Florida governor seeks to poach Kentucky jobs

Florida Gov. Rick Scott, who two decades ago spirited the headquarters of the nation’s largest hospital chain out of Kentucky, says he is coming back to the state to plunder some more.

In a press release Monday, Scott announced that he would be leading an economic development mission to Kentucky this month in hopes of convincing business leaders that they have a better future in the Sunshine State.

Kentucky Gov. Steve Beshear issued a strongly worded statement telling Scott that he would be better off staying home.

“Gov. Scott ought to be closing the roads leading out of Florida to stop all the folks who want to leave because they are sick and tired of paying the outrageous property taxes in that state,” Beshear said in a statement.

“Kentucky’s pro-union, big government policies hurt Kentucky businesses’ ability to create and retain jobs,” Scott said in the press release. Additionally, he touts his state’s zero percent personal income tax and a new law designed to keep college tuition in check.

In his response, Beshear noted Kentucky’s success in the past year in drawing jobs to the state.

“You would think with the difficult problems facing Florida today that Gov. Rick Scott would have better things to do to keep him occupied,” Beshear said. “However, if he wants to waste his time coming to Kentucky to try and convince our businesses to come to Florida, then come ahead because he will have no success.”

Scott’s press office didn’t immediately respond to inquiries.

Scott has a long and troubled history with Kentucky.

Two years ago, he sent a letter to Kentucky businesses urging them to relocate.

Beshear responded in a letter to Scott telling him, “Although I am well aware of the competitive environment that is inevitable in economic development, I admit that I was shocked and dismayed at your crude method of recruitment."

And in 1995, when he was the chief executive officer of Columbia/HCA, which was born of a merger of companies that included the remnants of Humana’s hospital business, he moved the company headquarters to Nashville just 10 months after locating it here.

In the press release, Scott claims that his state’s “business climate is better than Kentucky’s in almost every way,” focusing on Democratic opposition to laws that would allow people to work in union shops without paying union dues or representation fees.

The visit comes as the Republican Governors Association, on whose executive committee Scott serves, is spending heavily on television for Kentucky GOP gubernatorial nominee Matt Bevin. Bevin’s jobs plan counts on passage of the so-called right-to-work legislation, which Democrats claim is designed to undermine collective bargaining.

The News Service of Florida reported that Scott has made similar trips this year to California, New York and Pennsylvania — all states with Democratic governors.

Chris Poynter, a spokesman for Louisville Mayor Greg Fischer, declined to comment, saying it “seems like a political issue.”

C-J Reporter Joseph Gerth can be reached at jgerth@courier-journal.com.