The St. Petersburg Times education blog, The Gradebook, interviewed House Pre-K-12 policy chairman John Legg. The interview is mostly about getting kids ready for college and how lean budget times affect education bills this session. But the final question is about good ol’ intelligent design creationism.
It sounds like you have a lot of substantial things to do. And you still have bills coming forward that are really controversial and highly charged. For instance, intelligent design. Do those have a place in your committee this year?
All bills have a place in our committee. Because if a member files a bill, it has a place to be heard. However, I won’t use valuable time in committee to debate bills that really have no chance of moving forward, or for debate for the sake of debating. If there is a movement that it looks as though the body wants to bring it forward, then we’ll bring it forward. But just to debate and talk about a bill that is going to die in the House or the Senate, and it won’t even get to the floor, well, we have more things that are valuable to spend our time on.
Is anything just completely DOA?
Nothing is DOA until session starts.
You can read into that answer most anything you want. Of course, I wouldn’t expect him to come right out and express support or nonsupport for a possible intelligent design creationism bill. So, this noncommital answer is par for the course. We’ll have see what develops down the road while at the same time bugging our senators and representatives about the possible intelligent design creationism bill.
You have been calling your reps, right?
I have been calling and writing, here is a reply from Sen Paula Dockery.
“Senator Dockery voted against this bill last year and her position has not changed”. Warm regards-
Rachel Perrin Rogers
Legislative Assistant
Senator Paula Dockery, 15th District
(850) 487-5043
302 Senate Office Building
404 South Monroe Street
Tallahassee, Florida 32399-1100
I called and thanked her.
Excellent news, Jonathan! Thank you for all of your work.