With a slate of new legislation aimed at Florida’s public education system, the Pinellas County Teachers Association or PCTA and the Pinellas Education Support Professionals or PESPA is joining in Saturday’s statewide rally for public education.
“The main focus of this community gathering is to make sure the community knows the negative effects that this is going to have on their children, when educators are caught in this perfect storm,” PCTA President Nancy Velardi told Creative Loafing Tampa Bay.
The Florida Educators Fight Back rally is set for Saturday, April 1 at noon outside St. Petersburg City Hall located at 175 5th St, N.
Part of the perfect storm is Senate Bill 256, the anti-union bill aimed at public sector employees, especially the Florida teacher’s union. It passed in the senate this week, sponsored by far-right Spring Hill Republican, Senator Blaise Ingoglia. Remember that “Ultimate Cancel Act,” bill trying to outlaw the Florida Democratic Party a few weeks ago? That’s Ingoglia’s work as well.
SB 256 would require 60% membership, no union materials in the workplace. Dues also couldn’t come from paychecks but from a third party.
There’s also the DeSantis-proposed “teachers bill of rights,” or SB 244 which is sailing through the legislature right now. Velardi spent 18 years at the bargaining table before becoming PCTA’s president. She says SB 244 allows the Department of Education to represent workers if something goes wrong.
“That’s like your boss who’s yelling at you is also going to represent you,” Velardi said.“You need to have a separate organization that is made up of employees in order to have fair representation.”
And just this week, DeSantis signed the “universal school choice,” law which allows any student access to a publicly-funded voucher (up to $8,000) for private and charter schools.
This article appears in Mar 30 – Apr 5, 2023.
