Broward school employees will face stricter rules related to campaign activities after three school police detectives posed in uniform for photos endorsing School Board candidates.
Detectives John Mastrianni, Ken Cowley and Karey Bambino took part in endorsement photos for their union, the Police Benevolent Association. The union endorsed four candidates for School Board: incumbents Torey Alston, Daniel Foganholi and Debbi Hixon as well as Jason Loring, who is challenging incumbent Sarah Leonardi.
Election Day is Tuesday, with early voting underway through Sunday.
Photos posted on the union’s Facebook page July 18 show Mastrianni, Cowley and Bambino in uniform with Alston and Foganholi. Mastrianni and Cowley appear in photos with Hixon and Loring posted on Aug. 8.
In all the photos except Hixon, union President Rod Skirvin, who is not a district employee, is holding up endorsement letters with the candidates.
The officers were participating in the photos during their own time, district spokesman John Sullivan told the South Florida Sun Sentinel.
Many local and state law enforcement agencies have policies prohibiting officers from wearing uniforms when participating in political activities. But the Broward School District has no explicit policy or procedure addressing the matter, at least not yet.
“I’m suspecting there might be one in the future. We don’t have anything right now,” Skirvin told the Sun Sentinel.
He said normally if officers are in uniform, the union will black out any references to their agency in the endorsement photos. He said this was “an oversight” by the Broward Police Benevolent Association.
“We’re endorsing them. We don’t want anyone to think these are endorsements of the school district,” Skirvin said.
Sullivan said the employees have a right to participate in unions and participate in politics on their own time.
“However, their personal views do not represent or reflect the position of the District. The District will implement guidelines that prevent the use of the District name and/or uniforms while participating in activities outside of the employee’s District function,” Sullivan said in an email.
Mastrianni, Cowley and Bambino could not be reached for comment, despite attempts by phone and email.
Hixon told the Sun Sentinel she was endorsed by the Police Benevolent Association weeks ago but was only asked last week to pose for the photo, which she said she took the morning of Aug. 8. The question about the officers wearing their uniforms came to her attention after the photo had been posted, she said.
“I don’t know whether it is or is not allowed,” she said. “I didn’t think about it honestly until somebody said something later and saw the picture. I didn’t post it. Someone did mention it, but the PBA should know the answer.”
She said General Counsel Marylin Batista may also need to determine if the practice is acceptable.
“At the end of the day, that’s not my job,” Hixon said. “I think they did it with everyone. It wasn’t just me.”
Alston declined to comment. Loring and Foganholi could not be reached.
State law says that a government employee “may not participate in any political campaign for an elective office while on duty,” but doesn’t address whether they can wear a government-issued uniform if they are off duty.
A federal law known as the Hatch Act bans the practice for federal agencies as well as some other agencies that receive federal funding. It’s unclear whether that applies to the district’s police department.
“There’s a whole plethora of opinions on what falls under the Hatch Act,” said Mark Herron, a Tallahassee lawyer specializing in election law.
But Herron said a 2007 opinion from the Florida Commission on Ethics suggests “if there is no agency policy against it, they can probably do it.”
The Ethics Commission was asked at the time whether a law enforcement officer for the Sarasota Sheriff’s Office, who is also running to become sheriff, would be misusing his position to wearing his uniform while campaigning. The commission said no, that state law only bars public employees from “corruptly” using or trying to use their positions for political benefit.
Regardless, it’s a bad practice for school district employees to wear their uniforms to endorse candidates, said Allen Zeman, a School Board member who was endorsed by the Police Benevolent Association in 2022 for his current four-year term.
“These are employees of a government agency that are engaging in campaign activities for someone to be elected to be a School Board member who will vote on their salaries,” Zeman said. “It is inappropriate for an officer in uniform to participate in any political photo ops.”
One of the officers in the photo, Detective Mastrianni, has received scrutiny from Zeman and several other School Board members after he arrested Debbie Espinoza, a longtime district volunteer, on Oct. 18.
She was accused of battery on a law enforcement officer, a felony, following a heated meeting on sex education. Espinoza spent 27 hours in jail.
The School Board asked then-Superintendent Peter Licata to conduct a review of the matter, and a consultant’s report from a former school police chief in Sarasota concluded that the arrest should have been avoided.
The report found that just prior to the arrest, Mastrianni appeared to move into Espinoza’s “personal space,” which caused her to bump into him. The Broward State Attorney’s Office declined to pursue the case, saying there was no evidence Espinoza intentionally struck the detective. Licata decided not to investigate Mastrianni further.
In June, amid complaints from some advisory groups that Mastrianni was renewed for the 2024-25 school year, several board members asked current Superintendent Howard Hepburn to consider conducting an investigation on Mastrianni. But by that time, a six-month window under state law to investigate complaints against law enforcement officers had already passed, Hepburn said in a recent memo to the board. Hepburn said the district updated its procedures and provided officers de-escalation training.
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