to make government privatization really private. Photoillustration by Adam Weinstein

In their longstanding fight to privatize the state’s prison system—and a lot of other public services—Republican lawmakers in Florida are trying a new angle: doing it in secret.

Proposed Committee Bill 7170, introduced Tuesday in the GOP-dominated state legislature, aims to prevent “information relating to the outsourcing or privatization of an agency function” from being reported to the voting public “until after the contract for such functions is executed.” In other words, taxpayers wouldn’t get to know about government work turned over to a contractor until after the contract has been signed. The bill is expected to come to a floor vote later in the recently convened spring session; with Republicans holding supermajorities in both chambers of the legislature and Rick Scott sitting in the governor’s office, it could become law by this summer.

The proposal is “very disturbing,” Democratic Sen. Gwen Margolis told the committee that passed the bill on Wednesday. “The language is pretty broad,” she said. Another local activist speaking at the hearing called the measure an attack on “the transparency, accountability and due diligence of this body and citizens of this state.”

Florida has long been known for having some of the country’s most stringent sunshine laws. Currently they require that any government agency planning to contract out work must release a host of supporting information to the public, including cost-benefit analyses, business plans, and an assessment of the impact such a move would have on services. The new bill gets rid of those requirements for any privatization and outsourcing plans that come from the legislature.

If successful, the secrecy bill could draw interest from pro-privatization conservatives in other statehouses. But who’s behind the audacious plan? The bill was introduced by the Senate’s rules committee, which means the identity of the bill’s author is…still a secret.

“I don’t know why we are undoing these [laws] now,” Matt Puckett, leader of the state’s old corrections officers’ union, testified. “I think these are put in place so we don’t make mistakes when we privatize.”

Florida lawmakers have had plenty of such privatization plans; chief among them was a controversial agenda, passed last year, to hand most of the state’s prisons over to contractors—a measure deemed unconstitutional by a state court after Puckett’s union successfully sued to stop it. The new bill specifically exempts “contractual arrangements with private entities for operation and maintenance of correctional facilities and supervision of inmates.” But opponents say it could be used to outsource a lot of state government business to the private sector before Floridians even realize it’s happening.

Proponents say it will save millions of taxpayer dollars, especially if it can be used to push through the divisive jails plan. JD Alexander, the Senate’s powerful budget chairman, said privatizing prisons could save the state $40 million. “I think this has the promise, contrary to what the critics say, of offering not only savings but the potential for better outcomes,” he said at the hearing.

If that’s true—if privatizing any public agency or its work is the best financial and ethical policy for Florida’s citizens—then why do it in secret? That question wasn’t directly answered in Wednesday’s hearing. When the GOP-led rules committee approved the secrecy bill, however, it did publish a state-mandated analysis [PDF] of its provisions. Under “Public Records/Open Meetings Issues,” the analysis listed: “None.”

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WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

If you can, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones—that exists to make a difference, not a profit—with a donation of any amount today. We need more donations than normal to come in from this specific blurb to help close our funding gap before it gets any bigger.

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