I’ve been out of town for three weeks. Did I miss anything?
Let’s see. TUSD has a new superintendent, Dr. Gabriel Trujillo. Looks like a pretty smart choice. He’s getting stamps of approval from people on various sides of district issues, which is promising. And board member Mark Stegeman has voted against him twice so far, which makes Trujillo sound even better to me. Best of luck, Dr. Trujillo. You’ll need it.
Then there was the Mexican American Studies decision from Judge Tashima, a clear-the-bases, grand slam home run for MAS supporters. Ex Ed Supe John Huppenthal didn’t like the program because it taught students they were victims of a racist system; the judge said Hupp’s dismantling of the MAS program was the result of racial animus. Hupp didn’t want Mexican American youth to think of themselves as oppressed; Hupp suppressed a program which used historical facts to show ways Mexican American students and their ancestors have been oppressed. Earlier Ex Ed Supe Tom Horne was upset that MAS taught ethnic chauvinism; he went around the state telling white people their privileged status was threatened by the program. One term to describe the Hupp and Horne statements in light of the judge’s decision is “irony.” MAS supporters are probably more fond of the term “vindication.”
And then there’s the statement by Jim Swanson, the leader of Ducey’s Classrooms First Initiative Council, that our schools need an additional billion dollars in added tax revenue. It’s not exactly new news. Other business leaders raised the idea in June. But for Swanson, Ducey’s hand-picked head of his council to explore ways to improve education, to say Ducey isn’t doing enough to fund schools, and to go into such detail about the reasons why the extra money is needed, that’s really something. The public already supports increased education funding. A statement from Swanson and other business leaders helps build a statewide consensus which will make it harder for Republicans to pretend to be pro-education while saying they don’t want to “throw money at schools.”
Let’s go through some of the things Swanson said in the article. Prop 301 expires in 2021, which would take away $600 million a year in school funding in the form of a 0.6 percent sales tax. Swanson wants to renew it right away, in 2018, and he wants to boost it to a 1.6 percent tax, which would add another billion dollars for school funding (Quick rule of thumb: 0.1 percent sales tax equals about $100 million in revenue, which adds about $100 per student). Ducey is in no rush to put the issue on the ballot, and he doesn’t want a tax increase. He’d rather wait until 2020 when he’s not running for office. A tax measure on any kind on the ballot could cause him electoral grief, as could taking a stand against more money for education. Also, if the issue is put off until the last minute in 2020, right before Prop 301 is set to expire, Republicans can put together a lousy package and school supporters will be forced to vote for it or take a hit to school funding.
How does a businessman like Swanson justify raising taxes? He says, correctly, we’ve been cutting taxes for 25 years. If we had the same tax rate now we had in 1992, we’d be bringing in $4 billion more every year, so adding a billion dollars just replaces a quarter of what tax cuts have taken away from state revenue. Also, after a big cut in school funding starting in 2009 as a response to the recession, not only haven’t we brought funding back up to pre-2009 levels (which were already at the bottom of the national barrel), but we’re spending $266 less per student after adjusting for inflation.
Increasing sales taxes is always a problem for me since they impact lower income people more than other forms of taxation, so I wince every time I support a sales tax hike. To my surprise, Swanson understands this and wants to include an income tax credit for people with low incomes, which they get even if they owe no state taxes, to compensate them for the added tax burden.
This is election year gold for pro-education citizens and Democratic candidates if they’re interested in mining it, which they should. The headlines and campaign ads write themselves. “Business leaders: Ducey wrong on education funding.” “Business leaders: Schools are significantly underfunded.” “Business leaders: Raise taxes to fund schools.” “Business leaders: Schools need a billion dollar cash influx.” Like I said: Gold.
This article appears in Sep 7-13, 2017.
If there’s a massive infusion of funds coming, perhaps those who have taken the trouble to advocate for increased funding (and for legal fiscal transparency requirements in schools receiving public funds) will use those transparency requirements to track and report on how the new infusion of funds is applied. Which districts will use it to successfully reduce whatever teacher shortages they may be experiencing, through improving teacher pay, benefits, or working conditions? Which districts will further pad central admin? It’s an unfortunate reality that without consistent watchdog reporting, some districts will probably go astray, as they have in the past.
(FYI, David, this is what fiscal transparency requirements are for: to protect constituents from abuse and to hold public administrators accountable. Not to provide fodder for bashing charters and privates that don’t have the requirements. Those of us who’ve had kids enrolled in the public system in Tucson during the past few years have smiled wryly as the absence of transparency requirements in charters has received copious coverage in this blog, while the things that squirm under the rocks you can turn over with public records requests in the public district system have gone unreported here. If you have a genuine belief in the value of transparency, try demonstrating that in the future by using transparency to advocate for more student-benefit-centered applications of funds. For maximal impact, you might want to focus most of your attention on the largest districts serving the most students….)
What ever happened to the Money, that the courts said that the State Owed Education as a result of the lawsuit that Ducey lost while State Treasurer. I know that he felt that Prop 301increased funding, but it seems like the $3B from that lawsuit just evaporated and the State has never paid it. 301 did not have anything in it that would absolve the State of the obligation. What happened
Taxes should not be raised until tax credits are recaptured first. Not more tax credits for individual donations to Private School Tuition Organizations. Not more corporate tax credits for donations to Private School tuition organizations. Many more of the 30 some tax credits need to be recaptured. One thing is sure, all this tax cutting, going all the way back really to the tax rates of 1978, have done nothing for economic development except starve needed services, and money to public schools. In reality the State is supporting three school systems, public schools, privately operated charter schools (don’t you dare call them public schools), and now private schools with tax credits, and back door vouchers (maybe).
You touch on it, David, but the issue deserves more emphasis. Every time we bring up school funding, someone walks out Prop 301 and calls for a sales tax increase. Arizona already has one of the high sales tax rates in the nation, in fact, 11th from the top. We have the lowest property and income taxes, 5th and 6th from the bottom. Ducey and his predecessors claimed lowering income taxes would drive the economy, it has not. So, yes we need more money in education, but we need to raise revenue, an increase in income tax makes more sense that again increasing the sales tax.
Michael S. Ellegood, I agree completely. I’ve written about Arizona’s position as one of the eight worst states in terms of the burden of taxation carried by people with the lowest incomes. I wish to hell Democrats would have the courage to make “Tax the rich!” a catch phrase they haul out every time people say we don’t have enough money for a good program and all you liberals want to do is raise taxes. In Arizona, the rule that it takes a 2/3 majority in the legislature to pass new taxes could be changed by referendum or initiative. Without a change, any tax aimed at the highest income Arizonans will never happen.
Business leaders usually are rich & often funnel taxes to their interest
Arizona Rural Schools Association, representing 100 districts serving more than 100,000 students in every county have formally asked the leaders of Arizona’s business community to take up the challenge. Steps have been taken to address the needs of our education system, but they don’t fully address the needs and if something isn’t done to address the end of the current 6/10ths sales tax the future of education in Arizona looks very grim.