Issues to Watch in Legislative Session
Elected leaders in the Florida House and Senate are meeting in Tallahassee as part of their 60-day regular session that kicked off this week. A team of our Central Florida Public Media reporters joins Engage. They’re following developments from the Florida Legislature that may impact life for Central Floridians.
Environment Reporter Molly Duerig discusses the State Land Management bill filed following backlash to last year’s Great Outdoors Initiative that would have added pickleball courts, golf, and lodging to state parks. Reporter Joe Byrnes discusses a proposal to change the criminal justice system and divert nonviolent defendants to mental health treatment resources. Lillian Hernández Caraballo who covers housing and homelessness and is a Report for America Corps member, explains a bill related to housing for legally verified agricultural workers. Reporter Rick Brunson focuses on immigration and breaks down a plan being considered to expand E-Verify.
Mass Layoffs Hit Central Florida Federal Workers
The impacts of federal jobs cuts are being felt in our Central Florida communities. Even with the uncertainty over whether the firings are legal, people are losing their jobs by the thousands under the Trump administration and Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency. About 80% of the federal civilian workforce is outside of Washington D.C. They’re workers like Doug Jackson, a U.S. Marine veteran of the Iraq War living in Orlando. He applied to work at the IRS in May of last year. After successfully going through months of onboarding and completing the hiring process, he was just five weeks into his public affairs job at the IRS when he was fired at the end of February. Jackson was technically a probationary employee because he had transferred to a new agency in a new position. But before his time at the IRS, he already had more than three years of experience as a federal contractor. Prior to that, he worked for NASA for 4 years. Doug Jackson joins Engage in studio to talk about the misconceptions he thinks people have about probationary federal employees losing their jobs right now.
Peyton Perry is 17 years into her career at FCC Coleman. The Federal Correctional Complex that houses inmates near Wildwood is one of Sumter County’s largest employers. Perry is a contract specialist there and member of the American Federation of Government Employees Local 506 union who travels to D.C. as a legislative coordinator to meet with lawmakers. She joins Engage to discuss her concerns that federal DOGE job cuts could create an unsafe atmosphere for inmates, employees, and the surrounding Central Florida community. She begins our conversation by describing the email she received last week requiring federal employees to justify their job.
Goodwill Achiever of the Year
We’re taking just a couple of minutes to tell you about a Central Floridian striving to make his community a better place. Deltona resident Geo Acosta was recognized as the “Goodwill Achiever of the Year” for his work uplifting others in Central Florida.
