I am stinking, furious mad. Mad enough to light a torch and march on Tallahassee. Mad enough that I had better not run into any member of the Florida Legislature today.
When you read this, I want you to be stinking, furious, torch-burning and pitchfork-waving mad, too.
It is bad enough that your Legislature - YOUR Legislature - took big campaign money from the telephone companies, and in return voted to jack up your local telephone bill.
Bad enough.
It also is bad enough that the Florida Public Service Commission now appears to be dead-set on ramming through that rate increase as fast as possible.
Bad enough, for sure.
Now, here is the new part.
On Thursday, "your" Legislature kicked out the lawyer who has faithfully, aggressively represented the public in utility cases.
Instead, he will be replaced. The list of finalists includes an aide to House Speaker Johnnie Byrd, who was one of the guys who rammed through the telephone rate hike.
The lawyer who has been faithfully and aggressively representing the public is named Charlie Beck. Beck has been acting as public counsel ever since the retirement of the universally respected Jack Shreve.
Beck was Shreve's right-hand man. He was eminently qualified to succeed Shreve. Beck was Shreve's first pick, in fact.
Even as Beck was applying for Shreve's job, he was busy continuing to fight the telephone rate increases.
Beck's efforts annoyed both the PSC and the Legislature. One of the PSC members, taking offense at Beck's representation of the consumer, even asked him sneeringly if his goal was to "obstruct" the rate hikes.
Now, who do you think hires the public counsel? Who is in charge of choosing the people's voice, their advocate, their bulldog?
The Legislature, that's who. The same Legislature that took the phone companies' money and agreed to raise rates.
So here is what happened on Thursday.
Members of the committee that has final say in hiring the public counsel met, and narrowed down the list of applicants to five finalists.
Charlie Beck did not make the cut.
Here is who made the cut:
A policy staffer for House Speaker Johnnie Byrd, who has Byrd's endorsement.
A former aide to PSC member Rudy Bradley.
The outgoing general counsel of the PSC.
The director of the state Division of Consumer Services.
The lawyer for the Southwest Florida Water Management District.
Now, I do not mean any personal disrespect to any of these. But there is no question here that Beck was the most experienced, most qualified and most effective.
Obviously, he had to go.
Who stuck in the knife? It came down to two members of the Senate, one a Republican, and one a Democrat. One of them had to vote for Beck for him to make the cut. (Both parties are guilty of kowtowing to the phone companies.)
The Republican senator, Charlie Clary of Destin, told our reporter that it was time for a change, some new blood. The Democrat, Tony Hill of Jacksonville, didn't call him back.
Two men. The rest of the state can't hold them accountable.
But here's who we CAN hold accountable:
The rest of the Legislature.
I say that no sitting member of the Legislature who allows this to happen during his or her tenure deserves to hold office.
Not for one more second.
Not Jim King, the president of the Florida Senate, if he dumps on the people this way.
Not even Tampa Bay's own Tom Lee, a future Senate president.
No sitting member of the Florida Legislature, not Republican, not Democrat, deserves to remain in office if this goes through. No sitting member can say, "It's not my fault; I have nothing to do with it." Each member has the duty, now, to revolt against the leadership, now, and publicly demand the right thing.
I promise to you that I will regularly and vigorously use the resources allowed me by the St. Petersburg Times from now until November 2004 to make sure that the voters do not forget this twisted, puking offensiveness, and do not return to office any legislator, not a single one, on whose watch it occurred.
