The Honorable Tom
Feeney
Speaker
Florida House of Representatives
420 The Capitol
402 South Monroe Street
Tallahassee, Florida 32399-1300
Dear Mr. Speaker:
As requested, I have once
again reviewed the e-mails from Bridgette Gregory's computer. I
believe I have identified those relied upon by Mr. Date for his
conclusions. After a thorough review of those documents, I
continue to believe that they do not indicate any improper activity on
Ms. Gregory's part.
The e-mails in question
are essentially as follows:
1) a series of e-mails
from Eric Eikenberg to Ms. Gregory concerning a proposal for a firm to
assist you as campaign treasurer. As demonstrated in the
e-mails, Ms. Gregory did not respond to them. In fact, the
e-mails also demonstrate that attempts to contact Ms. Gregory by phone
on this matter were also of no avail. If she did respond, it
clearly was not done on the state's computer system. Absent
evidence that Ms. Gregory requested that the e-mails be sent to her
legislative computer, there was clearly no wrongdoing on her part with
regard to this matter. In fact, the evidence that she
continually did not respond to the e-mails suggests strongly that she
did not request them.
2) an e-mail was
inadvertently forwarded to Ms. Gregory at her legislative e-mail
address by Cheryl Moore regarding an inquiry on contributions to your
campaign. Ms. Gregory forwarded that e-mail to her hotmail
account, so that she could respond outside of regular work hours on
the proper computer. Ms. Gregory forwarded a copy of her
eventual response to the state computer, which although it may have
been poor judgment to do so, demonstrates that the response was made
from her own computer at 7:15 a.m. on a Saturday.
3) an e-mail from Fred
Karlinsky which was an invitation to Ms. Gregory to attend a fund
raiser sponsored by Mr. Karlinsky and others. Ms. Gregory did
not respond from her state computer.
4) a series of e-mails
between Ms. Gregory and Ms. Conklin regarding your schedule.
While a review of your calendar indicates that the trips discussed
were at least in part campaign-related, we have always advised that it
is proper for the information related to an officer's political
schedule, or for that matter his personal or private business
schedule, to be integrated into their legislative schedule in order
that conflicts can be avoided and so that the officer's whereabouts
are known in the event of an emergency.
While each of the e-mails
above related to campaign activities, with the exception of the
scheduling e-mails, Ms. Gregory was the recipient, not the generator
of the e-mails. She clearly is not in a position to prohibit
persons from sending materials to her at her public e-mail address.
This is really no different than telephone calls made or letters sent
to public officials at their place of public business that are
campaign-related. In those instances, we have trained our
employees to direct the calls or letters to the campaign. This
policy is explicitly provided in Policy 1.12 of the Policies and
Procedures of the Florida House of Representatives.
I also
note that the article written by Mr. Date suggests that there was an
unusual provision of health insurance for Ms. Gregory. All
legislative employees are provided free family medical insurance.
If the employee works a portion of the month, the premium is paid by
the legislature. If Ms. Gregory's unpaid leave of absence had
included an entire calendar month, she would have been required to pay
the premium for that month. She has been treated exactly the
same as all legislative employees in this respect.
I hope that this letter
provides you the information, which you requested.
Sincerely,
Tom Tedcastle
House General Counsel
