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Florida was ranked the worst state in the nation for corruption in 2012. Lawmaker responded by requiring state and local officials to undergo ethics training. A statewide session was held in Orlando on This week.

From prosecutors to sherifs, tax collectors and even the Tampa Port Authority, more than 150 constitutional officers and their staff are getting a day and a half of ethics training.

Jeff Hendry, Executive Director of the Florida Institute of Government, which sponsored the training told participants “It is going to be no shortage of information”

On top of the list is living up to the promise of open government and making records public. Both can be tricky subjects. One of the biggest problems for elected officials is new technology, they think they can communicate on private email accounts or via text messages, without breaking the law, but that’s not the case.

Pat Gleason from the Office of the Attorney General explained that “There’s no special standard for these particular communications, they’re subject to disclosure just like paper records.”

One objective here is to keep public officials from making stupid mistakes. Virlindia Doss says the majority of cases she sees at the Ethics Commission are because of a lack of information.“Some cases are willful, but there are a lot of cases where people just didn’t understand what it was they were supposed to do, so this is a good remedy for that problem” says Doss.

The training was mandated by lawmakers after Florida was ranked by Indiana University as the most corrupt state in the nation. It has since fallen to tenth. Dan Krassner of Integrity  Florida says the ethics training sets a tone from the top, but  there is still much to be done. “We need more open budgets and spending so the public can follow their money.”

Four hours of annual training on open records and he sunshine law are now required for Constitutional officers and their top staff. Municipal officials get the same requirement next year.

The Ethics Commission investigates about two hundred cases a year. More investigations would be likely, but the Commission must wait for a complaint and can not initiate its own investigations.