Florida's faux Fox News source, Sunshine State News, piles on "Enterprise Florida's High-Living Liability, Bill Johnson". Apparently, Miami's inside wheeler-dealer Mr. Johnson is a lightning rod for powerful Republican business leaders angry with Gov. Rick Scott. Scott's offense: trying to turn the state capitol into his own, wall-to-wall ultra-delux home aquarium. The guys who come to clean the tank every day -- our state legislators -- are restless. According to OPED writer Frank Cerabino:
Johnson had become Miami-Dade County's water-and-sewer chief after serving as director of the Port of Miami since 2006. With billions of dollars in upgrades required to comply with federal infrastructure standards, Miami-Dade power brokers needed someone who would reliably protect the status quo. But even earlier, Johnson had established a gold-plated reputation as facilitator for Miami-Dade pro-growth development agendas; earning the respect of downtown lawyers for pushing projects past citizen objectors like the ones who battled the Homestead Air Force Base fiasco in the mid-1990's.
When Johnson became CEO of Enterprise Florida, he also was awarded the title of commerce secretary.
The board of Enterprise Florida -- whose charter is to lure big corporations and jobs to the Sunshine State -- is a who's who of state business leaders. Apparently Mr. Johnson has been over-stating the case for Enterprise Florida's return on investment. At worst, he has been cooking the books while living very high-on-the-teat.
The Tampa Bay Times writes:
The partisan members of the Enterprise Florida board of directors may be turned off by Gov. Scott's remote, dictatorial management style, and Bill Johnson may take a fall as proxy for their upset with Scott. Don't worry about Johnson. A big payday awaits, even bigger than the mid-six figure salary plus benefits he is making today. Anyhow, there is a long line of candidates waiting for their turn in the batter's box. Their aim: to prove to the business elite -- like the board of Enterprise Florida -- that the status quo is unlovable, no matter what political scripts float into the public realm. You win if you do smoke-and-mirrors, you lose if you take too much credit. Like Rick Scott who wants to be Florida's next US Senator or Adam Putnam, another pay-to play exemplar, who would be Governor.
Tampa Bay Online, The Tampa Tribune and The Tampa Times - breaking news and weather.
Thursday, Dec 10, 2015
POLITICS: Enterprise Florida’s numbers don’t add up
BY JIM TURNER
News Service of Florida Published: December 9, 2015
TALLAHASSEE — The state’s business-recruitment agency, which Gov. Rick Scott uses for international trade missions, needs to do a better job of separating anticipated overseas sales figures from the actual sales, according to the Legislature’s accountability office.
The office also has advised lawmakers that Enterprise Florida Inc. should establish goals to assist a wider range of companies starting in the export-import field.
Enterprise Florida, which has drawn heavy attention recently because Scott has proposed setting aside $250 million to provide corporate incentives, said it is working to improve how its keeps the overseas sales figures.
The Legislature’s Office of Program Policy Analysis and Government Accountability outlined the disparity on international sales records in a report presented to lawmakers last week.
Mary Alice Nye, chief legislative analyst for the office, told the Senate Commerce and Tourism Committee that many of the sales numbers reported by Enterprise Florida remain “largely unverified and may overstate performance.”
After Scott led a trade mission to the Paris Air Show in July, the governor’s office sent out a release that said 17 companies from Florida on the trip pulled in more than $150 million in projected sales.
Projected sales for nine life-science companies that went on an Enterprise Florida mission to Brazil was $31 million. A trip to Mexico City resulted in more than $6.5 million in sales to six Florida companies. And 32 Florida exhibitors attending a Dubai-based show reported $155 million in projected sales.
However, while Enterprise Florida has reported anticipated export sales the past three years at $2.1 billion, the actual export total is closer to $243 million.
Nye said the problem results, in part, from a reliance on self-reporting by private companies that work with the business-recruitment agency.
“So even what’s reported as actual sales, those transactions may not be finalized,” Nye said.
There is also some difficulty in tracking the numbers as Enterprise Florida, which has 15 international offices, spreads out credit for overseas projects.
The foreign offices get credit for sales when they refer leads to Enterprise Florida. Later, the sales credits get picked up by the agency’s business development unit.
“Nevertheless, EFI doesn’t verify the amount of the investment or the jobs associated with that investment,” Nye said. “So they may or may not be what was originally indicated in the original lead.”
