In too many Florida counties, the construction industry names the tune, and local elected officials play it with gusto. There's no mystery why. Builders can make dreams come true, and not just for homebuyers.
The industry is a prime financier of political ambitions for county officials. Builders give at election time and the recipients make sure that construction codes aren't too onerous and pesky environmentalists are kept on a short leash.
But the amount of appreciation that may be legally shown to political candidates in Florida is limited. Campaign donors aren't supposed to give candidates any more than $500 per election.
That presented a hurdle, though not an insurmountable one, for the Building Industry Association of West Florida. The Pensacola association's political action committee wanted to show more than $500 worth of appreciation to some candidates running two years ago in Escambia and Santa Rosa counties.
So, after the association bumped up against the $500 legal ceiling, it got the construction lobbies in Hillsborough and Pinellas counties to give an additional $500 in their names to each of the favored candidates. The association then reimbursed the Hillsborough and Pinellas contributors for their generosity.
A pretty neat trick, except the Florida Elections Commission says it's illegal.
Hillsborough builders and their PAC chairwoman, Tampa zoning lawyer Judith L. James, are in extra hot water. They are accused of failing to report to state officials one of the $500 reimbursements from the Pensacola PAC.
The Panhandle builders operated through something called HOPEPAC, which stands for the Home Owners Possibility for Everyone Political Action Committee. The Hillsborough builders had a catchier name for their political finance vehicle, BACPAC, or Bay Area Construction Political Action Committee. For some unknown reason, the Pinellas builders called theirs BUGG, for Business United for Good Government.
All three groups have denied wrongdoing.
The state elections commission, chaired by University of South Florida Professor Susan A. MacManus, found probable cause in May to believe that BACPAC committed nine violations and BUGG five.
The news received scant publicity locally. The St. Petersburg Times ran a brief June 7. The Tampa Tribune published a longer Associated Press dispatch from Tallahassee the next day. Neither paper identified by name the PACs or their administrators who have been accused of breaking the law.
BACPAC and BUGG have the option of requesting a hearing before an administrative judge. If found guilty, the PACs face civil fines of up to three times the amount involved in each of their illegal acts.
It will be harder than usual for BACPAC and BUGG to employ the standard defense in a campaign finance caper: We were only trying to foster good government.
Escambia Commissioner Terry Smith received a total of $1,000 from BACPAC and BUGG. In April, Smith was indicted along with three other Escambia commissioners in a bribery and racketeering scandal.
Gov. Jeb Bush has suspended all four commissioners, including former Florida Senate President W. D. Childers. Suspended Commissioner Willie Junior has pleaded guilty to bribery, extortion and other charges, and will testify for the prosecution against the others.
As for the elections commission case, what might be most galling to the builders is that their alleged washing of campaign cash was brought to the state's attention by one of those pesky environmentalists.
Tom Garner, a Pensacola activist, filed a complaint with the elections commission last September. Commission investigators were able to corroborate much of Garner's information.
On Sept. 14, 2000, for example, BACPAC sent from Tampa $500 each to two Santa Rosa commission candidates, Buck Lee and Don Salter. Two days later, on Sept. 16, Lee and Salter also received $500 each from HOPEPAC, which wrote a $1,000 check for BACPAC back in Tampa that same day.
The following month, on Oct. 19, 2000, BUGG sent from Pinellas Park $500 each to future Escambia Commissioner Smith and a court clerk candidate, Mike Whitehead. HOPEPAC earlier gave the maximum $500 to Smith and Whitehead. Later that October, HOPEPAC sent back $1,000 to BUGG in Pinellas Park.
BACPAC and HOPEPAC ran a similar ruse with Smith and Whitehead getting cash during October too. Only the Tampa builders neglected to report a $500 reimbursement from HOPEPAC.
BUGG Chairman Paul J. Skipper told state investigators that his PAC did not coordinate its giving to the Panhandle candidates with HOPEPAC.
BACPAC Chairwoman Judith James also denied collusion with HOPEPAC. James was vague about what prompted the donations to the Panhandle. She admitted that BACPAC seldom donates to campaigns almost 500 miles away from Tampa, especially at the county level.
A few weeks before his suspension from office, Escambia Commissioner Smith told investigators that he had no idea why BACPAC gave to him. "Since I never had any contact with representatives from such (a) PAC, it would be very difficult for me to speculate as to why they contributed to my campaign," Smith stated in an affidavit.
James blamed the unreported $500 from HOPEPAC on an error by a bookkeeper working under BACPAC Treasurer Joseph Narkiewicz, executive director of the Builders Association of Greater Tampa. She said the builders have fired the bookkeeper.
Although James is a lawyer and has chaired BACPAC since 1997, she acknowledged under oath last November that she has never read the state statutes pertaining to political action committees.
The Hillsborough and Pinellas builders PACs face up to $21,000 in fines if they cannot convince state officials that this was all just good clean fun.
That's $21,000 the Bay area construction industry might not have this election year to influence county races closer to home. Whether that gives environmentalists and neighborhood groups, the industry's traditional foes, a better chance of being taken seriously in coming years remains to be seen.
Contact News Editor Francis X. Gilpin at 813-248-8888, ext. 130, or e-mail him at frangilpin@weeklyplanet.com.
This article appears in Jul 3-9, 2002.
