Pardon duplication from email but we are in the last week and we need to keep the pressure on our legislators! Read the UFF update from this weekend & join UFF on social media for updates.
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What Can We Do Right Now?
- Help Stop SB 220: Sunshine Law Exemption for University/College Presidential Searches
Contact your Senator ASAP. Ask a friends and colleagues to do so as well.
This bill would exempt the hiring process for new college and university presidents from Florida Sunshine Laws. These transparent processes allow for public and stakeholder overview of our public institutions; this change would be catastrophic for the independence of our 40 public institutions of higher education in Florida, and the vote count is close. This has passed the House, and may be up for a vote in the Senate as early as Tuesday. To learn more, read the Florida AFL-CIO’s talking points on the companion bill from the House.
- Continue to contact Legislators on SB 1014/HB 835
Call both your local Legislators on these bills. Our collective bargaining rights and basic freedoms are at stake.
- CALL legislative offices, SEND emails, WRITE letters to the editor or Editorials, keeping in line with our strategic talking points for this legislative session. You can review our talking points and positions in our Legislative Toolkit: http://bit.ly/UFFLegislativeToolkit
- Take to social media! RECORD a video of yourself and tag Senators and Reps, or TWEET at them to let them know how strongly you want them to vote NO on these bills! Please see the attached handout that was shared with testifiers this week, which includes the Twitter handles of all the Senators on the Rules Committee, some sample Twitter Scripts, and additional info you may find useful as you continue to activate and spread the message – we do NOT want these bills to pass!
- Join FEA’s Daily Action Hour:
Every day FEA will be hosting an Action Hour from 5 PM to 6 PM EDT and from 11 AM to 12 PM EDT on Saturday and Sunday. During the Action Hour, people who join on the Zoom meeting are asked to contact certain legislators on the issue of the day. Not all of these are Higher Ed related, but we want to act in solidarity with our K-12 colleagues, just as they do for us. Here is the Zoom Link for this statewide meeting: https://feaweb.org/dailyaction
Higher Education Budget:
- Less details are available on this budget, but we do know the worst of the cuts were avoided. Lawmakers originally planned cuts upwards of a half a billion dollars and that did not happen in the end.
- Lawmakers did cut the Bright Futures textbook grants, meaning students who receive the Bright Future Scholarships will now have to foot the bill for all their textbooks.
Once the final numbers and accompanying language are released, we [FEA/UFF] will provide more details.
Stay informed: Sign up for the FUSA Informant
Faculty United Service Association 