Florida Education Association - Collective Bargaining and Conflict

Collective Bargaining and Conflict

Despite the fragmentation of the FEA, teachers in Florida still were able to achieve a major collective bargaining victory. The militancy of the teachers' unions in Florida, combined with continuing concern over the 1968 strike, prompted the Florida state legislature in 1974 to enact a public employee collective bargaining law. Pat Tornillo helped draft the bill.

Tornillo quickly came to control FEA-United. Although he was not elected president of the federation until 1978, a position he held until 2000, he was the dominant force within the new AFT state federation. In 1981, he was elected a vice president of the AFT and sat on the AFT executive council's influential executive committee.

Under Tornillo, FEA-United proved to be very influential within the Florida AFL-CIO. A quarter of the AFL-CIO's state membership belonged to FEA-United, and the union began exercising its political muscle. In 1993, FEA-United, working with AFCSME, unseated 16-year incumbent state AFL-CIO president Danny Miller. With FEA-United's support, the post was won by Marilyn Lenard, president of the Space Coast Labor Council and a CWA member.

However, conflict between FEA-United and FTP-NEA continued. In March 1983, the AFT successfully raided the FTP-NEA's large Broward Teachers Union (BTU). The AFT had forced an election for a new bargaining representative three times between 1975 and 1979 but had failed to win the elections. After the 1983 victory, Tony Gentile, a veteran AFT activist, became the new BTU president. In 1990, the AFT also successfully raided the Volusia Education Association, another large FTP-NEA local.

In addition to raiding, both organizations also organized new members. For example, in 1990 FEA-United successfully organized a unit of about 450 blue-collar workers in the Hernando County school district. In 1998, full-time faculty at Miami-Dade Community College also voted to join FEA-United. In fact, during the 1980s both state unions put a high priority on organizing education support professionals across the state. It was during this period that the character of the two organizations changed from being unions that only represented teachers, to representing all categories of public school employees.

But there were losses on both sides as well. In 1980, the Hillsborough Classroom Teachers Association, the Collier County Education Association, and the Hendry County Education Association disaffiliated from FEA-United over Tornillo's increasingly dictatorial approach to running the state union, and became independent unions. Four years later all three locals chose to become affiliates of the Florida Teaching Profession-National Education Association. In 1982 the United Faculty of Florida, representing university faculty on all campuses of Florida's State University System, as well as a number of communinity college faculties, switched affiliation from FEA/United to FTP-NEA. In addition, in 1985 the FEA/United affiliate in Charlotte County was defeated by the two new FTP-NEA affiliates and lost the right to represent teachers and support personnel. In 1998, the Sarasota County Classified/Teachers Association—FEA-United's fourth-largest affiliate—voted to become independent as well, arguing that FEA-United had not done enough to service the local's contract.

But despite the conflict, the two unions remained remarkably evenly-matched. By 1987, FTP-NEA's membership had risen to about 37,000 members, while FEA-United's membership stood at about 30,000 members. By 2000, when the two unions merged, FTP-NEA membership had risen to 60,000 while FEA-United had 45,000.