PUBLIC CORRUPTION? WE'RE SHOCKED! SHOCKED!

It takes a Florida grand jury to state the obvious:

Public Government is Corrupt.

Frankly, we're shocked!

As reported in the St. Pete Times (the Herald was too busy licking TomAss to report on this...)

"Saying corruption is "pervasive at all levels of government,'' a statewide grand jury released a report Wednesday calling for reforms to combat "mismanagement and theft'' by public officials.

"Fraud, waste and abuse of state resources'' punishes taxpayers by driving up the cost of services, the panel said."

"The grand jury used the Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission to underscore the depth of the problem. In that agency, supervisors flagrantly circumvented purchasing rules, a practice that become common knowledge and prompted other employees to act unethically, the panel says.

"We were told employees would steal items such as flat screen televisions from the office. Depending upon the position of the employee, the supervisor often took no action," the report says. "Due to the unethical conduct at the supervisory level, a systemic acceptance of corruption was born."

Look no further than Miami Dade Transit.

In April 2009, a janitor sweeping Miami-Dade Transit's office made a startling discovery: In an empty cubicle on the 16th floor of the county's Overtown Transit Village complex, the cleaner found wads of cash totaling $9,863 and old checks for $14,772.

The former employee who had occupied the desk, Jeffrey Bechdel, helped run the county's seven-day Visitor Pass program, which sold weekly passes for bus and Metrorail. For 2 ½ years, before leaving Transit in January 2009, he stuffed the sale proceeds in his desk drawer. ``I'm a lousy bookkeeper,'' he later told police.

Police pegged possible losses at $120,000, but the staffer wasn't criminally charged. The reason: There was no evidence he stole, and investigators determined the agency was riddled with administrative flaws, including failing to create a system to deposit money from the pass sales.

Where was County Manager George Burgess?

Who is responsible for making sure that OUR taxpayer money is looked after?

No one.

If Governor Elect Rick Scott and the Florida Legislature are serious about tackling public corruption, Miami Dade County and City of Miami are the very first places they should look.