Last week, a lobbyist started bashing Tallahassee's City Walk Urban Mission for allowing Registered Persons to enter a shelter during inclement weather, and when confronted about it, he responded by saying, "“I’m working right now [ ]with Sen. Lauren Book and we’re going to make it even more difficult for a homeless shelter that take in registered sex offenders without properly notifying the surrounding community to do so.”
So just who is Barney Bishop? Here are a few things to know about him:
1. Bishop is a lobbyist who largely represents his own interests: Barney Bishop is a registered lobbyist who represents a handful of interests, primarily two of Bishop's own organizations (Florida Smart Justice Alliance and Barnet Bishop Consulting LLC, both at 204 S Monroe St, Ste 201, Tallahassee, FL 32301), another association ("Citizens For Responsible Spending" another of Bishop's largely on-man shows), as well as a number of sheriff's offices, including the Wakulla County Sheriff's Office. In 2020, Wakulla County had to pay City Walk $160,000 to settle a lawsuit. Bishop must still be smarting from that loss.
Barney Bishop doesn't exactly strike people as an effective lobbyist. The Eye on Miami blog says this about Barney Bishop: "And what is AIF ass Barney Bishop doing on the Board of the Collins Center anyway?... Whomever put Barney Bishop on this Board should be shot. He knows as much about public policy and smart growth as I know about Bible studies and the Torah -- yep, nothing!" To which one person responded, "Any board that includes Barney Bishop is a fraud from the start."
In fact, the Eye on Miami blog has an entire metatag just for Barney Bishop articles. To say he is not well-respected by anyone is an understatement
2. Barney Bishop was forced to step down as CEO of Associated Industries of Florida: "Several media reports speculated that his resignation came after some AIF board members grew upset with statements Bishop had made earlier this year. In June, the St. Petersburg Times alluded to a possible ouster of Bishop after he "butted heads" with the AIF board by calling for replacement of the entire board of state-run Citizens Property Insurance at a May press conference. The Palm Beach Post, meanwhile, reported that Bishop had caused a stir by declaring earlier this year that the "No. 1 job" of AIF's board is to defeat U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson in 2012 — a position that may have unsettled some on the board. In an interview with Florida Trend earlier this year, Bishop acknowledged that his outspokenness has occasionally ruffled feathers of AIF board members... Erika Alba, chair of the AIF's board, praised Bishop for his "passion and unequaled round-the-clock effort to rebuild AIF" and pointed to his success with record dues and membership levels. Indeed, the group's form 990 filings with the IRS show that AIF's dues income increased from $839,063 in 2008 to more than $1.1 million in 2009. The income from dues, however, still fell well below AIF's expenses, which totaled $4.2 million that year. Only some $4.9 million in "investment income" kept the group from being in the red for the year."
So, in addition to being a loudmouth, his lobbying didn't actually do much good for AIF, as a $250k increase isn't a lot of money in relation to the controversies Bishop caused by his mouth.
3. Bishop's "Florida Smart Justice Alliance" group lost tax exempt status for refusing to pay taxes, and most of the board resigned in 2015: Speaking of Barney Bishop looking out for only himsrlf, we have more evidence from FloridaPolitics.com (a site that has offered unwavering support to Lauren Book over the years) --
A Tallahassee-based advocacy group led by veteran lobbyist Barney Bishop has had a mass exodus of board members in recent weeks, including one who accused Bishop of being motivated by “self-aggrandizement and personal gain.” As of Monday, group founder and former chairwoman Lori Costantino-Brown and members Pamela Alvarez, Catherine Craig-Myers, Jim DeBeaugrine and Mary Lynn Ulrey had all turned in resignation letters to the Florida Smart Justice Alliance. Copies were provided to FloridaPolitics.com. Craig-Myers said the resignations were from those who supported a motion to fire Bishop and lost.
And last month, the Internal Revenue Service posted a notice it had “automatically revoked” the alliance’s tax-exempt status. The group is formed as a 501(c)(6), a category for “business leagues, chambers of commerce, real estate boards, etc.,” according to the IRS website. The reason for the revocation: The organization has not filed its annual financial disclosure as required by federal law for three consecutive years...
“Florida business leaders recognized that the state’s approach to criminal justice was costing too much without effectively reducing recidivism,” it says. The organization’s mission is to “make Florida’s communities safer, save the taxpayers money and hold offenders accountable while providing the tools for them to live law-abiding lives.”
But in her Sept. 3 resignation letter, Costantino-Brown said the organization “no longer represents the ideals it was founded upon.” That was also the date that current chair Don Eslinger, the sheriff of Seminole County, called an “emergency meeting” to discuss the group’s yearly Justice Summit, scheduled for December in Sarasota. At that meeting, Ulrey – CEO of the Tampa-based Drug Abuse Comprehensive Coordinating Office – said she suggested the group use a less expensive event organizer than last year’s. Her suggestion was quickly shot down, she added. “When you don’t feel valued in a situation like that, it makes you feel leery about continuing to be involved,” she said in a phone interview. Ulrey, the board treasurer, also quit the board on Sept. 3. When asked whether she was referring specifically to Bishop, Ulrey said, “Well, he’s in the driver’s seat … Barney certainly has his agenda and that’s fine. I just no longer felt I was a good match.”
