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Florida Judge Rules Drug Testing for State Workers Unconstitutional.

Here is one that I would think will go on to the higher courts.   Florida Governor, Rick Scott, proposed that all 85,000 Florida State workers have drug tests.

The judge rejected the proposal. He ruled that the Governor provided no evidence of a drug problem among Florida State Workers.

According to an article in NBC Miami…”The ACLU and a government worker’s union also filed a lawsuit last year challenging Scott’s order to drug test state employees, saying the testing violates the Fourth Amendment by subjecting state workers to an unreasonable search without adequate suspicion that they used drugs. Scott, who suspended drug testing for state employees in June, said he will appeal Thursday’s ruling.

“As I have repeatedly explained, I believe that drug testing state employees is a common sense means of ensuring a safe, efficient and productive workforce,” Scott said in a statement. “That is why so many private employers drug test, and why the public and Florida’s taxpayers overwhelmingly support this policy.”

Attorneys for the governor’s office had argued there is adequate statistical evidence in years of national studies about workplace drug use and its dangers to justify the order. They also reasoned that employees aren’t being forced to take state jobs and that they can find employment elsewhere if they don’t want to be drug tested.”

It should be noted that this ruling pertains to the drug testing of public employees.  There is no modification of the law where drug tests can be mandated by private employers.  Healthcare facilities and other areas in the private sector typically regulate mandatory drug testing as part of their employment screening programs.

 

By Gordon Basichis

Gordon Basichis is the Co-Founder of Corra Group, specializing in pre-employment background checks and corporate research. He has been a marketing and media executive and has worked in the entertainment industry, the financial, health care and technology sectors. He is the author of the best selling Beautiful Bad Girl, The Vicki Morgan Story, a non-fiction novel that helped define exotic sexuality in the late twentieth century. He is the author of the Constant Travellers and has recently completed a new book, The Guys Who Spied for China, dealing with Chinese Espionage in the United States. He has been a journalist for several newspapers and is a screenwriter and producer.

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