Byrd's flight of fancy

Not content to have canceled a House session so he could travel to New York to line his pockets with campaign contributions, Speaker Johnnie Byrd must have decided he could call more attention to his political decadence through his flight home. So, as Byrd returned to Tallahassee late Monday from a weekend of schmoozing, he flew aboard a private jet chartered by a Tampa HMO that is asking Florida lawmakers to hand it a $140-million contract for mental health services.

The flight set up by WellCare chief executive officer Todd Farha capped a weekend that included at least one fundraiser organized by Farha. It represented just one more favor from the company, whose executives gave Byrd's U.S. Senate campaign $15,000 in the last quarter of 2003 alone. The Legislature is actively considering whether to turn mental health services over to HMOs, and Byrd's influence is substantial as the session winds to a close.

Upon his return to the Capitol, where House and Senate members had worked through the weekend negotiating the details of the state budget, Byrd offered no real defense of his trip or his travel partner. "Why don't you call the campaign," he told a reporter. "I'm here to do the people's work in Tallahassee." He didn't say whose work he was doing in New York while he forced the people's work to be put on hold.

With Byrd, the "people's work" often seems to involve business lobbyists who are willing to write him checks. When lobbyists see his phone number flash on their caller ID, they know what's coming "He asked me to put some checks together, and he offered to meet with my clients," one lobbyist said last fall. "In the course of talking about (a legislative issue), he said, "I've got a fundraiser coming up, and I was hoping you could help me out,' " said another lobbyist.

Byrd owes his speakership, in part, to his ability to shake down lobbyists. He formed a committee that raised more than $400,000 over the past four years, and he funneled some of that money into the campaigns of House members who would support him as speaker. He also put some of that money, $20,346 worth, in his own pocket to "reimburse" himself for expenses he declines to talk about.

Give Byrd this much: He may not be the most shameless politician in Florida, but it's not for lack of effort.

Opinion

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