by AZ Free Enterprise Club | Apr 23, 2021 | Opinion
By the Free Enterprise Club |
Vaccines should always be voluntary and never be forced. But COVID-19 came in like a wrecking ball last year, and perhaps its most significant contribution to the world has been an overwhelming growth in government overreach.
From the abuse of emergency orders to the senseless “mask mandates,” some government officials have leapt at the chance to dangle the carrot of “normalcy” in the faces of their citizens in order to take away more of their freedoms. Unfortunately, many have taken the bait. And now, we find ourselves at a crossroads.
The latest promise to return to normal comes in the form of “vaccine passports.” This ridiculous concept would serve as “proof” that a person has been vaccinated so he or she can have access to all the freedoms they should already be able to enjoy as an American citizen. As you would expect, Big Tech is first in line to team up with the government on such an initiative. And New York has already implemented the “Excelsior Pass” so that its citizens can “be a part of [the state’s] safe reopening.” (Given Governor Cuomo’s handling of the pandemic, what could go wrong?)
But nothing about this is normal.
It’s not normal for companies to collect the private health data of individuals. And it’s certainly not normal to force American citizens to submit to certain medical procedures as the price of doing business.
Thankfully, some of our lawmakers here in Arizona have not fallen asleep on this issue. Earlier this month, Congressman Andy Biggs introduced his No Vaccines Passports Act. This piece of legislation would prevent federal agencies from issuing any standardized documentation that could be used to certify a U.S. citizen’s COVID-19 status to a third party, such as a restaurant or an airline.
And just a few days ago, Arizona became the sixth state to ban COVID-19 passports when Governor Ducey signed Executive Order 2021-09. This prevents state agencies, counties, cities, and towns from issuing measures that require an individual to provide documentation of their COVID-19 vaccination status in to order to enter a business, building, or area to receive a government service, permit, or license. It also prevents businesses that contract with the state to provide services to the public from requiring documentation.
While this is certainly a step in the right direction, Governor Ducey’s executive order still allows for businesses, schools, and health providers to ask about an individual’s vaccine status.
That’s why lawmakers should consider additional action on this issue. One option being considered is HB2190. This bill, sponsored by Rep. Bret Roberts (R-LD11) and Sen. Kelly Townsend (R-LD16), would prohibit a company that conducts business in Arizona from refusing to provide everyday services, transportation, or admission because a person does not divulge whether they have received a particular vaccine. It would also prohibit a state, county, or local government entity from offering anyone a special privilege or incentive to receive a vaccine.
Currently, HB2190 is awaiting action in the senate, and negotiations are underway on potential amendments to the bill. Regardless of what those amendments are, Arizona lawmakers need to work toward stopping vaccine passports. They are a serious threat to our civil liberties. And while we all want to return to normal, we must remember that “normal” shouldn’t come with a price tag.
by B. Hamilton | Apr 21, 2021 | News, Politics
By B. Hamilton |
On Tuesday, the Democrats in the Arizona House of Representatives attempted to prevent a vote on an election integrity bill, and then when that failed, Rep. Athena Salman called for a boycott of the state if the bill passed.
Earlier in the day, Democrat lawmakers refused to show up to work in order to prevent a quorum as part of their effort to block a vote on SB1485.
Later, in a vote along party lines, Sen. Michelle Ugenti-Rita’s bill passed and is now headed back to the Senate.
SB1485 would remove people from the Early Voting List (EV), who don’t return their mail ballot for two consecutive election cycles from the permanent list, which allows voters to automatically receive a ballot before each election.
Not everyone shared Salman’s view. Sen. TJ Shope, a moderate Republican, tweeted his support for the bill:
Sen. Salman and the Arizona House Democrats continue to make discredited statements about SB1485, including allegations that the bill would “purge” the early voting list and “infringe” on voting rights.
The reason the bill heads back to the Senate is that it was amended to win the support of more Republican lawmakers in the House.
The amendment softened the bill, according to experts.
Before the amendments, a person could be removed from EVL after not using an early ballot in two consecutive primaries and general elections. Under the amendments, a person would have to miss all elections within a two-year period including city or other minor elections, to be dropped from the EVL.
In all cases, voters remain registered to vote. They are simply dropped from the list of mail-in ballot recipients.
by B. Hamilton | Apr 21, 2021 | News
By B. Hamilton |
On Tuesday, conservatives lamented Governor Doug Ducey’s decision to veto legislation that would have strengthen parental input in the Sex Education curriculum offered to their children. They also questioned why the governor would then turn around and issue an Executive Order on the subject.
