Goldwater Report Finds School Funding Not Getting To Classrooms, Teachers

Goldwater Report Finds School Funding Not Getting To Classrooms, Teachers

By B. Hamilton |

Two topics that arise year after year, teacher’s salaries and public-school budgets, are often misunderstood and misrepresented. In fact, many say the RedForEd movement was created and nurtured with those misunderstandings and misrepresentations.

The misunderstanding and misrepresentation has led to frustration for taxpayers and parents. Many of whom feel that no matter how much they pay in taxes, nothing seems to get better in kids’ classrooms.

A new study by the Goldwater Institute indicates those feelings and frustrations might be justified.

According to Goldwater, the “20×2020” plan, approved by Arizona lawmakers in 2018, was designed to provide enough funding to give Arizona teachers a 20% raise. However, Goldwater has discovered that schools are not allocating the funds the way lawmakers intended them to be.

In The Truth about Teacher Pay in Arizona: How Arizona School Districts Have Held Back Teacher Salaries, Blamed Lawmakers, and Continually Captured Public Sympathy, Matt Beienburg, Director of Education Policy at the Goldwater Institute found that “school districts used the majority of the new 20×2020 funds simply to replace, rather than add to, existing buckets of state money for teachers (and vice versa). The result: During the 2019-2020 school year alone, teachers received at least $170 million less from their school districts in salary increases than Arizona taxpayers provided for. And it’s part of a decades-long pattern in Arizona education.”

So what are schools doing with the extra funding that is being provided?

“District spending on administration, for instance, has risen by nearly $2,000 in inflation-adjusted terms per class of 20 students, even as teacher salaries were no higher through fiscal year 2020,” according to Beienburg.

Each year, teachers use their own money to buy supplies and decorations for their classrooms and to help offset the consistently growing list of “must buy” supplies sent to parents at the start of the school year. Yet, during the 1983-1984 school year almost 2,000 managers, supervisors, and directors were inexplicably added to Arizona school districts’ payrolls.

Many teachers have expressed frustration about not being a priority and tend to put pressure and blame on lawmakers as part of their demands for more money. It seems, though, that it is the school district administrators who need to feel the pressure and are to blame.

This last year has also placed additional stress on teachers and parents, with virtual and hybrid learning due to COVID-19.

Members of the state legislature requested that the COVID-19 stimulus revenue funds were given for school district use but the Arizona Department of Education (ADE) has declined to distribute much of the millions of dollars.

While it may be easy to blame political leaders and taxpayers for lack of support and failing to prioritize teachers, it seems to many observers that the attention should be on the ADE, school district administrators, and school boards who need to review and reconsider their budgets and priorities.

I Investigated Coyotes, Killers And Cartel Members, Biden’s Border Policy Won’t Keep Us Safe

I Investigated Coyotes, Killers And Cartel Members, Biden’s Border Policy Won’t Keep Us Safe

By Lacy Cooper |

For the last 15 years I’ve protected Arizonans and Americans from dangerous criminals – the past eight working for the United States Attorney’s Office securing the southwest border. I’ve seen how decisions made in the halls of power – whether it be Washington, D.C., or Phoenix – play out on the ground. When our leaders put politics and political correctness before safety and security, there are real life consequences.

I know this because I’ve had face-to-face conversations with cartel members and listened to wiretaps on their phones. I’ve investigated them for drug trafficking, human smuggling, murders and mutilations. That was my job. I was a border security section chief for the District of Arizona.

In March, the flood of immigrants crossing the U.S.-Mexico border illegally was 67% higher than at the same time in 2019, when the United States last experienced a surge of immigrants at the border. According to Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, “We are on pace to encounter more individuals on the southwest border than we have in the last 20 years.” Our southern border is not secure.

This is a crisis. Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey has declared a state of emergency in several counties and deployed the National Guard. And it is a crisis that is entirely President Joe Biden’s making. Every action by this administration sends a direct signal to bad actors who control the flow of immigrants and drugs across the border.

Biden’s public safety failure

The media frenzy surrounding Biden’s border crisis has served to cover up another truly frightening aspect of this administration’s immigration policy: the release of criminals from jails and prisons. On Inauguration Day, the Department of Homeland Security issued an immediate 100-day pause on certain deportations.

With few exceptions, individuals who were going to be deported and were just awaiting their complimentary flight (or walk) back to their home countries would no longer be removed. The immediate consequence was that convicted felons who did not have permission to be in the United States were released from prisons after their sentences and let onto the streets.

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton successfully sued Washington and obtained a nationwide temporary restraining order preventing DHS from enforcing the 100-day moratorium. But the Biden administration simply issued replacement guidance, which had the same effect. Immigration and Customs Enforcement got the message – individuals who do not meet certain enforcement priorities should not be removed from the country. And unlike the 100-day pause, this new guidance has no expiration date.

