Gov. Ron DeSantis is, again, asking a sensible question and, again, infuriating the Far Left. He wants to know, should taxpayers be paying for work that benefits no one except the rich, powerful teacher unions who work exclusively on behalf of the Democrat Party?
Teachers in the government schools who belong to the union have their union dues deducted from their paychecks and the money is handed over to the union bosses.
This results in a huge savings to the unions, who do not have to pay to collect the dues.
There were 5,652 teachers union members in Duval County the last fiscal year and the school district collected some $4.2 million in dues from them.
No other organization gets this break. Taxpayers don’t pay for the collection of teacher memberships in the NRA.
DeSantis has tossed out the idea of doing away with this practice.
Elisabeth Messenger, interim CEO of Americans for Fair Treatment, a group focused on educating employees on their union rights, said, “Automatic dues deduction uses government resources to make it easier for unions to recruit and retain members and creates confusion for workers who may think their workplace union is endorsed by their employer or that membership is required by their employer. DeSantis would be taking a huge step in protecting teachers’ private information and ensuring the Florida state government is not a middleman in funding partisan politics.”
DeSantis, whose second term begins today, got zero support from the teacher union bosses and won re-election by a 20-point margin. He owes them nothing.
DeSantis also has been entertaining the idea of setting a threshold of at least 50 percent for unions to represent teachers.
Who not also merit pay? Why should the worst teachers be paid the same as the best teachers?
Florida’s teachers who sign up for the union don’t just pay local dues. They get skinned three ways. In Florida, the FEA’s yearly portion of teachers’ dues is $229, while the National Education Association rakes off $204. The rest of the money paid for dues goes to the local union. Most of the money collected goes into Democrat political campaigns.
Teacher union bosses advocate for more money and less work for teachers. Better education for children is way down the priority list. Let them do less lobbying and more bookkeeping.
