Update on Florida's Efforts to Privatize Public Education

The assault on Florida public education continues unabated in 2018, both by the Florida Legislature and the Florida Constitution Revision Commission.

Last year, HB7069 was signed into Florida law. This bill was more of a package of laws, including the expansion of vouchers, allowing for Schools of Hope to replace low performing public schools, and requiring capital outlays to charter schools. These statutory changes were not without consequence locally.  With more favorable conditions for charter schools, Academica’s Pinecrest Academy is applying for charter school status in Sarasota County. The Miami Herald analyzed Academica back in 2011, and the amount of state dollars flowing to this private company was staggering even then. At that time, Academica had 44 schools in South Florida. They now list over 110 schools in Florida.In Manatee County, Daughtrey and Oneco elementary schools may be threatened with Schools of Hope corporate charter school takeovers, if they don't improve their school grades next year.

This funneling of millions of tax dollars to private and corporate charter schools accelerated in 2018 with HB 7055. HB 7055 will

March For Our Lives & the NRA

The Corporations-Are-NOT-People banner stood out at the Sarasota March For Our Lives. Last Saturday, Sarasota students raised their collective voices to make preventing gun violence a high priority. How corporations have intervened in the gun debate is up for debate. Is the National Rifle Association (NRA) a big player in our state and national legislatures? And who provides the largest chunk of NRA funding - is it millions of individual members or a handful of gun manufacturers? The answers are more complex than you might think.  To start with, there are six non-profits that make up the NRA. And it just gets more complicated from there.

The Scourge of Unfettered Corporations

The Sarasota/Bradenton Nation Group provides a local forum for political commentary and activities that hope to shape and inform public discourse and political outcomes in line with the Nation Magazine. Sarasota resident, Bob Goldschmidt recently presented "The Scourge of Unfettered Corporations" to The Nation Group. Sarasota is fortunate to have many local people willing to stand up and speak out about corporate power as it is exercised in the United States today. Bob laid out his thoughtful perspective, paying close attention to the issues of employee wages, automation, the impacts of information technology, corporate media, and the downsides of monopolistic corporations.

Bob held one pharmaceutical company, Purdue Pharma, up for detailed scrutiny. The beginning of the opioid crisis can be traced back to the release of OxyContin, which is Purdue Pharma’s best-selling drug. The nationwide overdose epidemic has hit Manatee County especially hard. Back in December, the city of Palmetto joined municipalities across the state in potentially filing a lawsuit against big pharmaceutical manufacturers and distributors for their alleged role in the current opioid epidemic that has killed an estimated 200,000 Americans in the past few years. Last month, perhaps in response to lawsuits, Purdue Pharma announced it will stop marketing its painkillers to doctors. Bob's talk delves a bit into the historical context of the growth of Purdue Pharma.

The Q&A following Bob's talk was animated, but not included in the video.

End Corporate Rule: Legalize Democracy

March for Democracy

People loved signing the oversized 28th Amendment at the March For Demcracy. Thank you Jaime Canfield for inspiring the crowd!

Ending Corporate Rule & Building a REAL Democracy Movement

On Martin Luther King Day, George Friday treated Sarasota to her inspirational stories and ideas. George is one of the co-founders of Move To Amend and shared her clear vision of just how insidious corporations are in our day-to-day lives. She has worked tirelessly over the years to build movements for justice and peace. Her good news is that we can all join in and we will be successful, but only if we strive for authentic, diverse, and democratic participation. We all get to participate and we all have a role. George spoke about the strategic use of privilege. If I have white privilege, then it is up to me to point out racism and attempt to dismantle it. If I am wealthy, then it is up to me to use it help those who are in poverty. If I have more education and knowledge, then it is up to me to spread that information and to make sure that it is accessible to those who may not have the same level of education. And remember to be easy on yourself - to take time for forgiveness, comfort, and joy.

Martin Luther King Day and the Very, Very Tall Amendment

The 22 foot tall banner of a 28th Amendment to the Constitution was an eye-catcher on Martin Luther King Day.  The 37th annual Sarasota MLK Day Celebration, presented by the MLK Celebration Committee in partnership with the Jewish Federation of Sarasota-Manatee and Temple Emanu-El featured several events honoring King’s life and legacy. Following the MLK Memorial Breakfast, many joined in the march to MLK Park, where Manasota MTA had set up the larger-than-life Constitutional Amendment proclaiming that

  1) Money is Property, Not Speech

  2) A Corporation Is Not a Person

Many folks agreed and signed the imposing document that was as tall as the nearby palm trees.

Cathy Antunes: Dark Money in Local Politics (video)

Click image above to play video of Cathy Antunes giving her Dark Money speech on November 7, 2017.  See description here.

POPS Education Forum

Protect Our Public Schools (POPS) held its first public forum at the Fogartyville Peace and Action Center.  Presenters included Sarasota School Board member, Shirley Brown; Opt Out Florida Network Manatee leader, Bridget Heffernan Mendel and POPS leader, Carol Lerner.  POPS leaders, Sandra Danu moderated and Rhana Bazzini gave the welcoming and opening remarks.  The forum focused on the growing threat of school privatization, nationally, statewide and locally.

Carol Lerner opened the forum providing an overview of the history of school privatization and showing how so called school reformers are implementing the agenda of large corporations and billionaire hedge funders who see school privatization as a key part of their economic game plan and a good way to extract billions of dollars from the 1.5 trillion dollar education industry.  She explained that the two primary vehicles for school privatization have been the rapid expansion of corporate-managed charter schools and education vouchers or tax credit scholarships to private schools.  Florida, Lerner explained, is the most advanced state in the nation in terms of school privatization, having both the highest percentage of students attending charter schools and the most students attending private schools with vouchers or tax credit scholarships.  As Florida Governor, Jeb Bush made school privatization a central part of his agenda. This effort continues with his ExcelinEd Foundation. Betsy DeVos served on its Board before becoming U.S. Secretary of Education.  In addition, most of the leadership of the Florida State legislature has direct personal ties to the charter school industry. They have pushed through draconian legislation, such as the recently passed HB-7069, that will rapidly expand corporate-managed charter schools and voucher-supported private schools at the expense of public school districts.

Dark Money in Sarasota Politics

Small portion of Sarasota campaign flows

Cathy Antunes had to do some brilliant sleuthing to follow campaign revenue and expenditures in some of Sarasota's elections. Her November 7th presentation, Dark Money in Sarasota Politics, started with a handful of political groups and their donors. By the end of her presentation, the audience had seen a lot more of the far-reaching and byzantine network of donors and pass-through organizations. These are individuals and political groups that are both inside and outside of Sarasota and Manatee Counties, with some located in other states as well. This simple diagram gives a glimpse into the money shuffling that Cathy uncovered. If you want to know more, Cathy is planning a book on the topic.

One of the takeaways from this lecture is that we need to watch our elections closely.  There are three School Board seats and two County Commission seats opening up in 2018. And there are hundreds of thousands of dollars sitting in one of the political action committees (PAC) that Cathy detailed. Only those running the PAC know what that money might be used for.

At the federal level, the We-The-People Amendment would help provide broader constitutional protections, so that local and state governments could regulate campaign spending as they see fit. You can follow Cathy Antunes on her blog and on her radio show podcasts.