Nye also said Enterprise Florida needs to make its services more available to a wider range of businesses.
She said the office found that the number of businesses that have received financial assistance from Enterprise Florida is limited, with 36 percent of the grant recipients getting 63 percent of the awards.
The findings were no surprise for the group Integrity Florida, which since 2012 has been one of the biggest critics of Enterprise Florida, often calling out the agency for the appearance of favoritism.
“We have said all along that performance measures for Enterprise Florida should not be based on jobs promised or sales anticipated, but rather actual jobs created and actual sales delivered,” said Ben Wilcox, the research director for Integrity Florida.
There’s a rift developing between Gov. Rick Scott’s beloved corporate welfare operation, better known as Enterprise Florida, and the state Legislature that has to fund it.Scott tapped Miami-Dade's longtime port chief to run Florida's economic-development arm in January, 2015, making Johnson -- the Miami Herald called him "a prominent local administrator" -- the state's top corporate recruiter. To really rise to the top, you have to show your willingness to play ball, however it is played in the corridors of power. That's what it means to be "a prominent local administrator".
Scott and his recently appointed Enterprise Florida chief executive, Bill Johnson, have been complaining about legislators who don’t want to fork over all the requested $80 million of taxpayer dollars this year to use as job-creation bait.
From the way Johnson is talking, you’d think he’s running a soup kitchen, not an agency that just handed out $765,000 in employee bonuses, including $50,000 to himself — for a job that he started in February.
Enterprise Florida has turned out to be a job-creation outfit that is much better at creating job-creation announcements than actual work. And it has been orchestrating the kind of corporate handouts that even some Republican legislators find hard to justify.
“We don’t want to see tax incentives for corporations that are already coming here anyway,” Sen. Nancy Detert, R-Venice, told Johnson. “In my community, I’m not seeing this big splurge of jobs, and I’m really not seeing high-paying jobs. I’m seeing a lot of hospitality and those are not high-paying jobs.
Johnson had become Miami-Dade County's water-and-sewer chief after serving as director of the Port of Miami since 2006. With billions of dollars in upgrades required to comply with federal infrastructure standards, Miami-Dade power brokers needed someone who would reliably protect the status quo. But even earlier, Johnson had established a gold-plated reputation as facilitator for Miami-Dade pro-growth development agendas; earning the respect of downtown lawyers for pushing projects past citizen objectors like the ones who battled the Homestead Air Force Base fiasco in the mid-1990's.
When Johnson became CEO of Enterprise Florida, he also was awarded the title of commerce secretary.
The board of Enterprise Florida -- whose charter is to lure big corporations and jobs to the Sunshine State -- is a who's who of state business leaders. Apparently Mr. Johnson has been over-stating the case for Enterprise Florida's return on investment. At worst, he has been cooking the books while living very high-on-the-teat.
The Tampa Bay Times writes:
Mary Alice Nye, chief legislative analyst for the office, told the Senate Commerce and Tourism Committee that many of the sales numbers reported by Enterprise Florida remain “largely unverified and may overstate performance.”
After Scott led a trade mission to the Paris Air Show in July, the governor’s office sent out a release that said 17 companies from Florida on the trip pulled in more than $150 million in projected sales.
Projected sales for nine life-science companies that went on an Enterprise Florida mission to Brazil was $31 million. A trip to Mexico City resulted in more than $6.5 million in sales to six Florida companies. And 32 Florida exhibitors attending a Dubai-based show reported $155 million in projected sales.
However, while Enterprise Florida has reported anticipated export sales the past three years at $2.1 billion, the actual export total is closer to $243 million.Aww. Really, folks, isn't this how pay-to-play democracy works in 2015? The revolving door between the state legislature and the lobbyist corps is extraordinarily lucrative. Facilitators like Johnson move to the top of the food chain whether in government or quasi-government partnerships with industry like Enterprise Florida, and when it is time to move on, they are valuable commodities to the private sector who need insiders who "know how things work".
