TALLAHASSEE -- State Rep. Ray Sansom, already indicted by a grand jury, now faces disciplinary action from his colleagues after an investigator Friday found probable cause that he damaged ''faith and confidence'' in the Florida House.

The findings, based on the tens of millions of dollars Sansom funneled to a Panhandle college and his role in funding an airport building wanted by a private developer, will trigger a House tribunal that could recommend sanctions, including removal from office.

''It stinks, but we have to look at what was done,'' said Rep. J.C. Planas, R-Miami, who was elected with Sansom in 2002. ``This is obviously something that's very painful for the House.''

Susan Smith, the Tampa-area Democratic activist who filed the complaint against Sansom after reading newspaper stories, said she was glad action was being taken. ''Mr. Sansom has been a huge embarrassment,'' Smith said. ``The whole process needs to be cleaned up.''

A grand jury has indicted Sansom on charges of official misconduct and perjury. The Destin Republican also faces an ongoing state ethics investigation over his actions with Northwest Florida State College, which culminated in his taking a part-time, $110,000-a-year job on the same day last November that he was sworn in as House speaker.

''A reasonable person would conclude that his employment was designed primarily to take advantage of his position as speaker to the benefit of the college and the salary was direct compensation for Rep. Sansom's official acts as a member and speaker on behalf of the college and its president,'' investigator Steve Kahn wrote in his 75-page report released Friday.

College president Bob Richburg, who has since been fired, never advertised the job and did not include it on a meeting agenda, saying there was no time. But he began discussing the hiring with college trustees at least a month before the hiring.

''I'm gonna blow your socks off,'' he told an unidentified trustee in September, according Kahn's report. ``I am going to hire Ray Sansom.''

The trustee seemed concerned and asked, ''What will our enemies say?'' according to Kahn's report. ''It will be in the paper a couple of days and will blow over,'' Richburg replied.

It did not blow over. A series of reports showed Sansom and Richburg had been collaborating well before the job offer. They worked on funding and getting favorable legislation passed, and discussed the airport building along with developer Jay Odom.

Kahn's report emphasizes those connections. He concluded that Sansom used his power as the top House budget writer to get tens of millions in additional funding for his future employer, Northwest Florida State College, including $7.5 million for a leadership institute that Sansom was to oversee as an employee. That money was just part of a $25.5-million reward Sansom worked into the 2008 budget. The college had been supposed to get $1 million.

Sansom and his then-Senate counterpart, Republican Lisa Carlton of Osprey, refused to talk with Kahn about any deals they made to supersize the funding. Kahn, a former Senate lawyer, also faced reluctance from other elected officials.

AIRPORT BUILDING

Kahn focused on the $6 million building at Destin Airport. In 2007, Sansom quietly inserted the money into the budget and said the building would be used by the college to train emergency workers and would serve as a staging area during major storms. But Kahn -- as did the grand jury -- found evidence it was a gift to Sansom's friend and political contributor Jay Odom.

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