ST. CLOUD, Fla. – Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis announced on Tuesday that a lawsuit was filed against two textbook publishers, accusing the companies of overcharging Florida school districts for instructional materials.
The Attorney General’s Office filed the lawsuit against McGraw Hill LLC and Savvas Learning Company LLC, claiming the companies knowingly charged certain Florida school districts more than the lowest price they offered to other districts, and withheld cost reductions required by statute.
“They got discounts as they cut deals in other places, and they saved money. Unfortunately for them, Florida law requires the lowest price to be given to our school systems. They did not do that, so we have sued them, and we will hold them accountable,” said Attorney General James Uthmeier.
Press play above to watch the lawsuit announcement
According to DeSantis, the lawsuit was filed following a whistleblower complaint to the Attorney General’s Office. The governor said officials learned some of the state’s school districts were being “overcharged by millions of dollars” for the instructional materials.
DeSantis said the lawsuit states there have been at least 5,900 instances of overcharges by the textbook publishers and gave an example of the Osceola County School District, which he said was overcharged by more than $279,000.
At least five Northeast Florida school districts are listed among the districts potentially impacted by the alleged overcharges, including Clay County, Alachua County, Nassau County, St. Johns County, Columbia County and Putnam County.
“This is something that’s significant. Those resources should be going to the school districts, to the teachers and doing ways that are going to be productive, not to pad the profits of textbook companies who are not following the letter of the law,” DeSantis said.
A spokesperson with Savvas Learning Company sent a statement to News4JAX in response to the state’s allegations, saying in part that it did not charge Florida school districts more than the state contract price.
Read the full statement below:
“Savvas Learning Company has policies and procedures in place to comply with applicable statutes governing the procurement of instructional materials. We have always been, and continue to be, committed to complying with all laws and regulations pertaining to the sale of our instructional materials. We never charged Florida school districts more than the state contract price.
We will not publicly comment any further on this litigation and will defend our company vigorously against the allegations made by the Florida attorney general."
Richard Weir, Director, Corporate Communications and Public Relations
News4JAX reached out to McGraw Hill requesting comment on the lawsuit, and we are waiting to hear back.