As was expected, the state legislature moved quickly to begin the process of killing earned sick time at the local level. Back in October, WONO warned that “Without a Vote Soon, Sick Time Will Die” because of legislative pre-emption.
The state legislature can pass a law at any time – and they do it often around the country – about what regulations and ordinances local counties or cities can pass. And now, Sen. David Simmons (R-Altamonte Springs) and Rep. Steve Precourt (R-Orlando) have indeed signaled they will work to prevent local counties from adopting earned sick time measures. This would force a statewide measure to enact sick time for workers.
Citizens for a Greater Orange County collected the 50,000+ petition signatures needed for a citizen initiative to qualify for the ballot. However, after the County Commission followed the Chamber of Commerce’s orders to stall and keep the measure off the November ballot, organizers with the group shifted focus away from pushing for an election and moved into the courtroom.
Citizens sued the County over text messages with lobbyists and for keeping the measure off the ballot, but have not pushed for a special election. The court decision technically left that door open, but it was not pursued publicly.
If legislation is successful in Tallahassee, poof, all of those signatures are now worthless. This is why it was so important for interested groups to work on getting a vote as soon as possible, even if it ended up being a special election early this year. Now, if the legislature acts, everything around earned sick time locally will die and this exercise ends with a few lingering lawsuits that may never gain traction.
And the people will never have the chance to cast a vote on earned sick time in Orange County.
[…] to weigh in. Sen. David Simmons (R-Altamonte Springs) and Rep. Steve Precourt (R-Orlando) have signaled they are working on pre-emption legislation backed by the Chamber of Commerce that would prevent local counties from adopting earned sick time […]