Cathi Herrod, president of the Center for Arizona Policy, said the governor’s veto sent the “clear and deeply disappointing message” to parents that the “government knows better.” She also noted that the governor’s Executive Order “fails to implement the prohibition of sex education prior to fifth grade.”
The bill, SB 1456, prohibits schools from providing Sex Ed to any students below the fifth grade – including education on AIDS and HIV. It also required schools to make all Sex Ed curriculum available for parental review two weeks in advance, at minimum.
RELATED ARTICLE: Arizona Legislature Passes Bill Requiring Parental Permission for All Sex Ed Curriculum
The bill passed along party lines in both the House and Senate.
SB 1456, sponsored by Senator Nancy Barto, did not prohibit or dictate any curriculum in grades 5-12; it “merely would have ensured parents opt their children into instruction on human sexuality,” according to Herrod.
Barto said that the governor’s veto undermined parent’s rights. She said that the “commonsense bill” aimed to “put sensitive decisions about Sex Ed and parents’ hands.”
“An Executive Order is no substitute for parental rights grounded in law. The bill created workable transparency solutions for parents and stopped Sex Ed for younger school age children – something an overwhelming a mature overwhelming majority of Arizona support,” continued Barto. “The veto undermines every single elected Republican Legislature who voted to defend parents and address the frustrations they face with the current status quo that provides opt out for some sexual materials and opt in for others. Arizona is one of the best states to raise a family, but this decision is inconsistent with that reputation. While I am extremely disappointed, my commitment to parents’ fundamental rights remains unchanged. I will continue to work with my colleagues to protect Arizona parents.”
Herrod challenged statements made by Governor Ducey in his veto letter. Specifically, the governor claimed that he was concerned that child abuse prevention education would be prohibited. Herrod countered that “abuse prevention is not sex education, and would not have been blocked by any provision in SB 1456.
“Unfortunately, to my knowledge, this concern was not brought to the attention of lawmakers by the executive branch prior to the veto.”
“Make no mistake, the need to advocate for the parent’s ability to guide the education of their children, especially with regard to matters of human sexuality,” said Herrod in her press release. “will continue to be a key priority for us, and the many Arizonans who supported SB 1456.”
The governor’s Executive Order requires the State Board of Education to adopt the following requirements by June 30, 2021:
- All meetings held for the purposes of reviewing and selecting the sex education course of study must be publicly noticed at least two weeks before occurring and be open to the public.
- Any proposed sex education course of study must be available and accessible for review and public comment for at least sixty days before the governing board or governing body decides whether to approve that course of study.
- At least two public hearings within the sixty-day period before the governing board or governing body approves any course of study must be conducted.
- Once a course of study has been approved, a school district or charter school shall make the sex education curricula available for parental review, both online and in-person at least two weeks before any instruction is offered.
- Any existing sex education course of study must be made available and accessible for review both online and in person.
by Terri Jo Neff | Apr 16, 2021 | News
By Terri Jo Neff |
On Feb. 12, 2019, Pat Call had been serving on the Cochise County Board for more than a decade representing for the Sierra Vista area, which includes the Army’s Fort Huachuca. It was also the day Call and his two fellow supervisors took part in a public and then a private meeting which ended with his appointment as justice of the peace of the Sierra Vista Justice Court.
The new job paid twice Call’s supervisor salary despite the fact he was not an attorney and had no judicial experience. But there was no advance public notice that Call was even interested in the position, and during the meeting Call suggested the board not utilize a nomination committee to review any perspective candidates, all of whom were lawyers with experience in justice court operations.
The Arizona Supreme Court announced Wednesday that it will hear a local resident’s challenge to Call’s appointment based on alleged violations of Arizona’s Open Meeting Law and Conflict of Interest Statute. The case is being watched by public agencies and government attorneys across the state.
“When it comes to holding public officials accountable for backdoor deals, this is the most important case in Arizona history,” appellate attorney David Abney said after the justices accepted the case for review.
Abney is one of three attorneys representing David Welch, the Sierra Vista resident who challenged the appointment. He told AZ Free News it does not matter that Call’s term on the bench ended in December 2020.
