Jim Rosica
Woodrow “Woody” Simmons, Verizon Communications’ longtime lobbyist in Florida, is retiring.
Simmons, based in Tallahassee, withdrew his lobbyist registration effective this week, state records show.
“Woody’s excellent work on Verizon’s behalf to ensure a fair and competitive communications market accrues to the benefit of our customers now and well into the future,” Verizon’s South Area Vice President Michelle Robinson said.
“His personal integrity and commitment to excellence made working with him a pleasure,” she added. “Now that he is retired, he will be missed.”
He didn’t respond to calls to his office earlier this week.
Simmons has long been close to former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and now supports his bid for president.
He recently was noted by The Washington Post as having contributed the individual limit of $2,700 to Bush during the second fundraising quarter.
Simmons also was pointed out in a 2007 Florida Times-Union story on Bush’s “blizzard of business” in his final hours in office before Charlie Crist took over the governorship:
The last e-mails sent to Bush suggested he wasn’t enjoying losing power.
A few minutes after former Associated Industries of Florida lobbyist Jon Shebel e-mailed Bush to congratulate him for the standing ovation he received on the inauguration stage, Verizon Communications lobbyist Woody Simmons e-mailed the governor to cheer him up, BlackBerry to BlackBerry.
“Cheer up,” Simmons wrote Bush. “You look like you are at a funeral.”
On Thursday, the Federal Communications Commission announced it had approved a $10.5 billion sale of Verizon’s local wireline network assets and operations in California, Florida and Texas to Frontier Communications.
The pending sale was disclosed by Verizon in February, and should be complete by early next year.
Verizon was formed in 2000 by the merger of Bell Atlantic Corp. and GTE Corp.
