School boards across the country have been in the crosshairs of parents, teachers, and state officials this year.

Much of the public’s rancor is of the boards own making. In some part, this is because a school board member position in Florida does not come with all the power that the public believes it does. The ability of board members to raise budgets, pick textbooks, and even decide on what goes on inside schools is dictated by Tallahassee. And Tallahassee is a stern task master.

For more than a decade, the “Lords of Tallahassee” more formally known as the legislature, have pre-empted more and more authority from local control. Local elected officials see quite early on what little is in their purview to decide. Partisan political power is at the root of the problem.

The governor has decided that being a conservative was not good enough. He also wanted to be a populist. That resulted in politics interfering with home rule authority. I agree on his school policies in many instances. Yet he is going about it with all the make-believe tough talk populism that makes public discourse so grating on a civil society.

Over twenty years ago, the voters of Florida decided to make school board races non-partisan in a ballot initiative. The legislature now wants to reverse course and make sure that partisanship enters schools. Senator Gruters is the chair of the Ethics & Elections committee and is pushing the legislation. He is also chair of the Republican Party of Florida.

What will happen if the races go back to partisan politics in Martin County…probably nothing. All five current school board members are registered Republicans as are all five members of the county commission and the five constitutional officers. Do you know why everyone here is a registered Republican? It is because in deep red Martin County that is the only way you can be elected.

If we inject a partisan primary into school board races, then many times Democrats and NPA voters will be prevented from voting. One county commissioner regularly closes out races by having an ally run as a write-in candidate. If a primary race is closed by a write-in candidate, then only members of the party can vote in that primary. The last time, the commissioner had a high school student as his opponent in the general election. Is this what we want for our school boards in Martin County a decision by only 40% of the voters?

Florida is becoming a state where locally elected officials have no authority to enact policies and ordinances that their constituents want. From taxing authority to whether your next-door neighbor can open a business in his living room is now decided by Tallahassee.

The legislature has consciously determined, along with Governor DeSantis, to not allow elected local leaders to make policy in their communities. If everything is decided by the 160 senators and representatives in the Florida legislature and the governor, then we have a politburo and not a representative government. Our liberty is being taken away little by little by the consolidation of political power in the hands of fewer and fewer.

They can shout how they are protecting the people, but the people have fewer ways of making their voices heard. Diffusion in making political decisions is the guarantor of our liberty. Consolidation of power will ultimately have despotic results. Politicizing school board races will aid in that consolidation.