"And we support organizations who had that mission.". A short-lived organization called "Fix JEA Now" registered a web domain in 2017 and began making dramatic claims about the city-owned utility. Matrixs principal, Perkins, says he discovered only after Pitts left the firm that he and other now-former employees had been conducting shadow activities and operations dating back to 2016. In 2019, when the electric utility industry was up in arms about a constitutional amendment to open up competition in Floridas energy market, a Matrix-linked non-profit poured more than $10m into groups fighting it. A Birmingham mayor who employed Matrix got 15 years for bribery, conspiracy and fraud. In 2013, Terry Dunn, a Republican electricity regulator at Alabamas Public Service Commission made moves to hold formal hearings on how customers energy bills were calculated something that hadnt happened in three decades. Crist has also criticized FPL on the campaign trail, calling the utility out for raising its rates on Floridians and criticizing FPL for attempting to block clean energy with anti-solar legislation. The sites publisher, Brian Burgess, a former top spokesperson for past Florida governor Rick Scott, also suggested in emails that Matrix should lure prominent Florida journalists to a new site or buy local papers owned by media giant Gannett Company and then lay off most of the clown reporters to inject content into publications without anyone knowing who was pulling the strings. January 25, 2023 Become a member to support the independent voice of South Florida Forgive me for being unserious at a time when companies like Florida Power & Light (FPL)the nation's largest utilitykeep racking up scandals, but it's kind of hard to keep track of the. Top executives at utility giant Florida Power & Light worked closely with the political consultants who orchestrated a scheme to promote spoiler candidates in three key state Senate elections last year, according to documents obtained by the Orlando Sentinel. Under the leadership of Eric Silagy, 54, the company has been tied to allegations of campaign finance violations, media manipulation, and the surveillance of critical journalists. The companies that are doing the right thing still have those kinds of plants in their portfolio, specifically coal, but theyre working toward other alternatives, Hope said. Florida Power & Light denied any wrongdoing related to political campaigns. I looked at the language. "I want you to make his life a living hell seriously," Silagy wrote in a 2019 email to two of his vice-presidents about one of the Democratic state senators whose 2020 electoral contest was complicated by a spoiler candidate. Im hopeful this is a conversation starter but, at the same time, its really hard to have a conversation when you have a gun to your head. But the inclusion raises a complex but important question as 21st-century energy policy grapples with ways to further reduce carbon emissions as a climate-change doomsday clock continues to tick-tock. She said the support she got from other teams was 'overwhelming. Emails show that Bradleys staff followed up with Florida Power & Light after that discussion. Yet he acknowledged that the reports may have had an influence on the decision. The utility company also contributes to many Democrats and to the Florida Democratic Party. The fact that (West County Energy Center is) using natural gas is a plus, Matt Hope, chief operating officer of Find Energy, said inrecognizing that the report factors in a plants efficiency, but doesnt focus on it. Holley, the Florida Power & Light lobbyist who delivered the net metering language to the Senate, worked to promote Republican Senate candidates in the close races. Matrix also exerted political influence through the press, with its operatives acquiring control of a Tallahassee-based politics news site, The Capitolist. A spokesperson for the company declined to comment on the firms activities. Bob Self/Florida Times-Union. Matrix grew so large that by 2015 it was operating several private aircraft to whisk Pitts and Perkins to client meetings. The plan ultimately failed, and Stoddard was re-elected. Make a one-time donation today for as little as $1. And additional reporting since last year has made it clear the leakedMatrix records contain legitimate information. Under the scheme, a candidate with no political background was on the ballot as a no-party option in an effort to confuse voters and dilute support for the Democrat in the race, helping Republicans maintain their majority in the state Senate. "JEA is broken," the group boasted on its website, where it posted Times-Union coverage of the utility's involvement in an over-budget, behind-schedule nuclear project in Georgia. She also was a corporate operative. Rodrguez was ousted from office in the next election. Follow him onTwitter@NateMonroeTU. DeSantis appointees also allowed FPL to pocket over $1 billion in corporate tax savings instead of passing those savings on to customers. Miami's independent source of But utility experts have testified to the Florida Public Service Commission that rooftop solar in the state could grow at a rate of 39 percent a year until 2025 if Floridas current net metering system is left in place. Run by a former Rick Scott spokesman, Brian Burgess, The Capitolist often focused criticism not on powerful industry players or politicians but on individual journalists at publications like the Miami Herald, Palm Beach Post and Times-Union that had crossed the interests of one of the state's large corporations, like FPL. But Florida Power & Light is arguing rooftop solar could cost Florida utilities about $700 million between 2019 and 2025, according to documents submitted to the Florida Public Service Commission. influencing local mayoral and county commission elections, a Miami Herald story about the allegation, graphic showing acquisition flow of The Capitolist, Graphic showing number of stops taken by Matrix private planes. Silagy, CEO since 2014, will depart the company in April. The company says the move was not prompted by recent scandals. Electricity companies like Florida Power & Light make money off of the things they build: mainly