by Daniel Stefanski | Mar 15, 2024 | News
By Daniel Stefanski |
A ballot referral to help protect Arizona business owners from degrading landscapes outside their front doors will be considered by state voters thanks to the efforts of legislators.
The Arizona Senate President, Warren Petersen, and Speaker of the House Ben Toma introduced HCR 2023 / SCR 1006, which would “allow a property owner to apply for a primary property tax refund if the owner documents expenses caused by a city, town or county adopting a policy, pattern or practice which declines to enforce existing laws or the maintaining of a public nuisance” – according to the overview provided by the state House.
In a statement after the successful passage of the bill out of his chamber, Petersen said, “There are instances where local governments routinely and repeatedly fail their citizens by not enforcing laws. An example of this would be the City of Phoenix’s handling of the former homeless encampment known as ‘The Zone.’ This area was not only a public safety and public health disaster for those who camped there, but it was also a detriment to the livelihoods of small business owners who set up their shops in the area.”
President Petersen added, “Money talks, and as a way to encourage municipalities to enforce the law, Speaker Toma and I teamed up to sponsor HCR 2023/SCR 1006. This measure is a ballot referral that would protect law-abiding citizens. If approved by voters, property owners would be allowed to request a refund for expenses incurred to mitigate the problem, up to the amount of their property tax liability. The funds would be deducted from the local government’s state shared revenue.”
The chamber’s president also noted that “all Senate Democrats voted ‘no’” on the referral.
At the end of February, the Arizona House approved the referral with a 31-28 vote (with one vacant seat). The Arizona Senate then passed the measure with a 16-12 vote (with two members not voting). The referral was then transmitted to the Arizona Secretary of State to be placed on the November General Election ballot.
Representatives from Barry Goldwater Institute for Public Policy Research, QuikTrip, Arizona Free Enterprise Club, Arizona Chamber of Commerce, Arizona Food Marketing Alliance, and the National Federation of Independent Business, indicated their support for the proposal on the Arizona Legislature’s Request to Speak system. Representatives from the League of Arizona Cities & Towns, Living United for Change in Arizona, Arizona Coalition to End Sexual and Domestic Violence, Professional Fire Fighters of Arizona, Arizona Association of Counties, County Supervisors Association of Arizona, Arizona Housing Coalition, and several state cities and towns, signed in to oppose the measure.
Daniel Stefanski is a reporter for AZ Free News. You can send him news tips using this link.
by Elizabeth Troutman | Mar 7, 2024 | News
By Elizabeth Troutman |
On Monday, the Arizona Senate approved HCR 2023 to be on the 2024 general election ballot. The ballot measure would compensate residents, businesses, and property owners whose livelihoods are harmed by lawlessness surrounding the homelessness crisis.
According to the Goldwater Institute, the first-in-the-nation reform allows property owners, who have had to deal with mitigation expenses as a result of a municipality’s purposeful failure to enforce nuisance regulations related to the homeless crisis, to receive a refund for damages up to the amount of their property tax liability.
The funds are then deducted from the offending municipality’s state shared revenue and sent to the property owner.
“Arizonans no longer trust that their tax dollars are being used by local governments to enforce the law and address rampant homelessness,” Goldwater President and CEO Victor Riches said. “This ballot measure will ensure that when municipalities fail to do their job, business and property owners are not left holding the bag.”
The Goldwater Institute is a Phoenix-based conservative think tank. The group says the reform has a large coalition of support from residents, property owners, and business owners who have been hurt by their government’s failure to enforce the law, and the government’s tendency for pushing homeless people into unofficial open-air shelters like “The Zone” in Phoenix.
The bill was sponsored by Senate President Warren Petersen and Speaker of the House Ben Toma, both Republicans.
Toma said Arizona residents are tired of lawlessness and inaction regarding the homelessness crisis.
“Business owners and residents alike are having their property stolen, vandalized, or terrorized and are desperate for help,” Toma said. “That’s why I sponsored HCR2023, to hold our local governments accountable to our community members and to help provide some relief for property owners who have suffered damages because of a city’s purposeful failure to provide the public health and safety services we all pay for.”
Correction: A previous version of this story incorrectly stated that the Goldwater Institute was founded by Barry Goldwater. The story has been corrected.
Elizabeth Troutman is a reporter for AZ Free News. You can send her news tips using this link.
by Elizabeth Troutman | Feb 19, 2024 | Education, News
By Elizabeth Troutman |
The Goldwater Institute is suing the Biden administration for fining Grand Canyon University for $37 million without explanation.
The U.S. Department of Education assessed a record fine of $37 million against the private, Christian university in October 2023. This marks the largest fine of its kind ever assessed by the department.
The Goldwater Institute, a Phoenix-based conservative think tank, is suing the administration to get answers about the fine and hold the government accountable.
Fines on universities who have improperly dealt with sexual assault pale in comparison to those levied against GCU. The Department of Education fined Penn State University only $2.4 million for failing to report the crimes of serial pedophile Jerry Sandusky. Michigan State University was fined a mere $4.5 million fine for refusing to address sexual assaults committed by athletic director Larry Nassar, who abused more than 500 students.
