Our Team

Julie Imanuel Brown was reappointed to the Florida Public Service Commission by Governor Rick Scott for a four-year term beginning January 2, 2015 and ending January 1, 2019. Elected to Chair the Commission, effective January 2, 2016, she will serve as Commission Chairman until January 2018. Chairman Brown was first appointed to the Commission by Governor Charlie Crist and was reappointed by Governor Rick Scott for a four-year term beginning January 2, 2011. Prior to her appointment, she was Associate Legal Counsel of First American Corporation, a Fortune 500 company, where she handled a variety of legal issues in the Eastern, Midwest and Mid-Atlantic Regions, including corporate compliance with regulatory authorities. Previously an Assistant City Attorney for the City of Tampa, Chairman Brown specialized in contract, regulatory and administrative law while acting as legal advisor to the City of Tampa for wastewater, stormwater, land development coordination, and other matters. She also worked as a corporate attorney at Shumaker, Loop and Kendrick, LLP in Tampa, Florida, specializing in mergers and acquisitions and securities law. Chairman Brown is a member of the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners (NARUC) and serves on NARUC’s Committee on Gas, Subcommittee on Nuclear Issues–Waste Disposal, and its Presidential Natural Gas Access and Expansion Task Force to help expand natural gas service in neglected and rural areas. She previously served on NARUC’s Committee on Energy Resources and the Environment. In January 2017, Chairman Brown was selected to serve on the Financial Research Institute’s Advisory Board. Chairman Brown was also elected as Vice Chairman of the Gas Technology Institute’s Public Interest Advisory Committee in October 2016. A member of the Nuclear Waste Strategy Coalition since 2011, she was elected in early 2016 to serve on its Executive Committee to lead the group’s efforts to expand membership. Chairman Brown chaired the Florida Legislature’s Study Committee on Investor-Owned Water and Wastewater Utility Systems and previously served on the New Mexico State University’s Center for Public Utilities Advisory Council. Her civic affiliations have included the City of Tampa’s Architectural Review Commission, the Board of Directors for the Tampa Firefighters Museum, and the Florida Bar’s 13th Judicial Circuit Bar Grievance Committee. Chairman Brown graduated magna cum laude with a Bachelor of Science from the University of Florida, where she was the recipient of the Outstanding Female Leader award, President of Florida Blue Key, inducted into the Hall of Fame, and received the Dean’s Cup for the College of Journalism and Communications. She earned a Juris Doctorate from the University of Florida Levin College of Law, is a member of the Florida Bar, and a member of Leadership Florida, Class XXXIII. Her graduate education included study abroad at the University of Montpellier College of Law in France.

One of Tampa’s most prominent business men, James T. Swann, Sr., came from a family whose influence has been great since the beginning of the century in Florida and in the South since its American progenitor, William Swann, patented- Swann’s Point in Virginia in 1638. James T. Swann, Sr., was one of the men who, in association with his late father, Colonel Alfred Reuben Swann, developed Tampa’s attractive residential district, at first called Suburb Beautiful but today known as the Bayshore Drive District. He had a hand in numerous other developments and became as well known in amateur sporting, educational and cultural circles as in the business world. He had an additional reputation as a citrus grower and as a worker on behalf of community progress.

James T. Swann, Sr., was born on his father’s plantation at Dandridge, Tennessee, on November 19, 1886. His mother was the former Sarah Frances Burnett. The story of the life and career of Colonel Swann, who died at the age of eighty-three in 1926 and who made a recognized contribution to the post-War Between the States rehabilitation and development of the South, will be found on other pages. His son, James, one of eight children, received his early education at Swannsylvania Academy in Jefferson County, Tennessee, after which he attended Carson Newman College in that state. He became captain of the football team and was otherwise noteworthy in campus activities. In 1910, James Swann was graduated from Harvard University with the degree of Bachelor of Arts.

In 1914, Mr. Swann took over the management of the Interstate Investment Company, of which his father was president and he vice president. He remained in active charge of the company until his death on May to, 1953. He was one of the most successful and active real estate operators in Tampa and was outstanding in civic life. He became president of Interstate Grove Properties, Inc., Swann Securities Corporation and J. T. Swann and Company. In World War II, he became associate chairman of the Division of Transportation and Communications of the Florida State Defense Council and for many years served on the board of trustees of the University of Tampa.