2020 Votes – State House District 60
This has entrenched Republican incumbent Jackie Toledo being challenged by local Democratic activist Julie Jenkins. I have met with Jackie Toledo a couple of years ago and call her voice to provide input on important issues. Since she and I rarely see eye-to-eye, it’s no surprise she didn’t call in response to my ballot call. (I should note that I have a long-standing policy of calling candidates for local offices to speak with them directly prior to voting for them. Don’t call, you don’t get my vote, it doesn’t matter where you stand on the issues.)
Ms. Jenkins did call. We wound up having a lengthy discussion, and I believe she would best represent the interests of this district and the region. She believes in the Second Amendment but thinks we are a point of having to have some reasonable controls. She, like me, believes there is a place for Charter Schools that offer highly specialized instructional environments, but thinks most of the money for public education should go to public education, and that charter should have to comply with all the same regulations and requirements as the Public Schools.
In the meeting I had with Jackie Toledo I suggested giving the money going to Charters back to the public schools so they could fix what she thinks is broken. Toledo’s response was, “They’re broken and they can’t be fixed.” Those were exact and emphatic words. Toledo was part of the Legislature following the Marjory Stoneman Douglas shooting, and on a day when students from that school traveled to Tallahassee to lobby lawmakers, Republicans, in a clear shot across the bow to those students and with great disrespect for the losses they’d experienced, proceeded (while the students were there) to hold a vote on a bill to further reduce gun regulation in Florida. Toledo voted, as she always does, with the Republicans. She’s never taken a stand contrary to the Republican leadership. She’s never available in her district, and there’s some weird shit in her personal life as her husband, a practicing attorney here in Tampa. He suddenly shut down his office and disappeared with his client’s money, apparently leaving the country.1
Now I wouldn’t care about her personal life except Toledo had no problem toeing the party line when it came to telling LGBT people how to live theirs and who they could love. So just “f” her.
Obviously I’m voting for Julie Jenkins and would strongly suggest you do. This election cycle, for only about the third time in my life I’ve made contributions, and Ms. Jenkins got one from me.
- “State Supreme Court disbars attorney accused of vanishing with clients’ cash,” Fox 13 News, , Gloria Gomez, May 29, 2020 [↩]
