Affordability With Dignity

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I teach business analytics, so I follow the numbers wherever they go. The numbers on Florida affordability are alarming. The total monthly cost of owning a median home in Florida now runs about $2,921, which means a family needs roughly $117,000 in annual income just to qualify. Florida's median household income is $72,000. That gap is a crisis, and it is hitting Hillsborough County harder than almost anywhere else.

 

In South Tampa, I watch teachers commute 40 minutes to their schools because they can no longer afford to live near the kids they teach. I watch neighbors open their homeowners insurance renewal letter and stop paying their mortgage to keep up. Florida insurance premiums now average $5,600 a year, 181 percent above the national average. The Legislature has had four sessions to fix this and has done nothing.

 

Affordability with dignity means the people who keep this community running can afford to stay in it.

Here is my three point plan:

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1) Tackle the insurance crisis at the root. Push for a multi state insurance risk pool, real consumer protections against premium hikes that outpace claim history, and an audit of every insurance carrier that has taken state money while raising rates on Tampa Bay homeowners.

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2) Expand workforce housing in Hillsborough County. Direct state housing dollars to the teachers, nurses, first responders, and small business owners who serve our neighborhoods. Protect renters from sudden, unjustified rent hikes that are pricing families out of South Tampa.

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3) Make state spending answer to working families. Push for required spending audits on every state agency, first time homebuyer incentives that target working class buyers in our region, and a budget that puts affordability ahead of culture war distractions.

 

 

 

Opportunity Through Education

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I am a business professor. I have stood in front of a classroom every week for years. I know what students look like when they feel safe to learn, and I know what they look like when they do not.

 

The Florida classroom in 2026 is more anxious, more politicized, and more under resourced than it should be. Hillsborough County teachers are still earning starting salaries below the cost of living in the county they serve. Public school librarians I know have stopped recommending books to students because they are afraid of losing their jobs under vague new laws. Florida ranks near the bottom of the country in per pupil spending and near the top in legislative interference with what teachers can say.

 

Opportunity through education means a District 65 student gets the same shot I had when I came to this country: a classroom where they're seen, a teacher who is paid and protected, and a future that depends on what they learn.

Here is my three point plan:

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1) Pay Florida teachers what they are worth. Push for starting salaries that match the cost of living in Hillsborough County, expand professional support and mentorship, and stop the staffing crisis driving experienced educators out of public schools.

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2) Take politics out of the classroom. Repeal the laws that have silenced teachers and librarians, restore local control over curriculum, and protect every student, especially LGBTQ+ students and students of color, from policies that erase them from the conversation.

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3) Invest in public education from pre K through career. Increase per pupil funding, expand pre K access for working families, and protect Bright Futures, public university funding, and career pathways that give Hillsborough students real options after graduation.

 

 

 

Equality By Inclusion

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I came to the United States at 18 years old with two suitcases and a belief in what this country said about freedom. Jayson and I built our life in South Tampa because Florida felt like a place every family could belong. Over the last four years, the Legislature has worked overtime to make that less true, and nowhere has the damage cut deeper than in healthcare and in the rights of families like mine.

 

I teach business analytics, and the Florida math on healthcare is broken. The cost is being paid by the people the system was supposed to protect. The Legislature passed a six week abortion ban that cuts women off before most know they are pregnant. They refused to expand Medicaid, leaving 1.4 million Floridians in the coverage gap. They let disability service waitlists balloon into the tens of thousands. They cut HIV prevention and ADAP funding that has kept Tampa Bay residents alive and healthy for decades.

 

At the same time, the Legislature has spent four years targeting LGBTQ+ families directly. They passed Don't Say Gay to silence teachers from acknowledging families like mine. They passed HB 1001, an anti DEI law that puts Pride festivals, women and minority owned business programs, and home rule itself at risk.

 

These are not abstract policy choices. They are real families I see in District 65. A neighbor stuck on a Medicaid disability waitlist for years. A friend's daughter who had to leave Florida to get the reproductive care she needed. A community of LGBTQ+ Tampeños watching their doctors lose the right to make medical decisions with their patients.

 

Equality by inclusion means every family in this district can see a doctor, get the medication they need, make their own healthcare decisions, and live without state interference in who they love and how they raise their kids.

Here is my three point plan:

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1) Restore reproductive rights and full reproductive healthcare. Push to repeal Florida's six week abortion ban, restore physician judgment in reproductive care, and protect every woman's right to make decisions about her own body alongside her doctor, not the Legislature.

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2) Expand Medicaid and disability services. Close the coverage gap that leaves 1.4 million Floridians without insurance. Fully fund the iBudget waiver and family care services so disabled Floridians and the families who care for them get the support they are owed without waiting years.

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3) Protect LGBTQ+ families across the board. Pass statewide anti discrimination protections for LGBTQ+ Floridians in housing, employment, and public accommodations. Ban conversion therapy on minors. Protect the parental rights of same sex parents and adoptive families. Defend home rule so Tampa and the whole of Hillsborough County can keep protecting their residents.