House Speaker Richard Corcoran and Governor Rick Scott are in a stand-off when it comes to incentives. After Tuesday’s Cabinet meeting the governor defended using public money to boost business in the state.
First, Speaker Corcoran threatened to sue Visit Florida to release the details of a promotional contract with the rapper Pitbull. Corcoran got his way, and heads rolled at the agency. More recently Governor Scott’s political committee paid for a poll suggesting a majority of Floridians support the state’s economic development agency Enterprise Florida.
“It’s very important to me that Visit Florida, Enterprise Florida—any of these organizations that we give money to—there’s a return for us the taxpayer,” Scott says. “It is somebody’s dollars we’re taxing our citizens to do these things.”
Scott wants about $85 million for the agency this year, but Corcoran appears resolute in his opposition. In a public statement the speaker says House policies will “be driven by principle not by polling.”
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