In fact, Costantino-Brown said in her letter that she could not “support or engage in an entity that is associated with Mr. Barney Bishop in any capacity.” “It was brought to my attention over the last few months that Mr. Bishop’s operations with regard to ‘smart justice’ were directed towards self-aggrandizement and personal gain, as well as substantially damaging to its reputation and advancement of mission,” Costantino-Brown wrote.
On a related note, the Florida Smart Justice Alliance's website and social media pages have not been updated since 2015, suggesting this was the death-knell for the Alliance as a "group".
4. Barney Bishop suggests vigilante violence is his idea of "smart justice": Barney Bishop, in a testimony to the Florida House Judiciary Committee on March 3, offered this gem of a comment regarding a proposed 50 year minimum sentence for sex offenses law in committee:
"We think that very long sentences are warranted; in fact, we'd like longer sentences. And I would just say in closing that with respect to smart justice that maybe what we ought to really be doing is thinking about giving the victims’ families an opportunity to have visitation with the perpetrators and a pair of scissors. That's our idea of smart justice, Mr. Chairman, not anything short of that."
(it is worth noting he was working alongside Lauren Book's father and fellow lobbyist Ron Book that day.
When Derek Logue of OnceFallen.com emailed Biship to explain these words, Bishop made threatening remarks to Logue while denying making such statements:
“Mr. Logue, you (sic) memory is failing you terribly…I have NEVER said anything remotely like that, and I never would…there are many people who testify that use the words Smart Justice, but that doesn’t mean they can speak on behalf of Smart Justice…
If I ever hear from you again – in any fashion – your will be REPORTED to the authorities and I can assure you that you will suffer the consequences…it sounds like you enjoy jail and being confined and I can help you get that good ole feeling again…
Just respond to this email, or try to ever contact me again…I’m a former private investigator, and I’m an NRA member, I would NEVER resort to just scissors….and I will find your picture and put it into my Outlook file…you pic will be burnt into my memory…PLEASE contact me again, PLEASE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
5. While Bishop feels silencing and threatening a Registered Person expressing his First Amendment Rights is okay, Bishop believes silencing the KKK and Nazis is wrong: It is funny how Bishop, in a span of a few hours, goes from threatening to permanently silence an Anti-Registry activist to saying the KKK has the right to freedom of speech, and if you don't like the speech, just walk away.
https://www.facebook.com/RamonAlexanderFL/videos/564139997892070
"Ladies and Gentlemen, It doesn't matter whether you like the speech. It doesn't matter whether you like the speakers. It doesn't matter, Rep. Alexander, if it's the KKK, if it's the communists. It doesn't matter if it's the Nazis. It doesn't matter one single bit. Everybody, EVERYONE in this country has the right to freedom of speech and freedom of thought. You don't like it? Walk away. You don't incite violence. Students at Catholic Georgetown feel it is unsafe because a pro-life speaker was invited. Tufts University promotes a retreat to root out racism among white Christian folks, just white Christian folks."
When Rep. Alexander responded by saying, "“For you to suggest that I should walk away (at) Florida A&M University (from) the original terrorist organization in this country is just shameful, Barney. It’s shameful,” Barney respondede, "The KKK is not the original terrorist organization."
As reported in the Tallahassee Democrat:
"Alexander called Bishop "shameful" a total of five times. Bishop once sat on FAMU's Board of Trustees, as did Alexander. “Complete BS. And you are not a Democrat either,” Alexander went on, referring to Bishop, a former executive director of the state's Democratic Party. The contretemps happened in the House Postsecondary Education & Lifelong Learning Committee. “To suggest that I should walk away from an organization that dehumanized, murdered and lynched people who looked like me, just because of the color of their skin, is extremely offensive,” Alexander continued.
After their heated exchange, tempers had not cooled for either Bishop or Alexander. The state representative was hesitant to comment because, he later said, he didn't want to focus attention on what he called Bishop’s “wacko" interpretation of the First Amendment.
“I had to speak up," Alexander told a reporter. "If you do not stand for something, you will fall for anything.”
Bishop in turn dismissed Alexander’s protestation as “theatrical”: “He proved my point about the 'cancel culture' and how the left is unable to have a debate without bringing up victimhood or racism or to infer violence.”
Bishop said he spoke at the meeting as a representative of Citizens for Responsible Spending, a Tallahassee-based watchdog group focused on transparency and accountability in government spending...
“Nobody compels anyone to go to these events,” Bishop said in a phone interview. “I may be offended by BLM (Black Lives Matter). I may be offended by antifa, but I am not going to protest to keep them off any campus because I am not afraid of their ideas."
TO SUM IT UP
Barney Bisop is seen as a self-serving lobbyist (already a profession of ill-repute) and has no qualms about expressing what ever opinion serves his own personal interests at the moment. A person like him has no right representing anyone else. It should come as no surprise, then, when he supports a corrupt politician like Lauren Book.
Barney Bishop should be more mindful of his big mouth. It may only be a matter of time before he is dragged to court over it.
