Senate proposal to codify ‘Office of Faith and Community’ ready for the floor

Republican Sen. Clay Yarborough’s measure (SB 820) to codify the Office of Faith and Community in the executive branch is ready for the floor.

Yarborough told the Senate Appropriations Committee that the initiative follows up on Gov. Ron DeSantis in 2019 launching “the Governor’s Faith and Community Initiative to support faith and community organizations serving vulnerable Floridians.”

“This included the administrative establishment of the Office of Faith and Community within the EOG and assigning resources and staff to assist with administrative and programmatic implementation of the initiative,” the Jacksonville Republican said.

The goal of the bill, according to Yarborough, is to “codify the work of the office by defining the purpose of the office of Faith and Community, detailing the establishment of the office, specifying the responsibilities of the Liaison for Faith and Community” and to show the “performance and priority of it.”

The Office would be headed by “the liaison for faith and community or a director appointed by the liaison who reports to the liaison,” according to the bill language.

The Governor would appoint the Director.

The goal of the Office would be “to better connect with, communicate with, and provide resources to this state’s faith-based and community based organizations” and to “better serve the most vulnerable persons of this state through more robust and connected faith and community networks in coordination with state resources.”

The bill contemplates a number of ways to make this happen, including advocating for faith- or community-based agencies; establishing and operating the “Florida Faith and Community Phone Line” for those agencies to connect with the Governor’s Office; setting up “meaningful lines of communication” between these groups and the Governor’s Office; and using technology to develop “resources for enhanced connection between civil service systems, state agencies, and faith-based and community-based organizations.”

Ahead of the vote to advance the measure, Democratic Sen. Tina Scott Polsky pressed Yarborough about the “interaction” with Hope Florida, which shared a “liaison” — Erik Dellenback — with the Office of Faith and Community (OFC).

Yarborough noted that Dellenback, who stepped down from the former amid the ongoing controversy related to programming legal settlement funds into political activity, is still with the OFC. Yarborough would not speak to whether it was “appropriate” for state money to be used to message against constitutional amendments, and didn’t want to speculate about the question given his limited knowledge of that issue.

In debate, Polsky questioned whether the office had fully informed Yarborough of its political actions and the full scope of what it does given messaging against weed and abortion amendments.

She also said it was “upsetting” for her religious perspective — she’s Jewish — “to be marginalized,” warning against the emergence of a “faith-based government” and this group’s “connection with Hope Florida.”

“Just putting faith at the top echelons of our government to me is not correct and not right. We are all not of the same faith. We are all not people who have particular faith. There are a lot of people who don’t,” Polsky said.

“And so I think our government needs to be completely agnostic in that sense. Everyone can believe what they want to believe. Everyone can practice what they want to practice, but don’t force it on the rest of us, and that’s how this Office makes me feel. How this bill makes me feel. And how so much of what we do in general makes me feel.”

Asked by Senate Democratic Leader Jason Pizzo if the Faith and Community Initiative should be used as a “vehicle, vessel, or instrumentality of political messaging,” Yarborough said the “Office should focus on what the Office is designed to do.”

Pizzo warned that the conflation of faith-based initiatives and political messaging works to “desecrate the sanctity and the special nature of your pure and innocent faith in God by imbuing it with any participation whatsoever of political messaging.

“I want to understand why we’re codifying faith in our secular government,” added Democratic Sen. Lori Berman.

Yarborough said 3 out of 4 Floridians have faith affiliation and therefore “faith is something that is important to the vast majority of Floridians out there.”

In his close, he added that the Constitution doesn’t guarantee a separation of church and state, and that the belief it does stems from a Thomas Jefferson letter asserting that it is there.

The bill has completed the committee process in the House and is on the Second Reading Calendar.