Gov. Rick Scott appears on track to fulfill his vision of making the Florida Department of Environmental Protection a customer-service oriented rubber stamp that allows industry to dump on the environment with little worry.In 2011, there was a 28 percent drop in enforcement cases handled by the DEP, while pollution penalty assessments dropped by 29…
Former Deerfield Beach Commissioner Sylvia Poitier doesn’t want anyone to think she “doesn’t respect government.” It’s important that she pointed that out, because you might mistakenly come to some other conclusion when you heard about she polluted land with dry-cleaning chemicals, then wouldn’t submit the government-required report about the pollution, then…
Do you looove the First Amendment? Are you a fan of Woody Harrelson movies? Do you want to ask someone why Hustler magazine published a photo of a conservative columnist with a photoshopped penis in her mouth?If so, good news! Porn mogul Larry Flynt is coming to town tonight. Unpack…
A lot of crime news today, but it’s not every Friday somebody gets indicted on charges he mailed white powder to government offices.The FBI says that’s exactly what Justin Burton Lane did sometime between Christmas and New Year’s — there isn’t a lot of information available yet, but we know Lane…
This week’s feature is on two investigators who were kicked out of the Attorney General’s Office a year ago but keep trying to uncover foreclosure fraud however they can.In late 2010, robo-signing was just making it to the public consciousness, a sign of our economic downfall in which overworked employees…
Listen, pervs. If you’re on BoyAhoy, the “fastest growing gay dating app” for the “hottest, newest, and most fun way of meeting singles mobilely,” just assume every underaged boy is a cop and stop offering to give them blowies.Last week, a 26-year-old Boca man was arrested on charges he sent…
Bloomberg had an interesting scoop yesterday: The Mitt Romney campaign asked Gov. Rick Scott to tone down his bragging about Florida’s economy because it was interfering with Romney’s message of economic apocalypse under Barack Obama. The report also said Scott “was asked to say that the state’s jobless rate could…
Gurudeo “Buddy” Persaud is accused of organizing an investment scheme with a fraud that was… cosmic.The Securities and Exchange Commission on Wednesday charged Persaud with stealing more than $1 million from investors between 2007 and the beginning of 2010: He promised them returns of 6 to 18 percent but left…
A panel of judges for the U.S. Court of Appeals in Atlanta on Thursday shot down Grammy-winning reggae artist Buju Banton’s appeal on federal drug charges. The judges also reversed the lower court’s decision to throw out a gun charge. Now the same judge who decided there wasn’t enough evidence to hold Buju accountable…
Martin County Sheriff Robert Crowder is running for Congress. His opponent loves using words like communist, vile, and despicable to describe colleagues he disagrees with.Now Crowder is surprised Rep. Allen West, a fellow Republican, is being mean to him too…
Mitt Romney wants people to think everything stinks and the world is falling apart. But Gov. Rick Scott, with all his talk about Florida improving, is getting in the way.According to a story from Bloomberg today, “Scott, a Republican, was asked to say that the state’s jobless rate could improve…
Documents released this morning show that George Zimmerman admitting that he did not call 911 when he saw Trayvon Martin “casually walking in the rain looking into houses” — he called the Sanford Police non-emergency line — and then says Martin cursed and threatened his life numerous times.Zimmerman also admits…
Fort Lauderdale 18-year-old Victor “Duffleman” Finn is having a bad couple of weeks. Between June 11 and 19, he was accused of making bomb threats, mugging a woman, and throwing asphalt through a rehab center’s window. Now, he’s in jail.On June 11, he allegedly called a rehab center where his…
A group says it filed a complaint with the Internal Revenue Service yesterday over the recent actions of Terry Jones’ Dove World Outreach Center, which hanged an effigy of Obama outside of its church earlier this month. The D.C.-based group, Americans United for Separation of Church and State, says the…
One day in November, June Clarkson stepped out her front door in Hollywood to see a Local 10 news van parked outside. They were filming a public-nuisance story on the property next door to hers, which had been in foreclosure for around two years and was now covered with unsightly,…
Most of us rejoiced earlier this year when Secretary of Interior Ken Salazar announced a new set of restrictions on the much loathed, much feared, much hyped Burmese python. But six months after the feds announced a ban on the importation and interstate sale of Burmese pythons and three other snake species,…
June Clarkson went to Ernie’s Bar-B-Q in Fort Lauderdale to have lunch with her supervisor, Bob Julian; and some coworkers. It was a Friday in May 2011, the end of a hectic workweek at the local economic crimes unit of the Office of the Attorney General. Clarkson, a small, lively…
Despite widespread debate over both the state’s voter purge and its “Stand Your Ground” law, a Q poll released this morning shows both are overwhelmingly supported by the state’s wide Republican base.Of Republicans polled, 90 percent they said they approved the voter purges, despite claims from the U.S. Department of…
Update, 12:35 p.m.: Added comment from FAU President Mary Jane Saunders.Yesterday, the Institute for a Competitive Workforce gave Florida’s four-year colleges an ‘A’ grade on an extensive rubric that includes efficiency, cost-effectiveness, and student access.Also yesterday: The trustees of Florida Atlantic University approved a 15-percent tuition hike, which would ratchet…
Sometimes there are slow news days. Washington Examiner commentary writer Joe Gehrke must have had the slowest of his life yesterday.He was criticizing a blog post by smirking HBO commentator Bill Maher, a nice, soft target for a conservative gentleman. Maher’s post was a meandering meditation on everything from Congress not…
Starting today, New Times Broward Palm Beach has a new editor. Except he is the same as the old one. Kind of.Chuck Strouse, who edited this newspaper from 2000 to 2005, will return in the dual role as top gun at Miami New Times and New Times/Broward Palm Beach. Eric Barton, who started…
UPDATE: George LeMieux announced this morning that he’s dropping out of the race.A Las Vegas billionaire who has said he could dump as much as $100 million into the 2012 elections has donated $1 million of that chump change to a super PAC backing Republican Rep. Connie Mack in his…