“There are still penalties and sanctions that can be assessed against those who violate the open-meeting and conflict-of-interest laws,” Abney said. “So Justice of the Peace Call’s departure does not insulate him or his collaborators from liability.”
The county defendants contend they did nothing improper in filling the court vacancy, and point to the fact the Cochise County Attorney’s Office provided legal advice throughout the process.
“The Arizona Legislature has made clear that, for a plaintiff making claim to a private right of action under Arizona’s conflict of interest or open meeting laws, he or she must be ‘affected by’ the alleged violation,” according to the county’s petition for review to the supreme court. The county contends Welch has no standing to challenge the board’s action.
Welch lives within the boundaries of the Sierra Vista Justice Court and had a misdemeanor case pending at the court at the time of Call’s appointment. His case would have been heard by Call, but the county attorney’s office had the case dismissed the day Call took office.
The county later invoked the ratification option in Arizona’s Open Meeting Law to reaffirm Call’s appointment as justice of the peace during a special meeting in March 2019. Welch, however, takes the position shared by Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich that the supervisors may still be open to personal liability if it is shown they engaged in misconduct.
But it is not only the open meeting law issues that Welch has challenged.
Public records show Call engaged in discussions about how to fill the court vacancy he was awarded a few hours later. He also took part in an executive session with the other supervisors, a deputy county attorney, and the county administrator just before being appointed.
Arizona’s conflict of interest statute requires a public officer who has a substantial interest in any decision of a public agency to make known such interest. Then the public officer “shall refrain from participation in any manner…in such decision.”
There is no ratification option in that statute to simply “do-over” or reaffirm a decision.
A judge from outside Cochise County initially dismissed Welch’s complaints on the basis of a lack of standing to bring the challenges. That ruling was overturned in a unanimous Arizona Court of Appeals decision in October 2020, which sent the case back to the lower court for a new hearing on Welch’s arguments.
For now the case is on hold while the supreme court reviews the appellate decision. Attorney Chris Russell has been on Welch’s case from the beginning and understands some residents are frustrated the case has been going on more than two years with no immediate end in sight. But he is looking forward to the attention the Arizona Supreme Court’s review will generate.
“Corruption thrives in the darkness,” Russell said. “Without open and transparent government free from conflicts-of-interest we are no better than a cabal run by the rich and powerful. History has proven that such a circumstance is always detrimental to the people.”
The supreme court has given the parties until early May to file any updated legal briefings before oral arguments are conducted later this year.
by Heather Rooks | Apr 16, 2021 | Education, Opinion
By Heather Rooks |
I am a busy mom of 4 wonderful children and a wife of a hard working husband. I had the best memories of watching each of my children experience their 1st year of school in the Peoria Unified School District (PUSD). Their teachers were kind, engaging and overall the same experience I had in PUSD growing up. My husband and I had the great memories at Frontier Elementary and Sunrise Mountain High School.
Something in the schools changed in January 2021. I noticed a shift in my two older children’s content in the classrooms. My oldest had said he felt uncomfortable one day after watching the Presidential Inauguration in class. I had no clue that both my 2nd grader and 4th grader had a classroom activity that involved the viewing of the inauguration. I reached out to their teachers who have always been very helpful. I was surprised by the reason for the inauguration being shown in class. I was told by my 4th grader’s teacher that “the team” decided to change the lesson plan from Martin Luther King Jr. week to the viewing of the Inauguration as a “teachable moment” – although the same could not be said of the 2016 inauguration. This is where I began my journey into figuring out what was going on in the District.
I began reaching out to other parents for information and attending Governing Board Meetings. I wanted to know if there were other parents going through similar situations. And of course there was.
I started learning about parental rights under Arizona Revised Statutes and how they applied in the schools. I worked together with a support group of parents. Together we formed a parent Facebook group so we could stay in touch and have meetings to share what we learned. We started going through governing board agendas and seeing what was being voted through. We wanted to learn more about how the process works, how much power came from the Board and how much the Board really knew about what administration is putting into our kid’s education.
One thing I noticed was how little effort the Peoria Unified School District puts into helping parents and the community understand the whole governing board process such as the adoption of district policies, requesting public records and more.
For example, I learned curriculum resource materials are only allowed to be viewed at the district office. We need better access and more effort by the District to make materials /curriculum proposed for Board approval available especially now that so much of the curricula and supplemental materials are digital.
With help from a few people on the outside who knew how things worked, I learned how to request public records on professional Teacher development programs and communication emails in the District that included curriculum.
