Florida's anti-labor legislature is a cat's paw for bumptious bigoted Boy Governor RONALD DION DeSANTIS and his nasty nostrums, erasing faculty members' rights to arbitration. From Florida Phoenix:
Faculty unions sue FSU, UF, FL Board of Governors over rights to arbitrate employment disputes
Florida State University on July 21, 2022. Credit: Danielle J. Brown
A union representing public university professors and its chapters at Florida State University and the University of Florida filed a federal lawsuit Wednesday against the state law banning arbitration of their employment disputes.
The 31-page complaint from the United Faculty of Florida, which ropes in the state’s largest universities and the body that oversees all public higher education in the state, alleges that UF fired a tenured professor while on medical leave in January. When the UF union chapter tried to intervene, a university official said the decision wasn’t up for arbitration and was final, according to the suit.
The venue is the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Florida’s courthouse in Gainesville.
At issue is a provision in SB 266, a law Gov. Ron DeSantis signed in 2023, that eliminates arbitration through unions in disputes about tenure, terminations, and promotions. Under the law, university presidents have final say when it comes to employment decisions. UFF filed another suit over SB 266 in state court against New College last year.
UFF has the backing of its umbrella union, the American Federation of Teachers, in arguing that the arbitration ban violates the Federal Arbitration Act and chills professors’ free speech.
“SB 266 undermines the right to arbitration firmly established under federal law for nearly a century. Rather than follow the guidance of an impartial arbitrator, the law allows employers to make unilateral decisions that affect the livelihood of thousands of workers in the state of Florida,” AFT president Randi Weingarten said in a press release on Wednesday.
“We must stand up for the rule of law, and for freedom of contract and freedom of speech, not just for those we agree with, but for everyone. Gov. Ron DeSantis and Commissioner of Education Manny Diaz Jr. want to do the opposite — and that is why we’re taking them to court.”
More disputes over tenure review
The law also established post-tenure reviews that all tenured faculty must go through every five years, allowing universities to fire tenured faculty more easily.
While the universities have refused to include collective bargaining procedures in its next contracts with the union employees, UF has sent proposed letters of termination to four professors and 24 more have received poor post-tenure reviews, the unions claim in the suit.
“Academic freedom is the cornerstone of a strong higher education system. The message being clearly sent by Gov. DeSantis and Commissioner Diaz Jr. with this arbitration ban is that they do not care about due process or our state’s students,” wrote UFF’s president Teresa Hodge.
Just last week, three professors teaching at Florida public universities sued the state over tenure review, also alleging that it chills free speech, according to the Tallahassee Democrat.
The State University System of Florida does not comment on pending litigation, a spokesperson responded to Florida Phoenix via email.
UF and FSU did not respond to the Phoenix’s requests for comment.
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