Proposition 123

This week the citizens of Arizona are voting on a proposition to increase K-12 school funding.  It will amend the State Constitution and, among other things, prohibit any entities from trying to enforce a previous court order to fully fund education as mandated by the voters in 2000.  It will raid the State Land Trust, which was set up by the federal government over a century ago to support public education, by raising the payout from the land investments and sales to 6.9% from the current 2.2%, a fiscally irresponsible plan.

In 2014, the Arizona Supreme Court ruled that the public schools should get $317 million in new  (additional)  funding in 2015, after a judge found the state shorted the public-school system for four years during the recession. The total tab, over the next five years,  would have been $2.9 billion which included $1.3 billion for inflation costs lawmakers didn't fund during the recession. 

At the same time the Legislature was cutting budgets, including K-12, lawmakers approved tax cuts that started to phase in during the summer of 2013. In just one year, an estimated $183 million in tax reductions took effect, aimed at attracting business to the state (which has never materialized).

What we are currently voting on (Prop 123) will fund education for only the next 10 years.  After that the legislature will have a free hand, and no legal obligation to maintain funding levels.  It is projected that per pupil spending (which will only rise by $300) will plummet at the end of those 10 years.

I will be voting "NO" because it abdicates the legislature's responsibility to fund what the citizens demanded in 2000.  Republican lawmakers in Arizona believe they are immune to the rule of law. 

I will have none of it!