Will the 2 DeSantis-backed Miami school board members be independent? Some are asking
Around this time last year, the Miami-Dade School Board, under then-Superintendent Alberto Carvalho, defied Gov. Ron DeSantis and his ban on school mask mandates, requiring students and staff to wear facial coverings for the start of the 2021-22 school year as the delta variant surged in the state, fueling more than 20,000 new COVID cases a day.
At the time, Vice Chair Steve Gallon III said the public depended on the school board “to vote in a manner that does not capitulate to political pressures but relies on the empirical, scientific evidence.” The board voted 7-1 in favor of the mask mandate, with board member Lubby Navarro dissenting and Christi Fraga absent.
This year, however, following Tuesday’s elections resulting in two DeSantis-backed candidates winning a seat on the nine-member board, some are questioning how future School Board decisions could play out — particularly when it comes to potentially politically divisive issues, such as the curriculum — and whether the board can remain independent.
“When you have the kind of dollars coming into these local races that we saw come in, you have to assume that there are interests that go far beyond what the local community thinks should be part of the curriculum,” said Anna Hochkammer, a Village of Pinecrest council member, district parent and a member of the Miami-Dade County Public Schools Audit and Budget Advisory Committee.
Overall, the four Miami-Dade School Board races this year garnered more than $1.137 million in campaign contributions with nine candidates running. In 2020, 22 candidates amassed nearly $2.163 million.
Board members who see the money and influence intervening in a local election, especially one that is nonpartisan as school districts’ budgets come from local property taxes, could “think twice about voting against the interests of the state’s executives,” Hochkammer said.
READ MORE: DeSantis suspends four Broward County School Board members, appoints replacements
2 DeSantis-backed candidates win in school board election
The District 8 race, in particular, which pinned longtime incumbent Marta Pérez, 71, against Monica Colucci, 49, brought in nearly $494,000, more than any of the other three School Board races, campaign finance documents show. The governor, a Republican, endorsed Colucci while Lt. Gov. Jeanette Nuñez celebrated by her side at her victory party Tuesday night at Renaissance Ballrooms in West Miami. (Colucci raised $211,517, while Pérez raised $281,710.)
Colucci, an elementary school teacher with the district, edged out Pérez, who’d been in the seat since 1998, with 54% of the vote, compared to Pérez’s 46%.
Roberto Alonso, 41, a businessman and Miami-Dade College Board of Trustees member whom DeSantis appointed in 2020, won the open seat vacated by outgoing School Board Chair Perla Tabares Hantman, who held the District 4 seat for nearly three decades and served as chair for 14 terms (nonconsecutive). Desantis backed Alonso, who does not have a teaching background, in the race.
Alonso brought in nearly $165,000, compared with about $45,000 that Maribel Balbin, the former head of the Miami-Dade chapter of the League of Women Voters, raised in the race. The third candidate, Kevin Menendez Macki, a former district teacher and now principal of a local Christian school, raised nearly $29,000.
Both Colucci and Alonso received donations from high-ranking political figures and organizations, according to campaign finance records: Colucci from Nuñez, and Alonso from political action committees, including Friends of Ron DeSantis.
Both received donations from Moms for Liberty, a DeSantis-aligned conservative parents’ rights organization whose political action committee’s main source of funding was Publix heiress Julie Jenkins Fancelli, who donated $650,000 to three organizations instrumental in the Jan. 6 rally Trump held before the riots at the Capitol, according to a Washington Post investigation.
READ MORE: Publix heiress funds Florida school board races through Moms for Liberty PAC
The other two School Board races this year — District 2 and District 6 — brought in nearly $131,700 and about $273,500, respectively.
Incumbent Dorothy Bendross-Mindingall beat La-Shanda West, a teacher at Cutler Bay Senior High, with 75% of the vote to keep her District 2 seat, which represents Liberty City, Overtown, Little Haiti, Wynwood, Morningside, El Portal and Miami Shores. Bendross-Mindingall is a former teacher and principal.
In District 6, incumbent Maria Teresa Rojas kept her District 6 seat with 64% of the vote. Rojas, who is the sister-in-law of Carlos Gimenez, the former Miami-Dade mayor and now a GOP U.S. House representative, defeated Sandra Manzieri, a teacher at Key Biscayne K-8 Center, to represent Coconut Grove, Key Biscayne, Coral Gables, South Miami, Little Havana and parts of southwest Miami-Dade. Rojas is a former principal at Sunset Elementary.
Despite the support some candidates received from politicians, Alex Penelas, the former two-term Miami-Dade mayor, said the public should give the incoming board members “the benefit of the doubt.” And that’s especially true for Alonso, whom Penelas supported. (Florida Value Partners, which Penelas is an investor in but is not a managing member who dictates who receives donations, he said, donated $4,000 to Alonso’s campaign, records show.)
The salary for a Miami-Dade School Board member, elected to a four-year term, is $46,773, according to the Miami-Dade Elections Department.
Penelas: Give Alonso a chance to show independence
In District 4, “only a DeSantis-supported candidate would have won,” said Penelas. The district covers a large swath of northwest Miami-Dade, including Miami Lakes and the GOP stronghold of Hialeah.
But, Penelas added, when it comes to Alonso’s decision-making, “Time will tell whether he’s only going to be a spokesman for the governor or if he’s going to be an independent thinker, and we’ve expressed those concerns.”
Penelas, who’s been a friend of Alonso and his family for more than three decades, said Alonso has broken with the party in the past and proven on various occasions to act independently. Alonso, he added, has “earned a chance to prove his skeptics wrong.”
Hochkammer, however, was more hesitant.