The Education Department claimed to fine GCU for insufficiently informing P.h.D students that they may have to take continuing courses while completing their doctoral dissertations. The federal government report did not cite any student’s complaints, and Education Department personnel did not visit GCU as part of its so-called investigation.
The Goldwater Institute submitted a Freedom of Information Act request to the department to gain clarity on the fine against GCU.
“The records may help inform the public about this extraordinary fine, as well as coordination between various federal agencies in what appears to be the intentionally targeting of a successful university—one that’s no stranger to run-ins with the feds—based on extraordinarily thin allegations,” a Goldwater news release says.
The Department of Education refused to turn over these public records, the think tank said, so it is suing the agency in federal court to get them anyway.
“With its motto of ‘private, Christian, affordable’ and its track record of graduating students into high-demand and high-paying jobs, GCU is a success story by any metric,” Goldwater Institute staff attorney Stacy Skankey said. “And it stands apart from universities across the country that are facing declining enrollment, that are indoctrinating students with radical politics, and that are under attack for failing to defend the First Amendment.”
Correction: A previous version of this story incorrectly stated that the Goldwater Institute was founded by Barry Goldwater. The story has been corrected.
Elizabeth Troutman is a reporter for AZ Free News. You can send her news tips using this link.
by AZ Free Enterprise Club | Jan 14, 2024 | Opinion
By the Arizona Free Enterprise Club |
When you’re hired to do a job, it stands to reason that you should actually do the job you’ve been hired to do. Think about it. If a company hired you to be a writer, and you never did any writing for the company, you probably wouldn’t keep your job too long. That is, of course, unless you work for the government.
For quite some time now, federal, state, and local governments across the country—including right here in Arizona—have been engaging in the practice of “release time.” If you’re unfamiliar with this term, it means that certain people are hired to do a specific job for the government, but instead of doing that job, they are “released” to work full-time for their union. This could be someone like a teacher, for example, who instead of teaching students, spends all his or her time doing work for the teachers’ union. But here’s the thing, even though these employees don’t actually work for the government, they still get a paycheck from the government—all funded by your tax dollars.
Is this practice unfair? Yes. Is it unconstitutional? Absolutely.
That’s why the Goldwater Institute has been challenging this practice in our state in a case that has made its way to the Arizona Supreme Court…
>>> CONTINUE READING >>>
by Corinne Murdock | Nov 21, 2023 | News
By Corinne Murdock |
A Tucson restaurant owner has sued the Hobbs administration over its newer mandate that only cage-free eggs be produced or sold in the state.
Last week, the Goldwater Institute and Pacific Legal Foundation sued the Arizona Department of Agriculture (AZDA) on behalf of Grant Krueger, owner of Union Public House, Reforma Modern Mexican Mezcal + Tequila, and Proof Artisanal Pizza & Pasta.
In a press release, counsel and Krueger asserted that AZDA had surpassed their constitutional authority by bypassing the legislature; they dubbed AZDA the “egg bureaucrats.”
“Unaccountable, unelected bureaucrats shouldn’t be able to arbitrarily impose these kinds of harmful mandates on small business owners like me,” said Krueger. “If the government can do this with eggs, what else can they do it with?”
Krueger estimated that his restaurants purchase over 2,000 eggs weekly; he employs about 225 people.
Per his lawsuit, lawmakers directed egg producers to petition the AZDA for a rule on requiring cage-free housing for egg-laying hens, as the COVID-19 pandemic had disrupted law making procedures at the time. AZDA published the contested rule in April 2022, under then-Gov. Doug Ducey and then-AZDA Director Mark Killian. The rule began to be enforced on Jan. 1 of this year.
“Neither Arizona’s statutes governing executive branch rulemaking nor the Arizona Constitution permit AZDA to promulgate rules pursuant to such a standardless grant of authority,” read the lawsuit.
AZDA claimed authority for rulemaking under A.R.S. § 3-107(A)(1) and A.R.S. §3-710(J). The legal organizations countered in their lawsuit that the two statutes’ general authorization of rulemaking authority didn’t articulate the specific authority to enact a cage-free rule. Further, they argued that the Arizona Constitution didn’t allow for the delegation of legislative authority to an executive branch agency.
“The appropriate housing arrangement for egg-laying hens in Arizona and egglaying hens producing eggs for sale in Arizona is a major policy question that must be decided by the legislature,” read the lawsuit.
Per the lawsuit, AZDA had passed the rule to circumvent the effort of a similar ballot initiative, which the egg producers found objectionable due to the proposed timeline being too long.
The lawsuit warned that the new law will cause a significant increase in egg prices for both business owners and consumers: up to $66 million. For consumers, that would come to an additional 39 cents per dozen.
Per AZDA data, cage-free housing of egg-laying hens would increase egg production costs by up to 41 percent for labor inputs.
The Arizona Farm Bureau also stands in opposition to the sweeping cage-free egg mandate.
Corinne Murdock is a reporter for AZ Free News. Follow her latest on Twitter, or email tips to corinne@azfreenews.com.
