On Tuesday, Aug. 15, the United Faculty of Florida (UFF), the UFF chapter at the University of South Florida and three individual faculty members who were laid off from the University of South Florida filed suit in federal court to challenge the SB 266 arbitration ban and to protect union contracts in Florida’s university system. The SB 266 arbitration ban gives final decision-making authority over personnel disputes to university presidents instead of a neutral, unbiased arbitrator. With this ban, the State of Florida has upended decades of precedent that have ensured the Sunshine State’s university faculty are treated fairly and equitably in our workplaces.
In this case, we collectively challenge the university’s refusal to arbitrate layoffs, despite local contractual requirements to do so, and we fight for the property rights of public employees in their continued employment under the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. The full filing can be accessed here.
UFF and its members continue to believe that it is a fundamental right of every American to receive a fair hearing before a neutral decisionmaker when their rights are under attack, in the workplace and beyond. Today, we continue our fight to protect our members and their families, all of whom work every day to make Florida a better place for all people of all beliefs and backgrounds.
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CONTACT: Andrew Gothard, UFF President, andrew.gothard@floridaea.org, (205) 389-4981
UFF is the higher education affiliate of the Florida Education Association and an affiliate of the National Education Association, American Federation of Teachers and AFL-CIO, representing more than 25,000 higher education professionals across Florida’s public and private universities, state and community colleges, graduate programs, and K-12 lab schools.
