Latest news with #BlackFloridians
Yahoo
09-04-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Designation of West Augustine as home of Black History Museum uncertain despite senate support
The Florida Senate unanimously gave the green light to constructing the future Florida Museum of Black History in West Augustine Wednesday, but there are some indications that the plan could be in trouble in the House. The legislation passed by the Florida Senate follows through on the selection made by a state task force last summer. 'The story of Florida cannot be told without also telling the story of Black Floridians,' said Senate sponsor Tom Leek (R-St. Augustine). But the deal isn't set in stone. The House companion bill hasn't even been scheduled for its first of three committee hearings, despite there only being just over three weeks remaining in the legislative session. There is $1 million included in both the House and Senate budgets for phase one of the museum's construction in West Augustine, but in the House budget, there's also $375,000 included for construction of the Florida Museum of Black History in Opa-Loka. Opa-Locka was one of the finalists under consideration by the task force last year, but it lost out to West Augustine in the end. We reached out to State Representative Kyan Michael (R-Jacksonville Beach), who is sponsoring the House bill designating West Augustine as the museum's future home for an update on the legislation's status, but didn't hear back. Before the start of the session, bills seeking to have the museum built in both Opa-Locka and Eatonville were also filed. At the time, St. Johns County Commissioner Sarah Arnold (R-District 2) told us she was confident the legislature would follow through with the task force's recommendation and support West Augustine as the museum's future home. 'We went through the process, which was unanimously supported on both sides of the aisle, and again, we won on our merits alone. I don't think that it's going to hinder us getting this museum at all,' said Arnold in a February interview. The House has yet to take action on any of the three bills seeking to designate the future home of the Black History Museum. Commissioner Arnold told Action News Jax, so long as the phase one funding makes it into the final budget and that competing funding doesn't, it shouldn't matter whether the West Augustine bill passes. [DOWNLOAD: Free Action News Jax app for alerts as news breaks] [SIGN UP: Action News Jax Daily Headlines Newsletter] Click here to download the free Action News Jax news and weather apps, click here to download the Action News Jax Now app for your smart TV and click here to stream Action News Jax live.
Yahoo
02-04-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
DeSantis' DOGE Plan is a Trojan Horse
Gov. Ron DeSantis announces the creation of the Florida State Department of Governmental Efficiency (DOGE) task force to pare back state government, in Tampa on Feb. 24, 2025. (Photo courtesy of the Executive Office of Gov. Ron DeSantis) Given Gov. Ron DeSantis' penchant for political theater, full embrace of a far-right extremist agenda, and need for attention, it's not surprising that he would attach himself to the Trump-Musk DOGE project. Despite the utter chaos the project has created at the federal level, DeSantis recently announced the creation of a Florida version of the Department of Governmental Efficiency (DOGE) task force, which he claims will target and eliminate 'waste' in state government, save taxpayers money, and 'ensure accountability' in Florida. The Florida DOGE task force will work similarly to the 'department' created by President Donald Trump and led by Elon Musk, the tech billionaire who is unelected and unaccountable to the American people. Musk and his minions have orchestrated the slashing of agency budgets since Trump came back into office on Jan. 20. Florida Democratic Party Chair Nikki Fried's response to the announcement captures the absurdity of DeSantis' action. 'Republicans have been in total control of Florida's government for nearly 30 years, and he wants to talk about government waste?' she said. 'Ron has consistently passed the largest state budgets in Florida's history, illegally spent millions of taxpayer dollars to run political campaigns to take down Amendments 3 & 4, and just allocated $250 million to fund his political stunt on immigration. Don't lecture us on wasting taxpayer dollars.' Fried argues everyone knows 'this isn't about reigning in spending — it's about Trump endorsing Byron Donalds instead of Casey DeSantis. Maybe Ron should have considered the political consequences before he decided to run against the leader of his party for president.' DeSantis said the DOGE team will likely shutter 70 boards and commissions this year to cut costs. Meanwhile, the task force will review 900 positions in state agencies to ascertain whether they should be cut. His intention to have the task force 'identify potential wasteful spending in college and university operations' should be viewed as dubious after he signed legislation last year that banned public colleges and universities from using taxpayer money to promote diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI). The governor's hostility towards Black Floridians and his crusade to eradicate any programs to level the social, political, economic, and business playing fields continue unabated. It's likely that DOGE will be just another tool to eviscerate any entity deemed a threat to DeSantis' implementation of an arch-conservative imprimatur on Florida. There is also the fear that Florida will lose experienced civil servants who not only carry out critical government functions but also carry with them critical institutional memory. As it has played out nationally, the DOGE carousel will distract state employees from focusing on the people's work. If past is prologue, this political power move will increase fear among employees that they may lose their jobs, inducing paralysis among the ranks. Most of all, Florida government's best employees may seek greener pastures to the detriment to the state's people. DeSantis said the task force will use artificial intelligence to reduce 'bureaucratic bloat.' He said the DOGE team will be a continuation of the cost-cutting measures he has overseen during his six years in office. The governor boasted that Florida saved $3.8 billion in last year's budget and has paid down 41% of state debt since 