The group was led by Ms. Lynette Estrada, a public school special education teacher from his district.  On April 18th she had travelled all the way from Miami to Tallahassee to ask Villalobos for his support of the bill.  He told her and other parents that if the language requiring the "65% solution" was removed from the amendment, he would vote for the bill.  That language was removed, and he still voted no.  No press covered the event, but a letter to the editor sent by Ms. Estrada was published in the Herald this morning.

At about 4:00, about 20 parents and children walked into Sen. Villalobos's tiny Miami office. 

First to greet us was his aide, Vicki, who immediately yelled at Ms. Estrada, saying "I don't know why you don't understand and why we have to fight about this on the phone, this has nothing to do with the McKay scholarship program (for disabled children)."

The aide calmed down a bit, but continued to tell our parents that the amendment had nothing to do with McKay, that it was for Opportunity Scholarships and that our parents clearly didn't understand or hadn't read the bill.  Much to their credit, our visibly uncomfortable parents stood their ground even as they were told they didn't understand and were uneducated.  Michael Benjamin, executive director of Florida Alliance for Choices in Education, stepped in to point out to the aide that our parents did know exactly what they were talking about and that the bill was written for the sole purpose of protecting the remaining scholarship programs so they didn't meet the same fate as OSP.

Our parents asked over and over again why Mr. Villalobos had said he would support the bill and then didn't.  The aide took the position du jour: McKay is worth saving, but it shouldn't be in the same sentence with any other voucher program.

The second aide we met with was less defensive, and for a good reason: her grandson is a special needs student on a McKay scholarship.  She works for the sole purpose of making up the difference between his McKay scholarship and what the school costs.  She told us she never sees a penny of her paycheck, because it goes directly to his education.  She said Mr. Villalobos is very concerned about McKay, but failed to answer why he won't protect it.  They said McKay is not broken, so why allow it to go to the voters and possibly lose if it's been working fine for six years?  Benjamin explained that the OSP program worked fine for five years, too, until it was struck down.

She then said, "Mr. Meyer (the lead attorney challenging the voucher program) said if he was going to challenge McKay he would've done it years ago."  At that point we jumped in and told her that she was mistaken.  Mr. Meyer had, in fact, said that if he had known how slow the process of winding through the courts with OSP was going to be, he would've sued on McKay to begin with:

Ron Meyer, the lawyer who has shepherded the case for voucher opponents for six years through trial and appeals court, said that if he had known the case would languish in the appeals court for two years, he might have added the McKay program to the lawsuit.

Still, he believes that a ruling striking down Opportunity Scholarships would lead to the McKay program's downfall.  That program also sends money from the state treasury to religious schools — as will the state's pre-kindergarten program that begins this fall.

"McKay, pre-K — they both suffer from the same constitutional infirmity," Meyer said.

All the parents and children retired to the landing outside the office because it was getting too warm and crowded inside. When they stepped out, they found about 15 more parents and children had arrived and were listening from outside. 

They wrote their thoughts, names and phone numbers down on a piece of paper, which the aides said they would fax to the Senator and ask him to respond to at least Ms. Estrada to account for his change of position.

As the participants were outside, a few of us stayed inside with the two aides.  We figured the first aide who had been so hostile would be much less defensive without so many people around.  After chatting with her casually, we suggested that it seemed like the disconnect between their position and ours was a disagreement as to whether or not the McKay program is in danger.  We again reiterated what Meyer had said and that the ACLU had also threatened the legislature on the Pre-K program.  We also explained to them that because the Supreme Court was silent on the state's Blaine Amendment, the current law of the land is that programs that allow public money to go to faith-based institutions are still illegal.  Based on that fact, it would be easy for anyone to sue and win against McKay because it does just that.  All this information seemed to be new to her.  She became more friendly to Ms. Estrada, faxed the list of names in front of her and gave her a copy of the list and the fax confirmation to take home.

Some of the best stuff happened after the meeting: several McKay schools we haven't been in touch with were present and all indicated they would like to engage.  They invited Benjamin to come down during the summer to address their parents and were encouraged to sign up for his newsletter in the meantime.  Every single parent we spoke to said, "whatever you need me for, even if it's just a face, to help these programs, I will be there."

I think it was exhilarating for them to feel like they could have an outlet for their concerns.

Jenny Rothenberg is the communications director for the Florida Alliance for Choices in Education.