# Craig Waters

Craig Waters (born 1956) is a former public information officer and served as the communications director for the Florida Supreme Court in Tallahassee from June 1, 1996, to February 28, 2022. He worked in the open government and First Amendment rights as a lawyer and governmental official. He was the public spokesman for the Court during the 2000 presidential election controversy and announced lawsuit rulings regarding Florida's vote in the election.

## Education and early life

Before college, Waters attended public schools in Pensacola, graduating from J. M. Tate High School. Waters attended Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island as an undergraduate, receiving his degree with honors in 1979. Previously, he took classes at Pensacola State College, then known as Pensacola Junior College.
Before law school, he worked for four years as a journalist with the Gannett newspapers in Pensacola and Tallahassee. He received his Juris Doctor with honors from the University of Florida College of Law (now the Levin College of Law) in 1986.

## Non-legal work

Before law school, Waters worked for four years as a reporter with the Florida Gannett newspapers, from 1979 to 1983, and won multiple awards. These included recognition for work in increasing transparency, primarily by publishing court records online.
Waters founded the Florida Court Public Information Officers Inc. (FCPIO), a federally recognized non-profit organized for educational purposes. FCPIO serves as a network of Florida's court PIOs with members in all 27 subdivisions of the state courts system, with regular meetings around Florida.

## Career at the Florida Supreme Court

Waters began work at the Florida Supreme Court on March 2, 1987, as a law clerk (staff attorney) for Justice Rosemary Barkett. Waters also advised Justice Gerald Kogan from Miami until, upon becoming Chief Justice in 1996, Kogan moved Waters permanently into court administration along with his communications job.
In the early 1990s, Waters helped create and expand the Florida Supreme Court's website. In 1994, Waters was behind an effort to place all court documents in high-profile cases on the Web for instant public access.
In September 1997, in co-operation with Florida State University, Waters also launched the first comprehensive program to broadcast all court arguments live on television, via satellite, on cable systems, and through webcasts. That program, now called Gavel to Gavel, still remains in place today and has been imitated by other courts. The media credit Waters' work in the year 2000 of putting pressure on federal courts and the U.S. Supreme Court in particular to provide the public greater technological access to their own proceedings.
In the early 2000s, Waters made the Florida Supreme Court a pioneer in the use of emerging social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn to communicate with the public. This work was influenced by Waters' prior career as a Florida journalist and by his experience as an openly gay man.
Starting in 2015, Waters began implementing Chief Justice Jorge Labarga's plans, approved by the entire Florida Supreme Court, to implement a statewide communications plan for the state courts. The plan relies heavily on the use of Public Information Officers (PIOs) at all 27 divisions of the Florida State Courts and calls for increasing use of social media and other new technology like smartphones. The plan is being implemented through an organization Waters founded a decade earlier, the Florida Court Public Information Officers, Inc., a federally recognized 501(c)(3) nonprofit formed as a professional association. Waters retired after 35 years on February 28, 2022.

## 2000 Election

For more than a month following the November 7, 2000, election, Florida's vote for the presidency remained undecided and too close to call, with the outcome hinging on legal decisions from the Florida Supreme Court that were announced by Waters on live worldwide television. The first decision occurred on November 21, 2000, when Waters announced a court ruling extending the vote-counting deadline previously set by Florida Secretary of State Katherine Harris. The second was on December 8, 2000, when Waters announced a decision requiring a statewide recount of ballots. The United States Supreme Court overruled this last decision on December 12, 2000, in an opinion that effectively handed the presidency to George W. Bush. Waters is portrayed in the HBO Movie Recount by the actor Alex Staggs. The film, which had a broadcast premiere on May 25, 2008, chronicled the events in Florida during the presidential election lawsuits and appeals.

## Election 2000 in reality and in film

* Waters talks with reporters before oral arguments, December 7, 2000
* Photo of actor Alex Staggs taken during filming on location for HBO movie Recount, November 3, 2007, on the front steps of the Florida Supreme Court Building in Tallahassee, Florida.
* The actual Florida Supreme Court listens to December 7, 2000, arguments
* HBO reenacts the December 7 argument during filming November 4, 2007

## Speeches and educational lectures

Waters has given many speeches on issues he has explored in his professional life, including one on at the 10th international Court Technology Conference organized in 2007 by the National Center for State Courts. He is coauthor of a professional paper describing how state and federal disability laws will require rethinking current practices in creating and maintaining court websites.
He previously spoke on the technology of disasters, dealing with court emergency preparedness following the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and the extensive hurricane seasons of 2004 and 2005.
In early 2014, he spoke at Stetson University College of Law in St. Petersburg, Florida, as part of its Institute for the Advancement of Legal Communications. At that time, he met with faculty and students to survey the growing role of high-tech communications in informing the public about the role of courts and lawyers in our society. He drew on his experiences with Bush v. Gore and examined how the communications challenges of that earlier constitutional crisis might have played out using the technology available in 2014.

## Writings and scholarship

A writer and legal scholar, Waters' works include "Waters' Dictionary of Florida Law" published by London-based Butterworths, a three-volume treatise "AIDS and Florida Law" also published by Butterworths, and several dozen scholarly articles on various subjects generally related to civil rights, AIDS and disability law, court emergency preparedness, and the use of technology to improve court and media relations. He is coauthor of a comprehensive article on Florida Supreme Court protocol and jurisdiction.
In 2008, the article "Technological Transparency: Appellate Court & Media Relations after Bush v. Gore" was published by the Journal of Appellate Practice & Process. It chronicled the emerging use both of public spokespersons and high-technology communication increasingly employed by courts worldwide in the 21st century.

## Other activities

Waters is the founding president of the Florida Court Public Information Officers, Inc., a federally recognized tax exempt organization. He has been heavily involved in activities of The Florida Bar, including serving on the editorial board of the Florida Bar Journal and the Florida Bar News. He also serves on the Florida Bar Media & Communications Law Committee and has chaired and hosted many of its ongoing programs of outreach to media. These include the annual Florida Bar Reporters Workshop held each fall at the Florida Supreme Court Building, a program for training journalists in reporting on the courts and the law. A native of Pensacola, Florida, he has been a member in good standing of the Florida Bar since May 1987.