Legislation to eviscerate Florida's economic development programs is on its way to the House floor after clearing its final committee stop Tuesday.

  • HB 7005 aims at eliminating 'corporate welfare'
  • An amendment was added to spare Visit Florida
  • In exchange the tourism agency would see budgets slashed

The development prompted a furious response from Gov. Rick Scott, who has thrown his once-mighty political machine into overdrive in a so far fruitless attempt to quash the initiative.

The bill, HB 7005, is the brainchild of House Speaker Richard Corcoran (R-Land O'Lakes). Pointing to a slew of failed taxpayer-funded business incentive deals and questionable promotional projects, Corcoran has pledged to eliminate "corporate welfare" from Florida's economic development toolkit.

On the eve of Tuesday's vote by the House Appropriations Committee, however, the speaker and his deputies rolled out an amendment, ultimately adopted, that would spare Visit Florida from elimination. In exchange, the tourism promotion agency would see its budget slashed by more than two-thirds, to $25 million, and be required to freeze pay and submit to a tough new oversight scheme. The state's business development agency, Enterprise Florida, would still cease to exist if the bill becomes law.

"We need to see Visit Florida on the front page when they're helping, not when they're embarrassing us," Rep. Paul Renner (R-Palm Coast) said of the changes.

The amendment is largely seen as an entreaty by Corcoran to the Republican-controlled Senate, which will help determine the legislation's fate. Most Republican senators have expressed concern that nixing or neutering the agencies could severely impact the state's economy, pointing to studies showing that incentives on the whole generate a substantial return on taxpayers' investment.

"There's always going to be people who want to use issues like this to get political points on a daily basis, and it's our job to try to fathom through that and do what's best for the state as a whole," Sen. Jack Latvala (R-Clearwater) said during a Tuesday hearing of the Senate Commerce and Tourism Committee.

But, Latvala suggested, a compromise is possible.

"I want to give the House the credit for changing their attitude a little bit about Visit Florida."

Gov. Scott, who has made job creation a centerpiece of his agenda - and, critics note, has raised millions through his political committee from some of the same companies that have received state incentive dollars - blasted the Appropriations Committee vote in a statement.

"I know some politicians who have voted for this job killing bill say they don't necessarily want to abolish these programs but instead want to advance a 'conversation'," Scott wrote. "This is completely hypocritical and the kind of games I came to Tallahassee to change."

Some of the committee's Republican members, however, argued that Scott has become a master of Tallahassee's political games. Last week, he held campaign-style rallies in the home districts of anti-incentive Republicans, calling them out by name. The governor's political committee, Let's Get to Work, followed up the tour with robo calls to voters in the districts questioning their representatives' commitment to creating jobs and attracting tourists.

"We're not the only place that people can go," Scott has said of maintaining the state's competitiveness. "We've got great weather? We had great weather back in 2010 when we lost all those jobs."

If Tuesday's vote is any indication, though, Scott's aggressive attempt to corral his fellow Republicans may have backfired. As the second term governor's political capital continues to ebb, the derring-do of the House's hard-charging conservative leadership is on the rise.

"There's cockroaches everywhere, and I think you're seeing that," Corcoran said of the rationale behind his reform agenda.