Florida House Democrats host their first ‘field hearing’ in Tampa

Florida House Democrats Michele Rayner, Fentrice Driskell, Dianne Hart, Lindsay Cross and Susan Valdes (photo credit: Mitch Perry)

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A group of state House Democrats held the first of three scheduled “field hearings” on Monday night in Tampa to give constituents a chance to explain what they’d like to see when the Legislature reconvenes following the November elections.

In a pointed rebuke to the Republicans who run the Legislature, the Democrats put no time limit on the public speaking time. Republican committee chairs routinely limit each member of the public to as little as 30 seconds to make their points, even on far ranging and controversial legislation.

“The folks in charge in Tallahassee have made it increasingly difficult for Floridians to make their voices heard,” said Democratic House Minority Leader Fentrice Driskell in kicking off the event, which lasted for nearly three hours.

“We’ve witnessed not only just a passing of restrictive laws and regulations, but also the weaponizing of procedures, the packing of committee agendas, and the limiting of public testimony. All of this was designed to suppress the voices of constituents impacted by dangerous political decisions.”

Activists opposed to the agenda of the GOP-controlled Legislature have long lamented the lack of time allotted to them to speak to lawmakers.

“There’s so many times when we had a contentious issue and it is very personal to people,” said St. Petersburg Democratic Rep. Lindsay Cross. “They may have driven eight hours to come to Tallahassee and be told that you have three minutes, now we’re cutting it back, now you have 30 seconds to tell something that is deeply personal that’s going to affect your life, your livelihood, your family, and it’s just not right. So, we want this opportunity for the people in this region come and talk to us.”

Rounding out the session were Tampa Bay area lawmakers Michele Rayner, Dianne Hart, and Susan Valdes.

Among the issues raised were Medicaid expansion, guns, school vouchers, the six-week abortion ban, voting rights, and the 2023 DeSantis administration purge at New College of Florida in Sarasota, converting it from a progressive liberal-arts campus to one modeled on conservative Hillsdale College in Michigan.

The trouble is that unless the unexpected happens and the Republicans lose their majority in either the House of Senate in November, the Democrats will be essentially powerless to grant the wishes expressed.

New College

Amy Reid was the first of four public speakers who discussed New College.

A professor of French language, chair of the faculty, and the still named director of the now-abolished gender studies program, Reid said that a third of the faculty left the university last year and the “pace of the faculty departures at NCF continues.”

“I call on you to stand up against this,” she told the five House Democrats. “To push back on legislative initiatives that curb academic freedom and chill free speech on our campuses. To stand up for our faculty and our students, which is to say, for Florida’s future. … You came here to listen, and I hope you can move your colleagues to act.”

Betsy Braden with the gun safety group Moms Demand Action expressed concerns about how vending machines selling ammunition are coming to Alabama, Texas, and Oklahoma. She doesn’t want them in Florida.

“We will definitely not stand for that,” said Cross.

Norin Dollar is a senior analyst with the progressive Florida Policy Institute. She complained that the DeSantis administration opted out of a new federal program known as the Summer Electronic Benefit Transfer Program for Children , or Summer BET, designed to help low-income people pay for groceries. The deadline to apply for the money for next summer is Aug. 15, she said.

“We’ve already given up the opportunity for this summer,” she said. “Anything that can be done to ask that the application be made … and when the budget amendments come from the Department of Children and Families [DCF] if they do get made, that you look upon them favorably in your legislative duties. We know DCF can administer these programs because they did it during the pandemic.”

Andrea Dumala ( recently profiled by the Phoenix ) made the case for lawmakers to expand Medicaid, but she essentially was speaking to the choir, as Democrats have made the case for years for Medicaid expansion against overwhelming indifference in the Republican-led Legislature.

Hillsborough County resident Tracy Davis (not to be confused with the state House member from Jacksonville) spoke about how the Florida prison system is overcrowded and said that there is a need for an ombudsman for the Department of Corrections to address concerns about living conditions and health care within the prison system.

Heat safety

Alexis Tsoukalas with the Florida Policy Institute called on the panel to support legislation to protect outdoor workers from excessive heat, spread public awareness about how to deal with intense heat, and asked for repeal HB 433 , passed into law earlier this year to prohibit local governments from enacting ordinances to provide heat protections for outdoor workers.

A new report from her organization says Florida leads the state in heat-related illnesses.

“The federal government does not have a heat exposure standard,” she said. “OSHA [Occupational Safety and Health Administration] just started a process to put a rule in place, but this can take years. Plus, OSHA still doesn’t cover all workers. So, state intervention is paramount to protect working Floridians and keep businesses running smoothly.”

That prompted Rep. Michele Rayner to say that the bill sponsors “lied” during committee meetings and on the floor when they said that OSHA has such active standards. The bill was sponsored by Fort Myers Republican Tiffany Esposito in the House and Panhandle Republican Jay Trumbull in the Senate.

“We’re seeing a majority party that is willfully lying to people in order to benefit corporate interests and to benefit other people that are not every-day Floridians, because literally [Esposito] said in committee, when asked by myself and Rep. [Ashley] Gantt, well, ‘Yes, there’s uniform heat standard exposures and we’ll leave it to the federal government.’ Well, baby, how do we leave it to the federal government if they have no uniform standard? But this is what we’re dealing with.”

Jonathan Webber is Florida policy director with the Southern Poverty Law Center and a frequent speaker in legislative committee meetings. He applauded the Democrats for holding the field hearings.

“House and Senate committee chairs often overpack agendas, leaving little to no time for public testimony on critical bills,” he said. “This poor planning is not only annoying but it’s inappropriate, especially when regular Floridians … who travel to Tally to speak to their lawmakers on how their bill will impact their lives.”

Additional Democratic field hearings were scheduled to take place Tuesday night in Orlando and Wednesday night in Broward County.

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