Maxwell: We sued Florida for public records and got them … once again
Once again, the Orlando Sentinel had to sue the state of Florida to get public records the state should've disclosed immediately and voluntarily.
Once again, we prevailed and got the documents.
And once again, the state is paying our legal bills, reimbursing the Orlando Sentinel for attorneys we never should've been forced to engage.
This past Monday, a judge in Tallahassee approved a settlement where the Florida Department of Transportation agreed to pay the Sentinel $5,119. That covers our legal costs in the fight to see records related to the state's middle-of-the-night erasure of the rainbow-colored crosswalk painted in honor of the 49 people slaughtered at the Pulse nightclub.
The state also enlisted its own external counsel to defend secret-keeping for which there was no legitimate defense. One filing in the case was prepared by a politically connected law firm that has billed taxpayers $495 an hour in the past.
How much of your money did the state pay that firm in this case? We don't know yet, because Gov. Ron DeSantis' transportation department has yet to answer that question. If it doesn't provide that information quickly and voluntarily - as the law demands - we will enlist legal help again.
I've never covered an administration like this. Past governors honored Florida's Sunshine Law. Whether it was Bob Graham, Bob Martinez, Charlie Crist or Jeb Bush, Democrat or Republican, they readily turned over public documents.
That has changed in recent years as the DeSantis administration has been repeatedly caught hiding public information.
In the case of the crosswalks, we just wanted basic information about the state's dark-of-night erasure operation last summer.
We know the governor has reveled in using LGBTQ issues to stir up division. And frankly, he's allowed to dislike or be triggered by rainbows.
What neither he nor any of his staffers are legally allowed to do, with rare exceptions, is hide public information about spending, public policy or governmental actions.
So right after the rainbow tribute to murder victims was erased last August, we asked for some basic information, including how much money the state spent painting over the crosswalk, as well as work orders and invoices that might show whether the job was competitively bid.
We also asked for emails and texts that might show who ordered the removal and for any studies, memos or notes that might show whether the state had conducted any safety studies on the impact of this erasure.
That last part about safety was important - arguably most important.
See, the governor and his administration claimed they were erasing colorful crosswalks throughout the state for safety reasons. But that appeared provably untrue.
Maxwell: Orlando’s Pulse rainbow crosswalk erasure - lies, bigotry and danger
First of all, study after study has shown that drivers pay more heed to colorful warnings. (And come on, do you really need a study to tell you that? There's a reason stop signs aren't black and white.)
Second, the state itself had previously touted colorful crosswalks for their safety. In 2021, DeSantis' transportation division specifically cited improved "school safety" when giving the city of Tampa an award for a colorful crosswalk there.
And an FDOT report from 2024 cited the "decorative sidewalk and crosswalk features in conjunction with the Pulse Memorial” as part of an overall plan to “improve safety and driver experience.”
I'd also read that the state had deleted a Facebook post that had previously touted colorful crosswalks as safer for pedestrians. So I also asked for "copies of all social-media posts that have been deleted or removed from public view" from the FDOT's Facebook and Instagram accounts during 2025.
Keep in mind: It's supremely suspect for government officials to delete any public posts.
Well, six weeks after requesting all this information, the state hadn't turned over a single public record specifically related to the crosswalk. So our attorney sent notice that the state was "in violation of the Public Records Act."
Suddenly, we got a response. But an attorney for the state asked if we'd consider narrowing down our records request "to more efficiently locate potentially responsive records and may help reduce the time and cost associated with processing the requests."
We shouldn't have had to do so. But in a good-faith gesture, we complied, significantly narrowing down our requests.
Yet, two more months passed - four in total - and we still received nothing, proving we'd agreed to a good-faith compromise with people who weren't acting in good faith. So we sued.
After we did, the state finally turned over a batch of social media posts the FDOT had deleted, doing so later the same day.
One of posts had indeed touted the newly painted intersection near the Pulse nightclub as "enhancing safety for pedestrians with new lighting and decorative crosswalk features."
So you had FDOT admitting the colorful crosswalk was installed for safety. Yet the department painted over it - and deleted the social media post that showed it had previously touted the safety benefits it was erasing.
It took us four months and a lawsuit to get that public information.
As part of the settlement, in addition to paying our legal fees of $5,119, the state also attested that no other documents exist related to our request. If state officials are to be believed, that means they conducted no studies about the public safety impacts of their crosswalk crusade. And that there are no documents to suggest the painting project was competitively bid.
Which brings us back to the emails.
You may recall above that we agreed to delay our request for emails and texts in exchange for getting the other records more quickly, which did not happen. So we may request those as well.
But a local resident, Bryce Maschino, already did. And his case is just as brow-raising.
After Maschino requested emails from FDOT officials related to the crosswalk coverup, FDOT told him that it had found 115 emails "responsive' to his request and that he would have to pay $34.62 to see them.
Well, Maschino paid the money the state requested - back on October 22, 2025. Yet the state hasn’t turned over a single public record, despite saying it had identified them half a year ago.
So now, the First Amendment Foundation of Florida is preparing to help Maschino sue as well … while we wait for answers about how many tax dollars the state may have spent on lawyers defending this nonsense. We will not rest until we get that public information, too.
None of this is normal. Nor OK. This is government hiding information from the citizens it serves and spending their tax dollars to do so. All for a zealous crusade to erase rainbows that this administration seems to know it can't justify from a public policy or safety standpoint, since it keeps trying to hide the evidence.
Copyright 2026 Tribune Content Agency. All Rights Reserved.
This story was originally published April 11, 2026 at 6:43 AM.