large power plants and the power lines that bring that energy to customers. In 2020, FPL would help Florida Republicans keep control of the state Senate by contributing to several close races, in the process dispatching one of the few incumbents who was publicly critical of the company. Legislators pass legislation, she said. Headquartered in Montgomery, Matrix has been described there as the closest thing Alabama politics has to a non-governmental secret agency. FPL consultants secretly took command, control of Florida news website, reports say, Surveillance records at the heart of a tangled mess between FPL and a former consultant, none more enticing than the city's century-old municipal utility, JEA, dispatching one of the few incumbents who was publicly critical of the company, resulted in criminal charges against JEA's former CEO and CFO, to kill one of the utility's highest legislative priorities, uncharacteristically backed off a winter-hardeningproposal that critics alleged could have led to costly customer charges, had this Times-Union columnist surveilled, orchestrated a financial takeover of a small Tallahassee-based political news site with a conservativebent, planting seeds intended to underminepublic confidence in the Jacksonville agency, offering a job to Garrett Dennis, a member of the Jacksonville City Council who had been outspoken against selling JEA, Your California Privacy Rights / Privacy Policy. Skeptics of that plan notably included the Office of Public Counsel, thewatchdog group that represents consumers before the Public Service Commission butwas thought to have been more friendly to utility interests after the installation of a longtime industry lobbyist in 2021. Pimentel will rejoin the company on Feb. 15 and work with Silagy until his departure. Consultants who control Grow United billed FPL for over $3 million before the entity started moving funds around for the election scheme. The Florida Panhandle is in revolt over bills that some FPL customers claim are double or triple what they were paying under Southern Company's stewardship of Gulf Power. The complaint implicated Florida Power & Light in election law violations because of alleged attempts to obscure the source of the political donations. Florida Power & Light spokesperson Chris McGrath said the company doesnt oppose net metering but wants to see the current law revised. Southern Company and Alabama Power run the state of Alabama, Dunn said. DeSantis is running against former Republican Governor and current Democratic nominee Charlie Crist, who has been a vocal critic of FPL throughout his political career. He added that the net metering law has not been updated in 13 years and now is time to discuss it. A state board recently rebuffed a request from several Democratic lawmakers for an audit of Florida Power & Light's finances, which the representatives sought following reports linking the. The team decided an effort to repeal the ordinance would probably fail. Landlords would be able to sell cheap rooftop solar power directly to their tenants bypassing FPL and its monopoly on electricity. Asked by Wall Street analysts during an earnings call on Wednesday whether Silagy's retirement was in any way prompted by those reports, the parent company's chief executive asserted that was not the case. One of those Democrats,Sen. Jos Javier Rodrguez, happened to be both a prominent member of his party and an incumbent FPL particularly despised. . Records from the Florida Senate show that Florida Power & Light drafted the bill, and lobbyist John Holley delivered it to Bradley, R-Fleming Island, and Florida Power & Lights parent company followed up with a $10,000 contribution to her political committee. And in 2020, Matrix even harnessed the power of the press for itself, when its employees acquired control of The Capitolist, a Tallahassee-based political news site which it used for favorable coverage, leaked records show. Reporting, primarily by the Orlando Sentinel, showed spoiler candidates in three state Senate races in 2020 were propped up by at least a half-million dollars from dark-money groups in an effort to help damage the Democrats in those races and help Republicans control the chamber. Ari Peskoe, director of the Electricity Law Initiative at Harvard Law School said the whole purpose of firms like Matrix is to conceal that its the utility doing this. Do you need this bus to transport this many people, and do you need it to be this large? she asked hypothetically. Energy poles by Florida Power and Light from Turkey Point nuclear generating station in Miami, Florida. And the job was to come with one key hitch: To accept it, Dennis would have to leave his council position. "I think it took a toll," Ketchum said Wednesday of the multiple crises. Florida is one of 47 states that allow households and businesses that produce power to sell it back to the grid at a set rate. He noted that there is never a "perfect time" to leave. Ketchum also reiterated that when he was named to the NextEra CEO role after Jim Robo stepped down, Silagy had committed to Ketchum that he would lead FPL for at least one more year. That growth has the utilities, and legislators, worried. When the small south Florida citys mayor helped pass an ordinance in 2017 mandating rooftop solar panels on new construction, a network of 10 FPL-aligned operatives mobilized to ensure his ouster. So it's particularly jarring to have seen the facility land on a list of pollutingelectric plants that included plenty of old-school coal power plants. Matrixs influence was felt on matters small and large, from Stoddards city of less than 12,000 to statewide fights over the Florida constitution. FPL bristled at the inclusion of its power plantson the list bythe website Find Energy, which aggregates and analyzes finalized government data on electricity companies. I want you to make his life a living hell seriously, FPLs CEO Eric Silagy wrote in a 2019 email to two of his vice-presidents about state Senator Jos Javier Rodrguez, who proposed the legislation. The money was allegedly funneled through a network of tax-exempt nonprofits that obscured its origin. 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