It's a shame Jennings is bowing out

DYCKMAN E-mail: Click here Archive

By MARTIN DYCKMAN

© St. Petersburg Times, published June 8, 2000

No matter what you've heard, the Florida panther is not this state's most endangered species. There are still at least 50 of them.

There are a lot fewer moderate Republicans in state office, and yet another was lost Wednesday when Senate President Toni Jennings renounced the race for treasurer/insurance commissioner.

"I swear I'm still a right-wing crazy," she said by telephone from Tallahassee. "The center moved on me. I swear I haven't changed a bit."

If she didn't, surely the center did since she first ventured to Tallahassee as a 27-year-old back-bench House freshman 24 years ago. State politics is radically more partisan and poisonous. The bipartisanship in Jennings' Senate was a lonely vestige.

Because of term limits, she can't run for re-election. So it's home to Orlando.

That was good news to the presumptive Democratic nominee, Rep. John Cosgrove of Miami, whose chances for November look a lot better today. She had collected $1-million to his $209,000 when both had to suspend campaign fund-raising for the legislative session. And $80,000 of that was his own money.

Cosgrove would make a credible commissioner. Insurance was his legislative specialty, to the frequent dismay of casualty insurers who wished he knew less about it. But the political scene is bleak for the loss of Jennings' perspective. With Education Commissioner Tom Gallagher running for the U.S. Senate, Comptroller Bob Milligan may be the only moderate Republican holding statewide office.

As the insurance commissioner's race was hers to lose, the announcement was a shocker to most people. Some journalists had figured her as a possible dropout in the face of what threatened to be a nasty campaign. There had been a bunch of anonymous mailings, which cost someone a pretty penny to research, having to do mostly with her campaign contributors. There was nothing impressive about them, however, except for the quantity. In any event, it couldn't have gotten much muddier than what the Republican establishment threw at her when she was considering contesting Bush for the 1998 nomination, and she weathered that.

"There is nothing out there . . . absolutely nothing," Jennings said Wednesday, insisting she had simply come to realize that "I'm not sure the treasurer's post is what I want, and I'm not sure being a Cabinet member and going to Tallahassee was what I want."

I can understand that. Tallahassee has become a tough town for Republicans, even Senate presidents, who don't think Jeb Bush should be Big Brother. Her proposals for reasonable, modest campaign reform got nothing but scorn from the governor and House. Bush's surprise veto of the $25-million she had budgeted to help Workforce Development clients get and keep jobs must have been the last straw.

Her two terms as president are the best evidence of how much Florida is losing. She kept the gavel because the other senators bidding for it didn't trust each other nearly as much as they trusted her to run the Senate fairly. The Democrats, who lacked the votes to put one of their own on the rostrum, were critical to that compromise. They trusted her too.

Tim Ireland, a former House member making his third race for insurance commissioner, will probably win the GOP nomination over Rep. Greg Gay. Neither could raise much money with Jennings in the race. With her gone, Ireland -- who once said that market forces, not regulation, should control insurance rates -- will look much better to the insurance lobbies. But Cosgrove will look better to Democratic money sources.

Thoughtful Republicans may be looking for a new candidate. Senate Majority Leader Jack Latvala and former Pinellas Rep. R. Z. "Sandy" Safley, now a Tallahassee consultant, would be good for the job, but both have the same problem as Jennings: they're moderates. Latvala isn't likely to run, but Safley could be tempted. The environmentalists would be delighted.

Unlike education commissioner, the treasurer/insurance commissioner's post is a job with a future. Though both posts will disappear in January 2003 under the Cabinet reform amendment voters approved in 1998, the treasurer would be a logical candidate for the new office of chief state fiscal officer.

Jennings, a former school teacher, said she tried this year to repair relations between Senate Republicans and the teachers' unions. In fact, she did; they were going to back her all the way.

"Hopefully, I left some pluses for education and the public school system," she said.

More's the pity that she is leaving.

© St. Petersburg Times. All rights reserved.