TMCnet News

GOP women slam Crist for taking strip club money [Tampa Tribune, Fla.]
[October 20, 2014]

GOP women slam Crist for taking strip club money [Tampa Tribune, Fla.]


(Tampa Tribune (FL) Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) Oct. 20--TAMPA ­­-- State Republican Party Chairwoman Leslie Dougher and other local Republican women held a news conference Monday to demand that Charlie Crist, Democratic candidate for governor, return $90,000 of "dirty money" contributed to his campaign by strip club owners.



"These businesses are degrading to women and Charlie's refusal to return the money is shameful," Dougher told reporters in front of Scarlett's Ybor Strip Club at East Seventh Avenue and North 39th Street.

The Republican women had little to say, however, when asked about $2.2 million in contributions made to the party and to Gov. Rick Scott by two businesses linked to scamming of consumers -- Duke Energy and a mortgage company owned by St. Petersburg businessman and civic activist Bill Edwards.


"We don't talk about our donations and we'll discuss that at another time," Dougher said.

Duke has come under fire for extending its billing and meter-reading cycles, thereby forcing thousands of customers into higher-priced rate categories. After the state Public Service Commission investigated, the company refunded $1.3 million to customers; Duke said it was trying to make operations more efficient.

St. Petersburg state legislators including Democratic state Rep. Dwight Dudley and Republican state Sen. Jack Latvala have said they're angry at Duke over other issues, too, including service deposits and some $1.5 billion that Dudley claims Duke and its predecessor, Progress Energy, have wrongly collected as advance payments for a nuclear plant that now will not be built.

Last year, the Federal Trade Commission fined Edwards' Mortgage Investors Corp. $7.5 million for targeting millions of veterans on the national Do Not Call list with deceptive phone sales pitches for mortgages. Under the settlement agreement, the company admitted no wrongdoing. A spokesman said the company agreed to the fine in order end the case.

Edwards gave Scott's independent political committee, Let's Get to Work, two contributions of $500,000 each in 2013. Last year and this year, Duke and Progress gave $1.2 million to Let's Get to Work and the state GOP, which runs campaign ads and pays other campaign expenses for Scott.

Democrats and consumer activists have said Scott and the party should return those contributions.

The contributions to Crist include $50,000 donation to his independent political committee from Joe Rodriguez, owner of Cheetah's in Hallandale Beach, and $40,000 from two companies that operate the Scarlett's chain, J.W. Lee Properties and S.B. Productions Inc.

Law officers investigated and raided Rodriguez's club in 2009, charging 16 dancers and two managers with prostitution and cocaine possession charges. Rodriguez was not charged with a crime.

Charges against both managers were dropped and charges against the dancers either were dropped or reduced to disorderly conduct, said Luke Lirot, a Tampa lawyer who represented them. Lirot said the club is still operating.

A former dancer at the Scarlett's in Hallandale has filed a class action lawsuit alleging its operators wrongly classified her and other dancers as contractors rather than employees, failing to pay them minimum wage or any wage at all.

Exotic dancers, often treated as contract workers, typically aren't paid for performing, making their money from tips. Sometimes they pay a club a fee to perform.

"There are a lot of cases across the country which have found they're actually employees, and should be paid minimum wage," said Beatriz Sosa-Morris, lawyer for the Scarlett's dancer.

The lawsuit says another common industry practice used at Scarlett's, requiring dancers to pay fees or tips to other club employees, is also illegal.

State Rep. Kathleen Peters, R-St. Petersburg, said there's a "significant difference" between the donations to Crist and those from Duke and Edwards to the Republicans because Crist has advocated increasing the minimum wage.

[email protected] 813-259-7761 ___ (c)2014 the Tampa Tribune (Tampa, Fla.) Visit the Tampa Tribune (Tampa, Fla.) at www.tampatrib.com Distributed by MCT Information Services

[ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ]