Looking ahead to this week

Howard Finkelstein, chief public defender, Broward County

We were almost there. The Obama administration finally started reversing the horrible effects of the failed war on drugs. However, Attorney General Jeff Sessions wants to bring back that war. He wants more mandatory minimum drug sentences and tougher marijuana laws. It doesn’t matter to him that several states, including Florida, have legalized marijuana in some way. It doesn’t matter to him that the only thing the war on drugs accomplished was the break-up of families and the ruin of whole communities through mass incarceration. It doesn’t matter to him that we lost that war a long time ago.

Chuck Shaw, chairman, Palm Beach County School Board

Next week will be reports on the state mandated testing of our children. We might hear that it went well — no problems and all were happy. We may find that the same old stories are again told — millions on testing, stressed kids, unhappy teachers, flawed test materials, insensitive lawmakers, and a jubilant Bush Foundation. If we are lucky, however, we might hear of legislation that truly tries to improve on this testing world we live in. I hope it is first time we see some reform of testing in Florida.

Michael Dennis, M.D., chairman, Florida Atlantic University Schmidt College of Medicine

As a trustee of FAU, one of Florida’s 12 state Universities, and as a Florida resident concerned about the economic future for our youth, I am deeply worried about the schism in the Florida Legislature over educational funding. The Senate’s position is supportive and productive by proposing a 12 percent increase in overall university funding and significant expansion of aid for Bright Futures merit scholarships and those students with verifiable needs. The House is planning cutbacks at a time when the economy is dependent upon well-educated graduates filling satisfying employment opportunities. Fiscal restraint is important but so is success.

J. David Armstrong Jr., president, Broward College

New York announced plans to provide free tuition to students attending state universities and colleges. San Fransisco, Tennessee, and Oregon all have passed similar policies for community colleges, but New York is the first to include universities. Their decisions are inventive new solutions to the growing school debt dilemma, but the requirements will need refinement as students take advantage of the opportunity. There must also be reflection on the effect on local and state economies, as these new policies are effectively the community’s investment to educate a highly skilled pipeline for business ecosystems.

Barbara M. Sharief, mayor, Broward County

I traveled to Tallahassee this legislative session and met with Gov. Rick Scott and Lieutenant Gov. Carlos Lopez-Cantera to discuss blasting. The governor has agreed to allocate funds in this budget but still needs it included in a bill. CFO Jeff Atwater sat in my house for three hours to experience the blasting. The worst thing is to sit in front of someone and have them tell you that the laws are written to protect the quarries, not the residents. If you choose to sue and head to arbitration you will pay their legal fees. I’m fighting because this law is wrong.

Howard Simon, executive director, ACLU of Florida

Almost 40 years ago, the people of Florida voted to guarantee the right to privacy by putting it in our state constitution. Every natural person has the right to be let alone and free from governmental intrusion into the person’s private life. Now it appears that there is an effort to get the Constitutional Revision Commission to change all this, to convince us that privacy doesn’t mean privacy. The threatening change is because the Florida Supreme Court has ruled that laws restricting women’s access to abortion violate the right to privacy. Voters may need to re-affirm their own rights.

Steven Geller, member, Broward County Commission

When I served in the Florida Legislature, we generally considered local government officials our friends and partners. We represented the same people. There were arguments about the economic impacts of some of our legislation on local governments, but we generally passed legislation that dealt with the state, and left local decisions to local governments. Now, we have state legislators who complain about federal laws, saying “one size doesn’t fit all” or “the government closest to the people is best,” and who are trying to take local control away from local government, and pass laws preempting local control to the state. Hypocrisy.

Tim Ryan, member, Broward County Commission

A project to create water storage south of Lake Okeechobee that will reduce algae blooms and help Everglades restoration passed the Florida Senate with overwhelming bipartisan support. The project — 20 years in the making — would deepen reservoirs on 14,000 acres of state land, creating storage for 78 billion gallons of water. The water would be held and cleaned before release into the Everglades, and discharges have caused algae blooms in nearby rivers reduced. About $1.5 billion in state and federal funding would pay for the project. Hopefully the Florida House of Representatives will also approve this environmentally critical project.