2019. DeSantis' plan comes even though Florida has the lowest number of government employees per capita of any state, and the state has about $14.6 billion in cash reserves. DeSantis' plan comes even though Florida has the lowest number of government employees per capita of any state and $14.6 billion in cash reserves. Yet DeSantis is looking to slash 740 full-time jobs and scrap as many as 900 more related 'off-the-books' positions. Democrats pushed back by noting that Florida already has in place a voter-approved government efficiency task force created in 2006 that carried 'an almost identical mandate;' Florida DOGE therefore itself is an example of unnecessary spending. The effort is really an attempt to flatter Trump and Musk to restore DeSantis to his party's good graces. If Floridians are lucky, the significant pushback verbalized by the leaders of both of Florida's Republican-supermajority legislative chambers may end up with DeSantis' cockamamie plan being tossed to the trash pile. 'Let's focus on what matters. Let's pass actual reforms rather than symbolic gestures,' Daniel Perez, the Florida House speaker, told members on the legislative session's opening day. 'Let's repeal government programs instead of reshuffling them. Let's swing for the fences and not just try to get on base.' Perez turned the knife a little deeper when he said that 'DeSantis, a self-styled fiscal conservative, benefited from a 70% budget increase for the executive office of the governor over his six years in office.' Senate President Ben Albritton, a member of the existing efficiency taskforce, said in remarks to the Senate that he was proud that Florida already 'has a great framework for accountability,' and that he and other lawmakers had made a substantive number of recommendations 'to improve flexibility [and] simplify processes.' 'The fact is we are a state and nation of laws that should be created by elected officials accountable to the people who elected them, not appointed professional staff,' he said. None of this may matter though, because DeSantis has his eyes firmly set on running for the White House in 2028, which necessitates rebuilding the frayed ties with Trump and his loyal supporters, as well as positioning his wife Casey to run for governor when he sets down in 2027. SUPPORT: YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE
Miami Herald
06-02-2025
- Politics
- Miami Herald
This historian wants you to learn Broward's Black history. His flashcards might help
Not everyone in Broward knows the story of Clarence C. Walker. But Emmanuel George wants to change that. Walker became the second Black principal of Dillard High School in 1938, Fort Lauderdale's first public school for Black students. Walker lobbied the school board to make the school, which was named after Black-education advocate James H. Dillard, the first accredited public school for Black students. Local white farmers, worried that their free and cheap young Black labor force would opt to seek an education instead of helping with the harvest, pushed the school board to shorten the school year so the students could work. The school board eventually gave in to the farmers' in 1942. After a day of arguing in front of the school board, Walker left with a great deal of frustration. 'When he went home, he was so hurt and bothered that he actually ended up succumbing to a heart attack,' George said. 'So it's stated that he died of a broken heart.' These are the stories about Broward that Emmanuel George wants to preserve. 'Broward County has a lot of global Black history. It's not just local Black history,' George told the Miami Herald. George is curator and community liaison at the Old Dillard Museum, which documents Black history in South Florida. 'I want to be able to show that so that other people across the world can look into their own local Black history in their community and see that it is global. And if we adopt that mindset, we would not minimize our community's history.' The preservation of Broward's Black history comes at a crucial time: The teaching of Black history has been significantly limited with the passing of Florida's 'Stop Woke' legislation, a statute limiting how race-related issues are taught in schools, colleges and in workplace trainings. As Florida's legislators attempt to make schools and universities sanitize the history of Black trauma and white aggression or omit the achievements of Black Floridians from history lessons, local historians and educators like George are making it their mission to keep history alive. READ: Trump's purge of DEI programs incenses Black leaders in South Florida George is also the founder of Black Broward, an Instagram account devoted to sharing tidbits of Broward County's Black history. The concept started in 2018 when he began sharing Black history facts for the month of February and continuing it when he saw how it resonated with people. The account has nearly 5,000 followers. On it, you'll find stories of Liberia, a historically Black neighborhood in Hollywood, throwback photos of Black people living in Broward, and little known historical facts about the county's Black pioneers such as Dr. Von D. Mizell, who helped establish Provident Hospital for Black Americans, and civil rights activist Eula Mae Johnson. But now George is taking his digital Black Broward concept and making it analog, with Black Broward Flashcards. The flashcards come 24 cards to a deck with three source citation cards, detailing where information on the figures can be found, and are broken down into different regional areas – South, Central and North Broward – that feature prominent figures who lived in or did work in those areas. The cards feature historical places of note and other well known historical figures, such as Dr. James Sistrunk and Broward county educator Joseph A. Ely. RELATED: Sistrunk is seeing increased development. What does it mean for the Black community? The project was done in collaboration with David Paulo, also known by his online moniker ShotByLeather, who chronicles historical landmarks in Broward County. The duo, along with Samuel Woods, created an online platform, that chronicles Black history and culture through social and digital platforms. George said the flashcards, which will be sold through the website for $20, are great for card collectors and can help students, but he also emphasized, 'It's also a cool and creative way to educate people beyond the classroom.' George hopes the flashcards, which tell Walker's story and those of other Black activists and civil rights pioneers, will be used in classrooms to teach students about their local Black history, something he said he wasn't exposed to as a student in Hollywood. 