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Memo Pad

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An Offer Florida Legislators Can't Refuse — Or Can They?

September 27th, 2011 4:00 am Carl Hiaasen

Gov. Rick Scott’s crusade to drug-test cash welfare applicants is turning out to be another thickheaded scheme that’s backfiring on Florida taxpayers.

The biggest beneficiaries are the testing companies that collect $10 to $25 for urine, blood or hair screening, a fee being paid by the state (you and me) whenever the applicant tests clean — currently about 97 percent of the cases.

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  • JohnKohls

    Seems like this was a large issue right after Scott was elected because he had “transferred” his ownership of one of the companies that would be doing the testing to his wife. He then later sold the holdings outright when the heat grew, even though he no longer owned them. I guess the next peek should be at those he sold to, given the failed past experience with the testing and the millions to be made by his cronies. How much of a kick-back is he getting?

  • peteserb

    I have to be drug tested in my job. Why shouldn’t someone who gets a part of my taxes be obligated to do the same?

  • JohnKohls

    “I have to be drug tested in my job. Why shouldn’t someone who gets a part of my taxes be obligated to do the same?”

    No problem so long as a bigger, more intrusive, less effective government is what you want. With this law, the government has gotten bigger (someone’s got to monitor the testing program), more intrusive (hopefully no discussion necessary), and less effective (the savings don’t pay for the costs). And on the plus side, the effects and costs were already known from a previous $2.5MM experiment.

    Seems like Scott’s cronies are taking your tax money without any valid reason, and leaving us all a bigger government to deal with. Is that OK with you?

  • fredno

    This is just another example of Republicans trying to make political hay out of the concern that welfare recipients are low life drug users. They ignore the actual statistics and waste tax money for the pleasure of their conservative base.

  • GarySiebenaler

    Cuts Teacher and firefighters pay. Layoff of police throughout the state of Florida. More lost jobs since he took over. We want Charlie Back!

  • Terry B.

    Maybe the threat of drug testing is working.

    Plan = Success.

    Next step: spot testing.