“These are not grassroots candidates. These are ideological candidates,” she said. “To expect ideologically indebted people on the board to suddenly discover their backbone when faced with the deep pockets of Gov. DeDantis is beyond naive.”
Alonso’s connections to Manny Diaz
In addition to his relationship to DeSantis, Alonso also has a longstanding relationship with Florida Education Commissioner Manny Diaz Jr., who celebrated Alonso’s victory Tuesday at Paraiso Tropical in Hialeah. At the party, the commissioner told the Herald he and Alonso were good friends and that he wasn’t surprised by the election’s outcome.
When asked on Thursday how the commissioner would balance his personal and professional relationship with Alonso to ensure there would be no conflict, Alex Lanfranconi, the director of communications for the Florida Department of Education, said in an email, that “all school board members serve as constitutional officers elected by the people. Any insinuation of a conflict of interest based upon personal friendship is both comical and shameful.”
Colucci’s connections to lieutenant governor
Colucci has the political backing of Nuñez, the Florida lieutenant governor.
Nuñez’s aligned political committee, Jobs for Prosperity for Florida, paid for political mail advertisements sent to voters to promote Colucci’s candidacy and contributed $1,000 to Colucci’s campaign, according to campaign finance records. Colucci left teaching to work in the governor’s executive office from February 2019 to August 2020 as the special assistant to Nuñez, but the two have been friends since their college years at Florida International University.
For their part, both Alonso and Colucci have maintained they will act independently from the governor.
Colucci couldn’t be reached on Friday, but in an interview with the Herald’s Editorial Board in June, said she prides herself on being an independent thinker “because that’s what I instill in my students. [But] If I agree with someone, that’s what it is, and I am in agreement with the governor’s platform.”
Alonso rejected that he will be beholden to the governor’s agenda, he told the Herald Friday. The only group of people influencing him will be those in District 4, who lean conservative and often align with the views of DeSantis, he said. Moreover, he defended his relationship with Tallahassee and said it will benefit the school community.
There’s never been a governor in Florida as invested, or involved, in education, he said, and while some can argue the political nature of it, he believes the interest from Tallahassee can be wielded to improve schools, increase teacher pay and provide schools with the latest technology.
READ MORE: Teachers alarmed by state’s infusing religion, downplaying race in civics training
Many have strongly criticized the governor’s involvement in schools.
In March, several politicians — including Miami-Dade County Mayor Daniella Levine Cava, State Sen. Shevrin Jones, a Miami Gardens Democrat, and former Florida governor and U.S. Rep. Charlie Crist, who won his primary race Tuesday to challenge DeSantis in the November election for governor — condemned DeSantis for signing the “Parental Rights in Education.” Critics have dubbed the measure Florida’s “Don’t Say Gay” bill, which bars discussions of sexuality and gender identity in kindergarten through third grade in Florida public schools.
READ MORE: ‘It’s a sad day for education.’ Miami teachers react to passing of ‘Don’t Say Gay’ bill
More recently, teachers across South Florida raised concerns that a new state civics initiative spearheaded by the administration and designed to prepare students to be “virtuous citizens” was infused with a Christian and conservative ideology.
READ MORE: Teachers alarmed by state’s infusing religion, downplaying race in civics training
DeSantis’ education agenda
Tuesday’s election results follow DeSantis’ decision to make education — and controversial education issues — part of his political platform.
In addition to singing the “Parental Rights in Education” bill in the spring, the governor also signed a law that limits how race and racism is taught in universities and in workplace training. A federal judge earlier this month blocked the restrictions related to workplace training, saying that portion of the law violates the First Amendment.
The measures have been particularly troublesome for many teachers, who fear they inhibit their teaching and strip away their creativity.
Despite the two new board members’ political connections, Gallon, the board’s vice chair, told the Herald he isn’t “looking to anticipate one’s personal or political ideology.”
Instead, he has the “utmost confidence” both Alonso and Colucci will aim to serve in the best interest of their communities and the district,” he said. “I maintain the premise and believe that those who choose to serve, especially in education, do so on behalf and in the interest of students. The outcome of [the] election has not changed my optimism and outlook in this belief.”
The fight over the sex-ed textbook
The election comes just weeks after the board flip-flopped on a decision to adopt a comprehensive sexual-health textbook that a small group of parents raised objections over the age-appropriateness of the sex education content.
The board first adopted the book, but after concerns were raised — an effort led by by Alex Serrano, the county director for County Citizens Defending Freedom, a national organization with ties to conservative and politically active Christian groups — an independent review process was conducted by a district hearing officer, who later recommended that the School Board adopt the book.
The school board rejected the recommendations of the hearing officer, whom Superintendent Jose Dotres had appointed to review the matter, and voted 5-4 at the end of July to essentially ban the sex-ed textbook. (District officials said Friday Dotres was not available to comment.)
A week later, Tabares Hantman, whom Alonso is succeeding, in a surprise move, switched her vote in favor of the book. Pérez, however, remained against the book.
Despite Tabares Hantman switching her vote, she and Pérez have had a conservative voting record during their decades-long tenures.
That’s why, for this election, Penelas argued, the issue wasn’t so much about their politics, but whether or not the two candidates backed by DeSantis — Alonso and Colucci — were willing to support the governor’s agenda or break free of him if they disagreed.
“When it comes down to issues in Miami-Dade County that impacts schoolchildren here, are they going to be sufficiently independent to stand up and vote the way they should on that particular issue or will they have to vote the way the governor wants them to vote?” asked Penelas, who was once a rising star in the Democratic Party of Florida. “And that worries a lot of people.”
This story was originally published August 28, 2022 at 4:30 AM.
