Personnel note: Former reporter Joe Follick joins Florida TaxWatch as Comm. Director

Veteran Tallahassee reporter Joe Follick has joined Florida TaxWatch as its new Director of Communications and External Relations.

Florida TaxWatch is the state’s leading independent government research and analysis organization.

Follick brings more than two decades of communication and media experience, serving as communications director for the Florida Department of Education and with the Department of Children and Families since 2009.

“Joe brings rich experience in communications and media relations that will help Florida TaxWatch continue to provide and share high-quality, independent research that Florida policymakers and citizens have relied on throughout our 35-year history,” said Florida TaxWatch president and CEO Dominic Calabro in a statement Wednesday.

Before his work in state government, Follick was a 17-year newspaper reporter with almost a decade of experience for both the then-New York Times Regional Newspapers and the Tampa Tribune in Tallahassee. A graduate of the University of Cincinnati, he also worked on papers in Indiana and Michigan.