When political newcomer Rick Scott first took up residence in the Florida governor's mansion, some of his earliest moves ruffled the feathers of longtime GOP lawmakers -- most of whom did not support his primary campaign for governor.
But during the course of his first legislative session, he was able to get some of his agenda addressed, and certainly he claimed victory with his "jobs budget" signing Thursday.
Scott's line-item vetoes nevertheless have stirred up ill will again among powerful legislators, including Republican leaders who saw favored projects fall victim to the veto pen.
He claimed $615 million in "special interest" cuts before signing the budget, but $305 million comes from Florida Forever funding that was to be derived from sales of state land -- a tough proposition in today's real-estate market. House Speaker Dean Cannon, R-Winter Park, was also quick to point out that Scott's wish to put the savings back into education would be limited to the $100 million in general revenue gleaned from the line-item vetoes.
Cannon, who saw his coveted $400,000 study of the court system hit the cutting room floor, also noted that Scott's initial budget request was hardly kind to education funding, coming in at less than the Legislature funded in its final budget.
Sen. Mike Fasano, R-New Port Richey, went further, calling the governor's new stance on education funding "hypocritical."
"Where I do have a concern, all of a sudden, is his newfound love of education and for the teachers in our state," Fasano said Friday.
Scott used his weekly radio address Friday to urge lawmakers to take up his suggestion of investing more money in education.
"Now, with these funds to work with, I call on our House and Senate leaders to redirect some of those vetoed, special-interest dollars into elementary, middle and high school education," Scott said.
In order to do that, however, Scott must heal some bruised egos and reset his relationship with the Legislature in order to make the education funding and the rest of his unfinished agenda a reality.
ROCKY START
Scott's working relationship with the Legislature didn't exactly get off on the right foot.
He seemed unconcerned about the veto-proof majorities in both the House and Senate, which already had been used to override 10 vetoes of his predecessor, Gov. Charlie Crist, during a special session in November 2010. His executive orders to sell state planes and freeze regulations, and his decision to refuse $2.4 billion in federal funds for a high-speed rail project, drew complaints and lawsuits from lawmakers and citizens alike.
Senate budget chief J.D. Alexander, R-Lake Wales, criticized the governor for selling the planes without legislative approval, even though he agreed with the policy of saving $2.4 million a year by ditching the planes. Scott, a wealthy former business executive who spent $72 million on his own gubernatorial campaign, now uses his own private jet to zip around the state.
Sens. Thad Altman, R-Viera, and Arthenia Joyner, D-Tampa, even filed suit against Scott in the hope of reinstating federal funds for the high-speed rail line that would have stretched from Tampa to Orlando. Scott rejected the funds over fear of project cost overruns and overly optimistic ridership studies, and received an early win over the Legislature when Florida Supreme Court justices ruled unanimously to uphold his decision.
DURING-SESSION NEGOTIATIONS
For the most part, though, Republican lawmakers wanted to give Scott the benefit of the doubt as being new to public office, and were receptive to his ideas of streamlining government agencies and reducing redundancies.
They enacted a version of his plan to collapse the functions of economic development agencies, but did not give him as much discretionary spending as he originally wanted.
But, as the legislative session wore on and poll numbers showing a decrease in Scott's approval rating were released, lawmakers appeared less and less willing to go along with his policy preferences.
The 5 percent contribution rate for public employees to their pensions that Scott wanted was reduced to 3 percent by the House and Senate, despite a last-minute effort by Scott, who rallied business support at a press conference to push for his proposal.
Scott's biggest priority, however, was tax cuts. He campaigned on a 19 percent reduction in property taxes, and unveiled a plan to phase out the corporate income tax by 2018 after taking office.
Budget negotiators in the Legislature seemed to ignore those proposals until late in the session, when they tacked on $210 million in property tax cuts related to water management districts and $30 million in business tax cuts. The business tax relief came by way of raising an exemption, allowing Scott to show that 115,000 small businesses were taken off the income tax rolls. He has stated that is not the end of his effort to zero-out the corporate income tax, and vows to eliminate it before his term as governor is over.
Fasano said Scott's approval rating, which was in the low 30s during the session, made a difference in his ability to push his agenda through the Legislature.
"When you have a Governor Jeb Bush, Lawton Chiles, Charlie Crist in their first year who were extremely popular, they can use that. But Governor Scott, with such a low rating, had very little influence, very little input," Fasano said.
GOP BRAND DAMAGE AND 2012
For all of the tension and handwringing among some lawmakers over Scott's decisions, he does enjoy some support among the more conservative members of the Legislature.
Sen. Alan Hays, R-Umatilla, was on hand to warm up the crowd in The Villages Thursday before Scott signed the budget. He said he "didn't get everything he wanted" in the budget, but was proud of it, includinhg Scott's tough decisions on the line-item vetoes.
Part of the problem of Scott's uneasy relationship with the Legislature stems from the inherent tension between the legislative and executive branches, but also from the paradoxical position the governor finds himself in as a result of the 2010 election.
A fervent wave of fiscal conservative tea party enthusiasm helped push Scott past GOP establishment candidate Bill McCollum in the Republican gubernatorial primary and past Democrat Alex Sink in the general election. But that same wave helped usher in a veto-proof majority in the House and Senate that weakens his hand as chief executive.
In order to match the rhetoric of his campaign -- which Scott has mostly done, or attempted to do -- he must show he is working against the "special interests" in Tallahassee. He did this by nominally vetoing $615 million, which upset many legislators he needs to get the rest of his agenda through in future legislative sessions.
The 2010 wave was also supposed to bring in a more conservative Legislature, with Senate President Mike Haridopolos, R-Merritt Island, dubbing his chamber "the most conservative Senate" in recent history. But Haridopolos was unable to rally enough support for some of the more controversial pieces of legislation favored by Scott and the tea party, like immigration control and halting automatic union dues deductions for public-union workers.
The budget signed by Scott Thursday will undoubtedly cause some short-term pain, as nearly 5,000 government positions were eliminated (although many of those were vacant positions that will no longer be filled), but is all part of his plan to shrink Florida's government and foster a business-friendly environment that creates private-sector jobs.
But that short-term pain is already having a political impact, as recent poll numbers show Scott's approval rating fell further to 29 percent, the lowest ever for a first-year governor. Taking into account the Democratic upset in the Jacksonville mayoral race, some GOP members are wary that the Republican brand will lose its luster in a crucial swing state like Florida ahead of the 2012 presidential election.
In the meantime, Scott's office and state lawmakers will continue to wrangle over what to fund and how much.
Perhaps the inherent tension between the Legislature and the executive branch, and the debate over the wisdom of a given budget item, were best summed up by Rep. Will Weatherford, R-Wesley Chapel, who took to Twitter after the line-items were released Thursday.
"The state budget ... I guess it all depends on the eyes of the beholder," Weatherford tweeted.
Reach Gray Rohrer at grohrer@sunshinestatenews.com or at (850) 727-0859.