'There really wasn't much being taught of Black history, just being honest,' he said. 'Just, you know, Rosa Parks, Martin Luther King had a dream, and that was really it. A lot of the history I learned was actually outside of school.' 'A younger generation that is hungry for our stories' George had always been a history buff and knowledgeable about Black history as told to him by his dad. 'I had to tell it to him because we have to know where we come from and who we are,' his father, also named Emmanuel George, told the Herald. 'It makes me feel good knowing that he knows about himself, about his past, about his history – our history. I'm happy that he is where he is, being conscious.' George was born in Overtown but moved to Hollywood in 2002 where he graduate from South Broward High School and later attended Broward College and Full Sail University in Central Florida to study film. But his interest in Black history deepened after seeing historian and retired professor Marvin Dunn's documentary 'Black Miami in the 20th Century.' 'When I stumbled upon that, I'm like OK, there's a Black Miami, there has to be a Black Broward,' George said. It wasn't until he read former Florida Atlantic University professor and Miami Herald reporter Kitty Oliver's book, 'Voices of America: Race and Change in Hollywood, Florida,' that he affirmed his love for preserving Black history. George loved the book so much he emailed Oliver to connect with her about her work. Their connection led Oliver to recommend him for an African American archive project in Lake Wales, a city near Lakeland, Fla., where George interviewed residents from the historic Lincoln Avenue community and archived their stories. 'He already had such a good grasp of South Florida history through some creative work he'd been doing in Miami,' she told the Herald. The Lake Wells project led to back-to-back fellowships for George, including the CoGenerators fellowship in San Francisco. Prior to his work on the project, he produced his first film in 2016 under the Black Broward Film Project, 'The Tale of Sibling Communities: Liberia and Danie.' He would go on to produce a second film in 2021, 'Stories from our Ancestors: An Ode to Attucks High School,' that focused on how closing a historically Black high school affected Liberia and neighboring communities. His work is available on The Hub, a YouTube account also run by George and his partners, where people curious about Broward Black history and culture can browse through footage and films. George's work also earned him the honor of being the youngest person in Broward County to have his own special collections archive, the Emmanuel George Collection held at the African American Research Library. (That record was later claimed by Paulo.) The collection includes physical and digitally archived information on the history of Attucks High School. 'Emmanuel represents something that I think we need to be reminded of, especially my generation and the elders, there may tend to be a sense that younger people are not knowledgeable about our history or not interested in that. That is absolutely not true,' she said. 'Emmanuel is indicative of a younger generation that is hungry for our stories and hungry to learn from the past and learn from history and how it can apply to them today and use that as a foundation to move forward.' 'People like him are a crucial part of Black history right now because they see the importance of history that came before,' she continued. 'There's an authenticity' George's work was crucial in helping actor Wood Harris, perhaps most known for his iconic role as Avon Barksdale on HBO's 'The Wire,' find more information on his dad, who was in the first graduating class of Attucks High School in Hollywood. Harris' cousin Pam Walker saw a photo posted on George's Black Broward Instagram page and contacted him about it. 'I got their first graduation class photo there and she was able to identify him,' George said, 'and then I also found a couple newspaper clippings about their father taking part in fishing tournaments at Ojus, which is now Aventura.' George said Harris thanked him with a video message. 'It resonates with people, because there's an authenticity about history, because it's all factual,' said George's friend and business partner Woods, 'but it's also telling our stories the way that we want them told, and making sure that it's an intergenerational connection between our elders and our youth.' The two met five years ago and Woods described George as a humble and giving person, having made him the godfather of his daughter. That same spirit and love for history and preservation is how Paulo and George connected. Paulo, who is a landmark photographer, said their work goes hand in hand. Still, he emphasized he learned his Black history through George's work. 'I'm kind of a late bloomer on learning the history around me. A lot of big cities, it feels, get their history plastered everywhere, like New York, Chicago, L.A., but when it came to Broward, I didn't know that these were the people who are the pioneers for a lot of stuff going on in my community,' said the Lauderhill native. Woods said George's work is more important now than ever with efforts to suppress teaching Black history in schools and anti-diversity, equity and inclusion efforts across the board. 'I think that it's just progressively gotten worse in our school system, where the information is just not available,' He said. 'Either they're removing it or it was never there from the start… You don't get to know these people, their stories, their journey, their why, the who, the whens and the wheres, and you literally have to dig for them. And that's why the work that Emmanuel does and that we're doing and assisting with is just so imperative, especially with our elders leaving us every day.' George acknowledged the challenges that lie ahead when it comes to teaching and preserving Black history, but he is undeterred. 'I truly feel that yeah, there's a lot of efforts to suppress Black history, but I truly do know that we will always still be able to teach Black history,' he said. 'It might be through the flash cards. It might be through coloring books ... so many different ways.'