The Biden administration’s enforcement priorities are so narrow that they exclude many violent offenders. Take, for example, the “public safety” priority. It allows ICE to remove individuals who have been convicted of an “aggravated felony.” Sounds serious, right? But what if I told you that some murder convictions do not qualify as aggravated felonies. To put it in perspective, at least one of the killing offenses for which former Minneapolis officer Derek Chauvin was convicted would not qualify.

Violent offenders on the street

I prosecuted a Honduran in 2014 who had been denied asylum but returned to the United States and got into an altercation during which he hit his victim in the head with a metal bar, fracturing his skull. The resulting aggravated assault conviction was not an aggravated felony.

Just last year, the 9th Circuit ruled that if an individual harms a pregnant mother and kills her unborn fetus, a murder conviction based on that conduct would not qualify as an aggravated felony. An Oregon robbery conviction was also excluded from the definition. Another 9th Circuit opinion called into question whether a child pornography conviction would qualify even when a child under 16 was involved. The 2nd Circuit found that a conviction for unlawful firearms trafficking was not an aggravated felony by the federal standard. And the 3rd Circuit found that a woman in her 30s who was convicted of having sexual intercourse with a 15-year-old boy was not an aggravated felon.

And yet, this is the porous metric DHS has decided to use when determining whether our community’s public safety is a priority. Tragedy will undoubtedly flow from this awful choice, and it is not just those who reside in close proximity to the border who will be affected. President Biden, it’s time to make public safety a real priority.

Lacy Cooper was the border security section chief for the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Arizona. She served 15 years as both a county and federal prosecutor targeting violent offenders, gang members, cartels and terrorists. She is now Of Counsel with the law firm of Schmitt Schneck Even & Williams. The views expressed in this commentary are her own.

Arizona Is Only Hurting Itself With High Income Taxes. Why A Flat Rate Is Smarter

Arizona Is Only Hurting Itself With High Income Taxes. Why A Flat Rate Is Smarter

By Grover Norquist |

Arizona’s income tax – with a top rate of 8% – is not competitive. Reducing and eventually eliminating the state income tax would be a huge win for all Arizonans.

Individual taxpayers and families would be able to keep more of their hard-earned paychecks. Small businesses would be able to invest more in their employees. And Arizona would be much more attractive to businesses and investment, bringing new jobs and opportunities to the state.

Over the last decade, millions of people and jobs have been fleeing from high-tax states to states that do not impose income taxes. The ability to work remotely will only amplify this trend.

Unfortunately, Arizona’s current income tax puts it on the wrong side of this equation.

Arizona is a high tax state and slipping further

Under the status quo, Arizona’s income tax – with a top rate of 8% – is not competitive. Eight states – including Arizona’s neighbor Nevada and nearby Texas – do not impose individual income taxes of any kind. Thirty-two more states – count Arizona’s neighbors Colorado, New Mexico and Utah, among them – have top rates that are lower than Arizona’s.

Even worse for Arizona, the list of states that do not impose income taxes will continue to grow. Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves, New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu, West Virginia Gov. Jim Justice, and Arkansas Lt. Gov. Tim Griffin are among several key lawmakers that are working to eliminate income taxes in their states.

Unless Arizona begins reducing and phasing out its income tax, it will continue to fall behind.

The good news is Arizona’s leaders refuse to sit back and allow it to fail. Gov. Doug Ducey, Sen. J.D. Mesnard, President Pro Tem Vince Leach, Majority Leader Ben Toma and many others are eager to provide pro-growth income tax relief.

A flat tax is a much better way to go

They are working on a tax plan that would streamline Arizona’s current four-bracket system (five brackets when accounting for the Proposition 208 “surcharge” of 3.5% that will be imposed on certain income, resulting in top rate of 8%) down to a flat tax of 2.5%.

That would be lower than its current bottom rate of 2.59% (with adjustments being made to ensure that even with the Proposition 208 “surcharge,” which would effectively create two brackets, the top rate would not be higher than 4.5%).

Flat taxes protect all taxpayers from tax increases. Under a progressive income tax, taxpayers are divided into small groups, allowing politicians to rob them one by one. Raising a flat tax, on the other hand, is much more difficult because politicians are forced to answer to every single income tax filer.

Making this news even better, there is a serious effort to include a full phase-out of the income tax (excluding the Proposition 208 “surcharge”) over time through the use of revenue triggers, a responsible way for states to cut taxes without getting ahead of their ski tips.

It could bring new jobs, higher wages

If such a provision were included, Arizona would be a model for other states to copy.

In addition to reducing income tax rates, the Republican tax plan would provide even more income tax relief by quadrupling the child tax credit and by coupling the standard deduction to inflation.

The Republican tax plan would be a huge victory for every single Arizonan. Reducing and, ideally, eliminating the income tax would attract businesses looking to expand, investors looking for growing economies with hospitable tax climates and families looking for greater prosperity.

