Torey Alston Should Have Known Better
The Sun Sentinel has the official story about nursing exam scores, registration problems and Torey Alston's management style.
Maybe every one of those complaints is legitimate. But that's not the story people who understand Broward politics are talking about.
The political story is much simpler: Torey Alston got crosswise with Alexis Yarbrough. And Alexis Yarbrough is Shane Strum's wife.
That is a considerably more interesting problem to have.
Anyone who has spent five minutes around Broward politics knows Shane Strum isn't simply the husband of a college board member. He's the CEO of Broward Health. More importantly for this story, he was Gov. Ron DeSantis' chief of staff.
After leaving the governor's office, DeSantis specifically said that Strum would advise him on important appointments during his second term. Today, Strum runs Broward Health and is serving as interim CEO of Memorial Healthcare System.
Let me spell it out for those of you who aren't as well versed in politics: Shane Strum remains one of the most influential people in the governor's orbit in Broward County.
In other words, Shane isn't exactly sitting in Lighthouse Point playing pickleball and wondering what everybody in Tallahassee is up to.
And Torey Alston knows this world better than most.
DeSantis appointed Alston to the Broward County Commission in 2021. Then he appointed him to the Broward School Board.
Then Alston landed at Broward College.
The board unanimously selected him in January 2025. Yarbrough called his legislative experience and community relationships the combination that made him the “obvious choice.”
Everybody was happy. Until apparently, they weren't.
FORGET NURSING FOR A MINUTE, BECAUSE THIS IS WHERE THE STORY GETS GOOD.
Late last year, someone filed a complaint involving Yarbrough with the Florida Department of Education Inspector General. Alston didn't stay out of it.
According to Alston's own email, he became Broward College's principal institutional point of contact with the Inspector General and cooperated with the investigation.
And here's the sentence in Alston's own words that explains more about this fight than a thousand words about nursing scores: Yarbrough told Alston she believed he was “connected to or supportive of the underlying complaint.”
That's a political knife fight.
Instead of easing her fears, he decided to double down. Alston subsequently fired a senior executive whose hiring and retention Yarbrough had advocated. The relationship went downhill from there.
He fought with the board over what he believed was interference in his authority. His first-year evaluation became contentious. He challenged the accuracy of board records.
Alston's own chronology says Trustee Michael Caschette raised concerns about his leadership Aug. 10 and asked the college's general counsel how to put the matter on the Aug. 25 board agenda.
Torey being Torey, he didn't exactly respond by sending everyone a fruit basket.
At 7:15 a.m. Aug. 12, he fired off an 11 page formal complaint of his own.
Retaliation.
Board interference.
Contract issues.
Inaccurate records.
Possible Sunshine Law violations.
He even asked that certain trustee communications be referred to the Broward State Attorney's Office!
The Sun Sentinel reported that Alston filed the complaint after learning of his potential termination. But don't get the two complaints confused.
Complaint No. 1 involved Yarbrough.
Alston was enough of a participant that Yarbrough believed he was connected to it.
Complaint No. 2 was Alston's response after he learned his own head was on the chopping block.
Alston hit send at 7:15 Wednesday morning. By 7:00 p.m. that night a Broward College webpage showed a special meeting for Aug. 19 with one item on the agenda:
Terminate Torey Alston without cause.
Was Alston's complaint the last straw or was he already getting fired? Did dropping an 11-page grenade on the board chair speed things up?
I don't know the answer.
But I know this: The fight didn't begin Wednesday. And it sure as hell didn't begin with a nursing exam. It began inside the tiny political universe that has dominated Republican appointments and power in Broward for years.
Torey's entire political career has been spent navigating precisely the world in which Shane has enormous influence.
Which is why getting himself mixed up in a complaint involving Alexis Yarbrough was one hell of a career choice. He was picking a fight inside the same political network that had helped make his career possible.
There is really only one guy in Broward Republican politics who has gone toe to toe with Shane Strum lately, beaten him and lived to brag about it.
Me.
I beat Shane on an emergency room in Pompano. Hell, he took it so well that Broward Health practically packed up and left town afterward.
(Shane, I know you're still mad about it. Love you too, buddy. Let's get a drink soon.)
So, Torey should've called me first. Going up against Shane Strum is hard enough.
Going up against Shane Strum's wife?
Torey, that's suicide.