Edited by author 06-13-2007 05:25 PM
http://www.miamiherald.com/416/story/138292.htmlEx-PSC chairman is fined for FPL dinner
BY MONICA HATCHER
mhatcher@MiamiHerald.com
A former chairman of the Public Service Commission, and a prominent Miami attorney, has admitted he violated state ethics rules when he dined at a swanky South Beach restaurant, compliments of Florida Power & Light.
In documents filed with the Florida Commission on Ethics and not yet public, Braulio Baez agreed to a settlement in which he will pay $1,169.87 in civil fines for the meal at the Delano hotel's Blue Door restaurant.
He will also submit to a public reprimand by the commission, whose job is to regulate the rates and services of FPL and other utilities.
He and another PSC commissioner, Rudy Bradley, were among 26 people who joined William Walker, FPL's vice president of regulatory affairs, and Susan Clark, a company lobbyist and herself a former PSC chairwoman, for dinner and drinks at the Blue Door in 2002.
Clark picked up the tab for $5,197.25.
At the time the ethics complaint was filed in 2006, Baez said he did nothing wrong. The menu listed no prices. And he reimbursed his hostess what he was told was his share -- $30.
''Honestly, the best way I can put it is that it was a simple math problem that spun out of control,'' Baez said Wednesday, ``I was billed much later, after the meal occured, and, honestly, like humans are wont to do, I didn't bother to check if the tally was accurate. I would have paid $300 if that's what I was billed.''
The Florida Commission on Ethics, however, didn't buy it.
In a probable cause ruling issued in 2006, ethics commission advocate Linzie F. Bogan concluded the commissioner should have known the meal cost far more.
He charged Baez with accepting a gift ''from a business entity which owned or controlled a public utility'' regulated by the PSC.
The case against Bradley is still pending.
Baez, a senior counsel with Holland & Knight, began his service with the PSC in 2000 and served as chairman for two years before resigning just before his term expired in Jan. 2006. On the commission, he is best known for leading an effort to give back $34 million in lost revenue to FPL following the 2004 hurricane season.
Lloyd Brumfield, a board member with Common Cause in Florida who filed the complaint against Baez, said he was disappointed with the ethics commission's settlement, which must still be finalized at its July 27th meeting.
''They rapped him on the pinkie, not even the knuckles,'' Brumfield said.