The partisan members of the Enterprise Florida board of directors may be turned off by Gov. Scott's remote, dictatorial management style, and Bill Johnson may take a fall as proxy for their upset with Scott. Don't worry about Johnson. A big payday awaits, even bigger than the mid-six figure salary plus benefits he is making today. Anyhow, there is a long line of candidates waiting for their turn in the batter's box. Their aim: to prove to the business elite -- like the board of Enterprise Florida -- that the status quo is unlovable, no matter what political scripts float into the public realm. You win if you do smoke-and-mirrors, you lose if you take too much credit. Like Rick Scott who wants to be Florida's next US Senator or Adam Putnam, another pay-to play exemplar, who would be Governor.
Tampa Bay Online, The Tampa Tribune and The Tampa Times - breaking news and weather.
Thursday, Dec 10, 2015
POLITICS: Enterprise Florida’s numbers don’t add up
BY JIM TURNER
News Service of Florida Published: December 9, 2015
TALLAHASSEE — The state’s business-recruitment agency, which Gov. Rick Scott uses for international trade missions, needs to do a better job of separating anticipated overseas sales figures from the actual sales, according to the Legislature’s accountability office.
The office also has advised lawmakers that Enterprise Florida Inc. should establish goals to assist a wider range of companies starting in the export-import field.
Enterprise Florida, which has drawn heavy attention recently because Scott has proposed setting aside $250 million to provide corporate incentives, said it is working to improve how its keeps the overseas sales figures.
The Legislature’s Office of Program Policy Analysis and Government Accountability outlined the disparity on international sales records in a report presented to lawmakers last week.
Mary Alice Nye, chief legislative analyst for the office, told the Senate Commerce and Tourism Committee that many of the sales numbers reported by Enterprise Florida remain “largely unverified and may overstate performance.”
After Scott led a trade mission to the Paris Air Show in July, the governor’s office sent out a release that said 17 companies from Florida on the trip pulled in more than $150 million in projected sales.
Projected sales for nine life-science companies that went on an Enterprise Florida mission to Brazil was $31 million. A trip to Mexico City resulted in more than $6.5 million in sales to six Florida companies. And 32 Florida exhibitors attending a Dubai-based show reported $155 million in projected sales.
However, while Enterprise Florida has reported anticipated export sales the past three years at $2.1 billion, the actual export total is closer to $243 million.
Nye said the problem results, in part, from a reliance on self-reporting by private companies that work with the business-recruitment agency.
“So even what’s reported as actual sales, those transactions may not be finalized,” Nye said.
There is also some difficulty in tracking the numbers as Enterprise Florida, which has 15 international offices, spreads out credit for overseas projects.
The foreign offices get credit for sales when they refer leads to Enterprise Florida. Later, the sales credits get picked up by the agency’s business development unit.
“Nevertheless, EFI doesn’t verify the amount of the investment or the jobs associated with that investment,” Nye said. “So they may or may not be what was originally indicated in the original lead.”
Nye also said Enterprise Florida needs to make its services more available to a wider range of businesses.
She said the office found that the number of businesses that have received financial assistance from Enterprise Florida is limited, with 36 percent of the grant recipients getting 63 percent of the awards.
The findings were no surprise for the group Integrity Florida, which since 2012 has been one of the biggest critics of Enterprise Florida, often calling out the agency for the appearance of favoritism.
“We have said all along that performance measures for Enterprise Florida should not be based on jobs promised or sales anticipated, but rather actual jobs created and actual sales delivered,” said Ben Wilcox, the research director for Integrity Florida.
4 comments:
On Tuesday, the face of the Republican Party on the County Commission is asking her colleagues to stand up and cheer for Governor Scott and his Enterprise Florida group. She is asking the county lobbyist in Tallahassee to push for the $250 million that Billy Johnson wants to hand out to Scott's friends.
Bill Johnson is already getting a $200,000 per year pension from Miami-Dade County taxpayers. Now he is piling on with the $250,000 per year PLUS perks from State of Florida taxpayers. What ever happened to the concept of public service?
Nothing new here. Bill Johnson wined and dined politicians and their supporters on endless luxurious junkets while port director doing "trade missions", etc. This continues to an even greater extent under corrupt Director Juan Kuryla. Someone should take a look at $millions of county taxpayer dollars squandered for these travels.
If you know Bill Johnson well, you find nothing new in the story. He keeps doing the same thing every where he goes, but for some reason he is good at turning a bad performance into good evaluation.
The mayor moved him to WASD as a way to get him out of the county, but he was able to foole the governor.
Bill is the biggest expence to tax payers in the county.
We are happy he is out of MD.
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