This would bring new jobs and opportunities to current Arizona residents.

Income tax relief would also allow small businesses, which overwhelmingly pay their income taxes on the personal side of the code, to invest in higher wages, and would allow the hardworking people of Arizona to keep more of their paychecks.

Arizona’s future will be brighter if it begins reducing and eliminating the state income tax.

Grover Norquist is president of Americans for Tax Reform, a nonprofit taxpayer advocacy organization that was founded at the request of President Ronald Reagan. Reach him at gnorquist@atr.org.

Arizona Senate Passes, Governor Signs Election Integrity Bill

Arizona Senate Passes, Governor Signs Election Integrity Bill

Arizona’s Permanent Early Voter List (PEVL) is no longer permanent, after Gov. Doug Ducey signed one of Arizona’s most important pieces of election integrity legislation in years on Tuesday.

The Arizona Senate approved SB1485 earlier in the day to ensure Arizona voters receive a mail-in ballot only if they signed-up to and now wish to continue automatically receiving a ballot before each election. It provides for a voter’s removal from the newly named Early Voting List (EVL) if a voter did not cast a ballot in at least one of four consecutive elections and did not respond to messages from their county recorder to remain on the list.

“This bill is a modest, but critical step toward restoring confidence in our election system,” sponsor Sen. Michelle Ugenti-Rita stated in a press release.

Proponents of SB1485 touted its cost-savings impact for counties from only printing and paying postage for early ballots a voter expects to use. But the main impact, they said, would be ensuring that tens of thousands of early ballots are not mailed out to voters who no longer utilize the option.

Opponents of the bill deflected from the election integrity benefit and tried to characterize the bill as targeting minority populations to make it harder to vote.

However, being dropped from what is now EVL has no impact on a voter’s right to vote and all voters remain registered to vote. That was a message the governor focused on in his comments while signing SB1485 a short time after its passage in the Senate on a 16 to 14 vote.

“Let’s be clear — despite all the deceptive and heated rhetoric being used by some partisan activists to lobby against this reform, not a single Arizona voter will lose their right to vote as a result of this new law,” Ducey stated in a video his office released to announce that SB1485 had been signed.

Ugenti-Rita’s bill was amended several weeks ago to win the support of more Republican lawmakers in the House. The amendment softened the bill, according to experts, so that a voter would have to miss all elections within a two-year period -including any city or other minor elections- to be dropped from the EVL.

Ducey used the bill’s signing to push back on national companies inserting themselves into Arizona’s election laws.

“These big businesses have seemed to embrace a static view of elections,” he said. “Freeze the systems the way they are and view any change suspiciously. It’s wrong. Dead wrong.”

AZ Legislature Urges Study Of Harvesting Mississippi Floodwaters For Colorado River

AZ Legislature Urges Study Of Harvesting Mississippi Floodwaters For Colorado River

On Tuesday, the Arizona Legislature called on the U.S. Congress to fund a feasibility study for the development of a dam and pipeline to harvest floodwater from the Mississippi River to replenish the Colorado River.

The request took the form of House Concurrent Memorial (HCM) 2004, sponsored by Rep. Tim Dunn. The proposal outlined in the Memorial authorizes the official legislative communication – commonly referred to as a “postcard to Congress,” was passed on Tuesday with a vote of the Arizona Senate.

Dunn’s bill outlines that if it’s shown to be feasible, the U.S. Congress is urged to implement the diversion dam and pipeline as a partial solution to the water supply shortage in Lake Powell and Lake Mead and the flood damage that occurs along the Mississippi River.

HCM 2004 directs the Arizona Secretary of State to transmit copies of the Memorial to the President of the U.S. Senate, the Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, the Governors of the Mississippi River states of Arkansas, Illinois, Iowa, Kentucky, Louisiana, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Tennessee and Wisconsin, and to each member of Congress from the State of Arizona.

In Arizona, water from the Colorado River enters the Central Arizona Project canal to reach the cities of Phoenix and Tucson. Under the 2019 Drought Contingency Plan, Arizona is already taking cuts to its CAP supply.

The state’s junior rights mean its Colorado River supply is more vulnerable than other states.

The question as to how much water can the Colorado River reliably produce into the future is at the core of all of plans.

“Arizona has long been at the forefront among western states in supporting the development and implementation of pioneering, well-reasoned water management policies,” Dunn said in a press release. “Arizona and the other six Colorado Basin states are in the twentieth year of severe drought and experiencing a severe water shortage. Water levels are critical levels, jeopardizing the water delivery and power generation. A new water source could help augment Colorado River supplies. One promising possibility involves piping water that is harvested from Mississippi River flood waters. Diverting this water, which is otherwise lost into the Gulf of Mexico, would also help prevent the loss of human life and billions in economic damages when such flooding occurs. This concept is already being proven in Denver, where floodwater is being successfully harvested from the Missouri River to help alleviate its water shortage.”