FROM BOLD TO BLAH
Gov. DeSantis’ second-year agenda overlooks many needs
TALLAHASSEE – It’s a new year at the dawn of a new decade, and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis enjoys a level of public support most politicians can only dream about. With a recent poll showing that two-thirds of Floridians approve of his performance, the Republican governor is at the peak of his popularity.
Good for him. But this is no time to play it safe. The leader who boldly arrived on the scene one year ago seems unwilling to spend some of his goodwill to really drive Florida in the right direction when the state faces huge challenges.
In his second State of the State address, delivered Tuesday as the traditional starting point for the annual session of the Legislature, DeSantis offered next to nothing in critical areas such as affordable housing, climate change, health care and public safety.
We need the fearlessness of a visionary. Instead, what we got sounded like a riskaverse political consultant.
Perhaps we all make too big a deal out of these annual speeches, but the State of the State is here to say, so it might as well be done right.
For example, the two-year milestone of the horrific Parkland school attack is just a few weeks away, but DeSantis said nothing Tuesday about gun violence or school safety.
Mental health, a crisis that affects every Florida family, got a perfunctory nod as DeSantis saluted his wife Casey who has made the issue a priority. But severe shortages of psychologists, counselors and behavioral specialists have made our schools less safe. This epidemic deserves more than a passing mention in a 35-minute speech. It demands action.
On a positive note, DeSantis emphasized the need for stronger environmental protection to protect our water, battle bluegreen algae and combat an epidemic of Burmese Pythons. If you listened closely, you heard him refer, indirectly, to the Fort Lauderdale sewage crisis: “Those that spew untreated wastewater into Florida’s water bodies need to be deterred from doing so by appropriate penalties,” DeSantis said. We agree.
He also placed a worthwhile emphasis on the need for civics education in our schools, which he said would be a part of the new post-Common Core learning standards to be announced in the coming days.
But for the most part, we heard rah-rah rhetoric on the virtues of charter schools, the need for an E-verify law to hunt down illegal immigrants and another parental notice law on abortion that’s sure to be challenged in court. If those are the top priorities of the leader of the nation’s thirdlargest state, we’re in trouble.
The disconnect was never more obvious than when DeSantis claimed that for six straight years, Florida led the nation in the amount of income flowing into Florida from people moving here from other states. Tens of billions of dollars, he said. If it’s true that more money is coming into the state, then why are state prisons falling to pieces? Why the waiting lists for essential services? Why do Florida teacher salaries rank 46th out of 50 states?
Speaking of which, the governor had a golden opportunity to directly address the many questions about his plan to raise the pay of starting teachers. He didn’t. That means the skepticism among his fellow Republicans will continue to fester at the Capitol.
DeSantis took predictable bows for the state’s strong business climate, but never mentioned the threat posed by climate change. He cited the drop in the violent crime rate, but never spoke of the gun violence that daily plagues too many of our communities. He boasted of the improved rankings of our two flagship state universities without a word about the crushing student loan debt that’s holding back so many young college graduates.
DeSantis took credit for the lack of a personal income tax, which is prohibited by the Florida Constitution. It’s sadly familiar for governors to beat the drum of low taxes, but Florida suffers from too many people for its limited tax base, especially when so many of those people will require Medicaid supplements for their Medicare coverage and perhaps nursing home stays at Medicaid’s expense, too.
The obvious reality is that our state isn’t working for everybody, and the people who can’t see that are among the most politically powerful in our state.
The Florida budget has nearly doubled to more than $90 billion in two decades but nearly half of the state’s population lives paycheck-to-paycheck. The state of the state is great, if you’re wealthy and wellconnected. We have a popular governor. We need a champion for all of us.
Editorials are the opinion of the Sun Sentinel Editorial Board and written by one of its members or a designee. The Editorial Board consists of Editorial Page Editor Rosemary O’Hara, Sergio Bustos, Steve Bousquet and Editor-in-Chief Julie Anderson.