Charlie, we really tried to give you the benefit of the doubt after your heavily funded win over an honorable opponent, Jim Davis, in 2006. And our doubts were sizable. Sadly, when Floridians needed an honest broker who would take on the many problems in our state, now, in 2009, you have demonstrated that you just weren't up to this job.
One question: If you are successful in pulling off a six-year term in the U. S. Senate next year, will you also skip out of THAT responsibility in 2012, when your eyes lust for the White House?
We won't be sorry to see you go.
Crist will leave behind big unfinished agendaBy Aaron Deslatte
June 11, 2009
Tallahassee - Charlie Crist was inaugurated governor in 2007 pledging to lower property taxes and insurance rates and proclaiming Florida's "best days are not behind us, but before us."
With a broad ambition to transform Republican politics, he launched an aggressive agenda to cut property taxes and insurance premiums, reduce Florida's greenhouse emissions and enact a host of other reforms.
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But Crist's decision to skip a second term and run for the U.S. Senate in 2010 means much of that agenda won't be finished on his watch.
Critics and supporters alike say that Crist's signature issues have fallen victim to economic pressures, GOP intransigence or his administration's own lack of follow-through.
"He came in with great challenges, and he's leaving lots of things undone," said state Sen. Dan Gelber, D- Miami Beach, a candidate for attorney general who has worked closely with Crist.
"Because of his choices, it's hard to define what kind of a governor he's been because he's left so much hanging."
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This is what he accomplished:
Crist stitched together Cover Florida to provide bare-bones (and low-cost) health insurance for the state's estimated 3.8 million uninsured. But after a year, it has enrolled just 2,434 people.
Civil rights groups praised Crist in 2007 when he returned the right to vote to hundreds of thousands of non-violent convicts, calling it "the right thing to do."
But tens of thousands of ex-felons haven't been notified of their rights because of budget cuts – and many more convicted of violent crimes still can't vote. "The effort is incomplete, at best," said Mark Schlakman, of the Center for the Advancement of Human Rights at Florida State University.
The governor wooed green groups in 2007 with a pledge to make Florida a leader in capping greenhouse gas emissions from homes, cars and power plants. He kicked it off with a high-profile summit in Miami that drew national media attention.
But legislators this year rejected his bill to impose California-style auto emissions standards and require that utility companies draw 20 percent of their power from renewable sources by 2020.
Crist and lobbyists for U.S. Sugar Corp. agreed in 2008 to pay $1.75 billion for the company's 187,000 acres of land, its sugar mill and other assets "lock, stock and barrel" to enable a restoration of the Everglades.
But the economy soured – and legislators complained – so the deal was scaled down to $536 million for 73,000 acres, with a 10-year option to buy 107,000 more. And without Crist, long-term prospects are murky.
The governor also shocked environmentalists this year by signing a growth-management bill that guts the requirement that developers build enough road-capacity to handle the extra traffic they create – and, last year, by reversing his position against offshore oil drilling.
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No issue will loom larger over Crist's legacy than his handling of property taxes and insurance. So far, results have been mixed.
Property taxes have fallen, but largely for reasons beyond Crist's control. "Taxes are going down because the market is going down, not for any other reason," said Orange County Property Appraiser Bill Donegan.
The plunge in property values has largely masked the impact of Crist's property-tax changes, the largest of which was 2008's Amendment 1 expanding the $25,000 homestead exemption, among other tweaks to the property tax system.
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Under a bill Crist signed last month, Citizens Property Insurance Corp., now Florida's largest insurer with nearly 1.3 million homeowner policies, can raise rates up to 10 percent a year until it is financially solvent. Private insurers will also be freer to raise rates, as the state backs away from its pledge to cover their losses after massive storms.
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Since he took office, the unemployment rate has tripled, to 9.6 percent. While foreclosures around the nation slow, the 59,000 foreclosures filed in Florida in May were up 50 percent from a year earlier, according to Realty Trac.
But rather than making any dramatic moves this year, Crist and lawmakers largely did nothing.
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Crist said recently he is "not really" thinking about what he might leave unfinished.
"We're trying to finish everything now," he said.
After Jeb Bush unleashed his 8-year wrecking ball on Florida, Charlie Crist stood by and let her bleed out slowly.
Once again, painfully, Floridians have lost more precious time to the self-serving ambition of another shallow but determined politician.
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