FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — An upheaval affecting the intersecting worlds of Florida government, politics and lobbying is forcing officials to choose: They could hold onto their positions in elected or appointed offices. Or they can keep their careers, or future career plans — as paid lobbyists.
Several elected officials failed this week in their attempt to get a federal judge to block implementation of the new rules, which go into effect on Dec. 31. Some people have already resigned their government posts, and an attorney involved in challenging the law said more departures could come in the hours before the substantially tighter restrictions go into effect.
An unknown number of elected and appointed officials throughout the state are potentially affected, including several who are prominent in South Florida.
—Steve Geller, a Broward County commissioner and former Democratic leader Florida Senate, whose law practice involves some lobbying in the state Legislature.
—Lubby Navarro, an elected Miami-Dade County School Board member who’s one of the lobbyists for the South Broward Hospital District, better known as the Memorial Healthcare System, the Hollywood-based operator of a network of hospitals and health services in the southern third of the county.
—Mack Bernard, a Palm Beach County commissioner, former state representative and former Delray Beach city commissioner, who said in a court filing that he plans to “advocate before Palm Beach County” once he’s out of office.
Bernard had always been planning to abide by the previous ban on lobbying the county for two years after leaving office. He and other elected officials who filed a lawsuit seeking to block the new regulations as unconstitutional, argued the new six-year ban on lobbying his former agency is excessive.
In 2018, Florida added strict new lobbying restrictions to the state Constitution. Voters overwhelmingly supported the amendment, which received 78.9% of the vote.
The enhanced rules prevent public officials from lobbying on just about any subject — policy, government spending, or procurement decisions — at just about any level of government — federal, state or local — while they’re in office and for six years after leaving office.
Earlier this year the Legislature passed laws implementing the restrictions, including a $10,000 fine for violations.
The new regulations replace far more limited restrictions, which prohibited legislators from lobbying state agencies while they’re in office and banned legislators, statewide elected officials and many local government officials from lobbying their former agencies for two years after leaving office.
The state House of Representatives rules had restricted former legislators from lobbying the House for six years after their time in office and preventing legislators from lobbying local governments while in office, according to a legislative staff analysis of the changes.
Bernard and four other elected officials filed a federal lawsuit on Dec. 21 seeking to block implementation of the law and asking that it be ruled unconstitutional.
“These expansive new restrictions on lobbying profoundly and impermissibly constrain core First Amendment rights of current and former public officials. Lobbying — that is, the practice of directly communicating with government decisionmakers to inform and influence government policy and practice — has long been recognized as conduct entitled to robust protection under the First Amendment,” the lawsuit stated.
The lawsuit conceded that lobbyists aren’t professionals popular with the public, but said their activities go “to the heart of the democratic process.”
The plaintiffs include Rene Garcia, a Miami-Dade County commissioner, former state legislator and former Hialeah council member; Javier Fernandez, mayor of South Miami and former state representative; Crystal Wagar, Miami Shores councilwoman, all of whom have jobs involving lobbying.
Another plaintiff, Leon County Commissioner William Proctor, had planned to lobby after leaving office once the previous two-year ban had expired, the lawsuit said. The plaintiffs are Democrats and Republicans.
One of their arguments is that the six-year lobbying ban for former elected officials is far too broad. It acknowledged that “a far more limited ban may withstand strict scrutiny. A shorter-term prohibition on lobbying immediately after leaving office to prevent former officials from taking advantage of the contracts, associations and special knowledge they acquired during their tenure as public servants arguably could be narrowly tailored to serve a compelling state interest.”
Several states and the U.S. Senate have two-year bans and the U.S. House of Representatives has a one-year lobbying ban, the lawsuit said, but the National Conference of State Legislatures’ national list doesn’t show any state with anything longer than two years.
Many of the government jobs are part-time and come with part-time salaries. “A constitutional provision that destroys careers and livelihoods by unnecessary and overbroad restrictions is manifestly contrary to the public interest,” the lawsuit said.
“It has a very broad impact,” said Scott Hiaasen, one of the attorneys for the plaintiffs.
For example, the lawsuit said, “the new restrictions would prohibit a city commissioner with a municipality in Palm Beach County from advocating in Orange County or elsewhere. A public official who works as a legislative affairs representative for a union or public hospital district would be barred from lobbying the Legislature even on issues outside the scope of their elected offices.”
Geller said he doesn’t see a conflict for someone like Navarro, the Miami-Dade School Board member, working for the South Broward Hospital District trying to get the hospital system more money from the federal government.
“This is broad overreaching. If they had said that you can’t lobby elected officials that are in your county, I still don’t know that that would matter, but at least I could understand that,” Geller said.
U.S. District Judge Beth Bloom on Thursday rejected a request by attorneys for the plaintiffs to block the law from going into effect on Dec. 31. She said the case could continue, and set January deadlines for both sides to submit additional arguments.
In the meantime, some officials are in somewhat of a limbo.
Geller, for example, said a small part of his private law practice involves lobbying the state Legislature for clients. He said he wouldn’t do any lobbying work until the issue is resolved, which he expects will result in the regulations being overturned.
“When it’s resolved I’ll figure out what I’m doing. I’m staying as a county commissioner, and I will obey the law,” Geller said.
People whose primary job is lobbying have a more difficult decision. “I expect that some of those elected officials may resign.”
Many government offices were closed on Friday, including the state Attorney General’s Office, which is responsible for defending the new rules before Bloom, and Navarro’s office at the Miami-Dade County School Board. Her representatives didn’t immediately respond to an emailed request for comment. Bernard didn’t immediately respond to a message seeking comment on Friday.
The total number of affected people isn’t clear.
Geller and Hiaasen said some elected officials may not know the scope of the law and thus not realize they are affected.
“The law is going to take effect Jan. 1, and so there are public officials throughout the state who are going to have to make a decision,” Hiaasen said. “Some are going to decide to give up their public office and some may decide to give up their private business depending on their circumstances.”
“It wouldn’t surprise me to see more resignations, particularly at the local and municipal level in the next 24 hours,” he said at midday Friday.
Several appointed heads of state agencies have left their jobs in recent weeks, apparently to avoid coming under the new, tighter restrictions.
Richard Radcliffe, executive director of the Palm Beach County League of Cities, and Mary Lou Tighe, executive director of the Broward League of Cities, said Friday they didn’t know of any city, town or village elected officials in the two counties who are impacted.
Radcliffe said he originally thought it was a big enough issue that it warranted the League putting an educational program for elected officials who might be interested. But, he said, none of the 204 municipal elected officials in the county signed up, suggesting not too many are affected.
The constitutional amendment was put forward by former Senate President Don Gaetz, a Republican, when he served on the Constitution Revision Commission, which meets every 20 years to propose changes.
He said in 2020 that he pushed for it because of what he saw during his time in the Senate from 2006 to 2016.
“It seemed to me that we had a sub rosa culture of people going into public office, whether it was elected office or appointed office, and creating a soft landing for themselves in the lobbying community,” Gaetz said. “I saw circumstances where people I served with in the Legislature spent their last year in the Legislature basically as an audition for which lobbying firm they could get hired by.”
Gaetz said he chose the Dec. 31, 2022, effective date to “spike any suggestion that Amendment 12 was designed to hurt specific people or to stop someone who was at the end of their legislative career from doing what they had intended to do. ... I wanted to have a clean proposal that could not be attacked.”
(Information from Orlando Sentinel archives was used in this report.)