I talked with other parents about the curriculum and the ideas that were being taught to their kids in the upper grade levels. I learned that topics such as discrimination throughout American history is being taught with black lives matter; George Floyd, mob mentality, CNN news resource in classroom assignments and students knowing their teachers political affiliation was all showing up in middle school classes. During all my years as a student in the Peoria Unified School District – K-12 – I never knew any of my teachers’ political affiliations.
I started to learn more about Critical Race Theory and the idea behind diversity, equity and inclusion.
As a parent with two children with disabilities on Individualized Education Plans (IEP’s) that affect their everyday lives I thought the inclusion idea was great. But the diversity, equity and inclusion that I had researched was twisted and not actually for children with disabilities.
I didn’t want any curriculum or program teaching my children that they were privileged based on their race. I couldn’t imagine why anyone would want to teach a child that their skin color determines who they are in life. My mother and grandparents always taught me to reach for my goals and work hard for my future. America has always taught that anyone can succeed in this country.
I started reading through the different items on the April 5th board meeting agenda. Once I started looking at the supplemental material vendor lists of three contracts under the Consent Agenda I reached out to our group. We worked together to figure out what was on each vendor website.
The content for some of the vendors was not easily accessed without subscription; some vendors had their message of the same concept of Critical Race Theory (CRT) and more. The ones that really stood out were Cengage, Gale, Savvas Learning Company (formerly Pearson Publishing known for Common Core) and Everfi . These are just a few of the vendors which are all part of the SAVE consortium contract on the Consent Agenda. Topics on these websites included Social justice, gender identity book titles for all grade levels, Culturally Responsive Learning, Equity, Diversity and Inclusion, LGBTQ even for younger grades like kindergarten and more.
One of the vendors, Everfi, has a description of Diversity Foundations for High school that introduces learners to key concepts of identity, bias, power, privilege and oppression. In that lesson learners explore the concepts of power, privilege, oppression, discrimination and racism.
The real shocker was the day of the board meeting when I was able to access the Peoria Public Library’s database list. Of course Gale Academic One File, the vendor listed on the SAVE Contract, was listed. I clicked on the link and was taken to the actual website where I had to type in the barcode of the library card.
From there I typed in a title provided by the contact from Colorado (who had the same situation with Gale and Cengage Company in their child’s district) called Abuse Porn: Reading Reactions to Boys Halfway House. The article was very descriptive on an adult website for boys and at the bottom of the article I saw the sources listed with 4 blue links. The 1st link took me off the Gale website and directly to a gay pornographic webpage. To say I was shocked is an understatement.
I had in four days discovered controversial topics, hidden content and links to pornographic websites off of one contract the District wanted to purchase for their teachers to use in our children’s classrooms. The curriculum department explained that the district had to choose curriculum that matched changes to the AZ State Standards. When they began their “process” they turned to a preapproved contract complied by Mesa Public School District for the SAVE Consortium so that the work was done for them and would be a “cheaper” process.
My questions are why is no one else in the district curriculum department checking through these vendor websites before bringing them to the Board for approval and into our children’s classrooms?
How could the Superintendent Reynolds and his staff in the Curriculum Department fail our children and our trust by not researching EVERY single vendor listed on that contract?
Why would the district not want to invest in the time and money searching for outstanding and appropriate resources for our kids learning?
This contract was on the Consent Agenda for approval of the Board without discussion and only as a financial expenditure with no information being provided by the curriculum department about the content.
I am grateful to James T. Harris for having me on his radio show so other parents could hear what is going on. These same parents came to the standing room only board meeting to voice their disapproval of the content of these supplemental materials and the associated websites.
It reminded me of America and how strong it can be when we come together. I spoke at the board meeting and talked about my findings of links to porn websites from the supplemental vendor resources.
Thankfully, board member and Representative Beverly Pingerelli (R LD21), with support of board member Rebecca Hill, motioned to table all three contracts and have the curriculum team bring forward exactly which vendors they wanted to use in the schools. The board all voted in favor of this idea and Beverly Pingerelli asked to allow the parents to view the content of each vendor.
There’s nothing better than sending your child off to school for their first day. These are moments you cherish for a lifetime. You trust the teacher. You trust the principal. You just trust. Then all the sudden the trust is gone and you’re left with fighting those you trusted. Those you trusted to educate your child.
