Was FPL-donated PAC money spent to aid Carroll’s re-election effort?

Heran-controlled, FPL funded PAC spent $39,388 from Aug. 21 to Sept. 11

UPDATED 9/25/13 5:50 p.m.

NEWS ANALYSIS

MARK SCHUMANN

Glenn Heran, utility activist, president of the Taxpayer's Association and head of Citizens for a Bright Future — Glenn Heran, head of Citizens for a Bright Future

Citizens for a Brighter Future, a political action committee controlled by utility activist Glenn Heran and largely bankrolled by Florida Power & Light, spent $39,388.15 between Aug. 21 and Sept. 11.

Did the PAC’s payments to a West Palm Beach campaign consulting group, a Tallahassee law firm and a Colorado-based polling group go to settle outstanding bills from last March’s electric sale referendum? That is not possible since Florida election law requires political advertising to be paid for in advance. What seem likely is that Heran’s FPL-sponsored group has arranged to bring the big guns to bear in support of City Council candidate Tracy Carroll, who is running for re-election.

Heran told the island weekly all $39,388 in disbursements between Aug. 21 and Sept. 11 – to four separate vendors -were to pay for legal services, newspaper advertising design, direct mail services, campaign services, phone services and signs, all in connection with the March referendum.

Conerstone Solutions & Communications, a West Palm Beach campaign consulting group, received four payments from Heran’s PAC totaling $22,194.94. Luce Research, a Colorado-based polling company was paid $9,891.12.

Could it be that a fiscal conservative such as Heran would be paying Luce now for work done last March? More likely, between now and Nov. 5 registered voters in Vero Beach will be receiving lots of attention from persuasive callers posing as pollsters.

Citizens for a Brighter Future also paid $3,600 to a West Palm Beach sign company, and $3,686.99 to the Coates Law Firm of Tallahassee. Three-thousand six-hundred dollars buys a lot of signs, signs that may soon be gracing local laws and public right-a-ways.

Last spring, FPL contributed approximately $100,000, to Citizens for a Brighter Future. With some $39,000 left after the March referendum, the PAC had a healthy war chest coming into the CIty Council election.

Supporters of Tracy Carroll are attempting to make the case that without her re-election the sale of Vero Electric to FPL will unravel, leaving the city’s 34,000 electric customers doomed to perpetual servitude.

If Citizens for a Brighter Future has, in fact, arranged for political mailings, persuasive polling calls and campaign signs, all designed to stress the importance of concluding the sale of Vero Electric, the effort can hardly be seen as anything other than a coordinated effort to support Vice Mayor Tracy Carroll in her bid for re-election.

In statements made before the Utility Commission today, Florida Power & Light spokeswoman Amy Brunjes, wife of Scripps Treasure Coast Newspapers Publisher Bob Brunjes, seemed to be stressing the importance of Vice Mayor Tracy Carroll’s re-election.

“We’ve gotten as far as we have to this point thanks to the support we have had on the City Council and we need that to continue,” Brunjes said.

Other candidates running for City Council contend the City’s signed contract with FPL commits the Council to complete the deal. They contend that whoever joins Craig Fletcher, Jay Kramer and Pilar Turner at the dais in November will be committed by law to make every reasonable effort to complete the sale.

5 comments

Political Action Committees – the way to get below the radar of accountability and the Sunshine laws………motto:” Any way you can, do it”. Other motto: “Would we lie?”

Amazing. How FPL could tie themselves to a one-trick, damaged poster child like that is just wrong, IMHO… But the ends justify the means to them, I suppose. Seems to me that if the deal is already done, the re-election is moot, at least for her. I would think getting her off our Council would be more important now than ever before because we need to focus on new issues-like our lagoon… and strengthening our local businesses… and getting the community back on track, instead of spending all this time involved in her time-consuming personal and professional dramas.

FYI Cornerstone Solutions etc. is a branch of the PR firm that runs those nasty and false smear campaigns all over Fla., headed by Rick Asnani, former partner of the Solari-Mayfield buddies Public Concepts in WPB. Vast majority of their money comes from DEVELOPERS, Florida Builders Assn., etc. The company you keep [literally in this case].

I think that this group has disbanded. The electric vote has already been decided. According to latest finance reports, Tracy Carol is behind in the money race.

According to the latest financial reports which were filed 9/13/13, the group has a zero balance in its bank account, but that doesn’t mean it cannot and will not receive another infusion from FPL. More to the point though, the group did exactly as I reported, and spent 39,388.15 between August 21 and Sept. 11 as itemized in this report. Since political advertising must be paid in advance, these disbursements have nothing to do with expenses incurred for the March referendum. You can rest assured Mr. Heran has arranged political mailing and “pushing” calls, and plenty of signs, all to promote a message designed to give Carroll a boost.