The Palm Beach Post is reporting that Rick Scott is (finally) in the process of divesting his family’s shares of Solantic, the health care company that Scott co-founded in 2001, to eliminate any perception of a conflict of interest.
As Scott continues to push policies that critics say would benefit the urgent care chain (such as drug tests for welfare recipients and state workers, and moving Medicaid patients into HMO's), the Governors' spokesman has always said simply that there's no conflict of interest, because he had passed controlling interest in the company to his wife, Ann.
When asked about this yesterday, Scott replied,
"As you know, I’ve been transparent. I was transparent in my race. I’ve put those assets in my wife’s name,” Scott said. “Everybody knows it. I’ve been very clear. I’ve said that the state will not have a contract with that company. I’ve told everybody, ‘Hold me accountable.’?”
But as the Post reports, that's poppycock, after they became the first media organization to report that Scott had transferred his shares with the company to his wife:
Despite Scott’s reiteration that he’s been transparent about transferring the Solantic shares to his wife, it was The Post that first reported the transfer March 13 after interviews with company officials. Six requests to the governor’s office on the topic had been ignored.
This news comes as Clearwater activist David Plyer has filed an ethics complaint, accusing the Governor of using his office to benefit Solantic.
This article appears in Apr 7-13, 2011.