However, scientists say that they're doing their best to ascertain that brain donors are actually dead before the organs are taken.

"Sometimes it's a close call," Dr. Hans conceded.

Beer and pizza for everyone, Mr. Governor

June 5, 1987

The Mole People finally adjourned in Tallahassee, emerging squinty-eyed into the sunshine where they are now posing, partying and nearly wrenching their arms patting themselves on the back.

Having committed their largest deeds behind closed doors, the legislators of the great state of Florida would now like you to know what a valiant effort they've made on your behalf.

They passed the biggest tax increase in state history, set up a lottery, and agreed to spend millions more on prisons, indigent health care and water cleanup.

They also passed laws that will legally put handguns into the fists of more drunks, half-wits and fruitcakes than ever before. Despite so-called "safeguards," the Legislature will have no more success keeping licensed pistols from lunatics than it does keeping bad drivers off the highways.

In other ways it was a progressive session because—like them or not—new taxes are the only way to start paying for Florida's explosive growth. The scary part is that the average voter has practically no say in how these revenues will be spent, or who'll get their paws on the money.

Years ago Florida passed its famous Sunshine Laws, ostensibly to take the business of government out of the cloakrooms and corridors. At the time a reform-minded Legislature boldly voted that all meetings of public bodies be held in the open—except, naturally, those of the Legislature itself.

The law that makes it illegal for members of a city council or a school board or a county commission to meet secretly doesn't apply to your faithful representatives in Tallahassee, who this year had their way with $18.7 billion of your money.

How did they do it? We're not exactly sure, since they wouldn't let us in.

True, floor sessions and regular committee meeting are wide open to the press and public, but the real lawmaking doesn't happen there. It happens in private.

Take the controversial new sales tax on services, for instance. It wasn't negotiated on the floor in view of the gallery. It was drafted over beer and pizza at the Tallahassee townhouse of Bob Coker, a lobbyist for a Big Sugar firm. Among those joining the House and Senate leaders in the late-night festivities were key aides to Gov. Bob Martinez.

You remember Bob Martinez, that fellow who campaigned vigorously on a promise of no secret meetings? Remember his indignant TV ads, showing arrogant cracker legislators slamming the door in the public's face? Apparently the governor is not so indignant now.

For a brief moment this session a few senators rebelled. They proposed an amendment that would have required legislators to meet in the open at all times, even when jawboning with the governor.

You can imagine the rapture with which this idea was greeted. Senate Rules Chairman Dempsey Barren and Senate President John Vogt (the King and Crown Prince of the Mole People) snuffed the Sunshine amendment as quickly as possible.

Later Sen. Larry Plummer of South Miami pointedly offered a new version that would have opened all governmental sessions, including "midnight meetings over pepperoni pizza or anything else."

This, too, was flattened by Vogt's gavel.

Think about what it means. These are people who work for you, and whose salaries you pay—yet they won't let you watch what they're doing. It's like having the Maytag repairman lock you out of your own house until he's finished fiddling with your appliances.

Admittedly, cutting deals is a part of the legislative process that's easier done in a tunnel than on TV But if nothing sleazy is going on, then what's the harm in letting the public see?

Martinez says gee whiz, he'd just love to open all the meetings, really he would—but those darn legislators just won't go along.

It sounds like the governor's eyes have already adjusted to the dark.

Foul odors get worse in legislature

December 12, 1990

The Legislature is like a dead skunk. No matter how bad you think it's going to stink, it stinks even worse.

Few stomachs remain unturned after this week's Herald series about pet projects that give away millions of taxpayer dollars. Although everybody was aware that this stuff goes on, many people had no idea that the pilfering is so flagrant.

It's hard to decide which is more outrageous—the way the money was blown, or the lame excuses now being made by those who blew it. Some of my favorites:

• Lottery funds, designated for education, were used to send a bunch of state legislators to Israel as part of an "agricultural research project." Among those who took the free trip were Sen. Gwen Margolis (representing those rolling farmlands of North Miami), and Rep. JackTobin of Margate, where almost all the supermarkets do sell fresh produce.

Margolis apparently was too busy tending her crops to respond to inquiries about the Israel trip, while Tobin insisted that the lottery couldn't have paid for the whole thing. It did.

• Last year, the Legislature gave $1 million to fund an "amateur" athletic facility. Instead, the money was sent to the Ladies Professional Golf Association. This year, lawmakers spent another $2 million for a new road to the LPGA's headquarters in Daytona Beach.

Now legislators say the word "amateur" was "inadvertently" added to the funding proposal. They say the grant was meant for the city of Daytona Beach, which needed the funds to help the LPGA move there. Now isn't that better? Three million bucks of "economic development" money for needy professional golfers—who said government doesn't have a heart!

• Metro Commissioner Sherman Winn campaigned for a $400,000 state grant to something called the American International Exhibition for Travel, a firm that staged tourism-promotion shows. By eerie coincidence, Winn's son Steve just happened to be the Tallahassee lobbyist for that company—and got $52,000 for his work. Months later, the owner of American International disappeared, and so did the state's $400,000.

Sherman Winn now prefers not to discuss the matter. Explained an aide: "He doesn't want to be implicated with something he had nothing to do with."

Guess what, Sherm. You're implicated.

• The Beacon Council, guiding light of Dade's business community, hired two lobbyists to pry $150,000 in grant money from the state Legislature. After the funding arrived, the Beacon Council kicked back $15,000 to the lobbyists. The state comptroller's office said that's an improper use of taxpayers' dollars.

The kicker: It was lottery money.

• Rep. Luis Rojas of Hialeah weaseled $100,000 for the Hialeah Latin Chamber of Commerce to fund a "productivity improvement center." The chamber used the dough to hire Rojas' former legislative aide, Carlos Manrique.

Rojas insists that the state money spawned new commerce in Hialeah, and he's right: His buddy Manrique later went into business with a company owner he'd met through the grant program. Hey, if you can't help your friends, who can you help?

• Wooed by lobbyists, the Legislature gave the Greater Miami Opera almost $1 million. Later, some of the lawmakers who voted for the money asked the opera for free tickets.

One of those, Rep. Susan Guber, says—and this is priceless—it's important for her to attend the shows to make sure taxpayer dollars are being put to good use. Bravo!

To her credit, Guber is one of the few legislators who wants to change things so that "turkey" items aren't so easily sneaked into the appropriations bill. There's not a moment to waste, either—Florida is in worse fiscal shape than most had predicted.The crisis is forcing $270 million in emergency cuts next month. Education, social services and law enforcement will suffer.