Legislative rookies: Promising new Florida House members

Amy Keller | 5/15/2012

Rep. Richard Corcoran (R-Trinity), 47

[Photo: Mark Foley]

Making his mark: Corcoran, an attorney with the Tampa firm Broad and Cassel, cut his teeth in politics by serving as a research assistant to the House Republicans and eventually becoming an adviser to former Florida GOP House Speakers Daniel Webster, Tom Feeney and Marco Rubio. With close ties to the Tampa Bay and Miami-Dade legislative delegations, Corcoran had little trouble locking down enough pledges to become House Speaker in 2017-18. He's known for leading the charge to repeal the use of red-light cameras. (His bill passed the House but failed in the Senate.) He had better luck with a health care transparency bill he authored that requires primary care physicians and other clinics to publish and post a schedule of prices for various medical procedures so patients paying out of pocket can make informed decisions.

Notable: He's been spearheading an effort to change the culture of the Legislature. Once a week, Corcoran and other first-term GOP lawmakers get together and go through "great leadership books" with the goal of creating a "constitution of how we believe the institution should be run. It's the thing I'm most passionate about because I think what it could do is have a systemic cultural change in the Legislature, and the biggest change that I think we all agree on is that the special interests have too much influence," says Corcoran.

Tags: Politics & Law, Government/Politics & Law