With Gov. Ducey back in Phoenix after traveling to Palm Springs to kiss the rings of his dark money benefactors Charles and David Koch—”Geez, guys, I can’t thank you enough for all you’ve done to help me get elected, and I need to know what you want me to do next.”—it’s a good time to take a look backward, then forward at Ducey’s record on education funding. Rumor has it Ducey has visited the chiropractor to fix the repetitive muscle strain he caused by patting himself on the back so often, congratulating himself for his plan to give students money from their [state land] trust fund to pay 70 percent of what he and his fellow Republicans owe them, by law. And he’s been known to say the added funding is only a first step. So what’s his next step?
Let’s begin by looking backward. In 2012, Proposition 204 gave the voters a chance to put in a sales tax that would have added nearly a billion dollars a year to education funding. Ducey wasn’t only against it. He headed the No on Prop. 204 campaign, which got a $500,000 boost from the Koch Brothers. Ducey said in a tweet, “Anyone who READS Prop. 204 will see NO MONEY goes to children’s education.” Really? No money? Where does all that money go? According to Ducey, it goes “to unelected and unaccountable bureaucrats.” What will those bureaucrats do with all that money? Ducey doesn’t say, but he says firmly, “The money will not go to the teachers and classrooms, where it is needed most.”
Lies, lies, lies. The money would have gone predominantly to teachers and classrooms. Contrary to popular belief, promoted and encouraged by Arizona’s public school haters, we don’t spend lavishly on administration. In fact, we have the lowest per student cost for administration of any state in the nation. If you want to find Arizona schools that spend a lavishly on administration, you have to go to charter schools, which devote far more of their budgets to “bureaucrats” than school districts. But something tells me Ducey wasn’t talking about wasteful spending at charters.
So. Ducey stood strongly and publicly against a proposition that would have added three times as much to education funding as the $300 million a year he wants to steal from the children of tomorrow to spend on the children of today. Ducey’s $300 million plan would move us from 48th place in per student funding to . . . 48th place. We wouldn’t budge. That billion dollars he fought against would take us to 45th place, tied with Tennessee. That would still leave 90 percent of the states spending more than us, but it would make a significant difference, improving students’ educations and increasing teacher retention by raising teacher salaries, increasing classroom supplies and lowering class size. The kids would have greater opportunities to learn, and the teachers would have a more fulfilling experience every day in the classroom and a more pleasant experience when they got their paychecks at the end of the month. Ducey’s plan? It would put us back where we were in 2009—underfunded—when the Republicans illegally cut education funding. (Actually, it would only get us to 70 percent of where we were in 2009. Only a deadbeat dad [#deadbeat] would say he supports his kids by using their own money to restore 70 percent of what he’s taken away [I’m sorry, have I said that before? If so, it bears repeating, again and again and again and . . .])
Ducey said the $300 million in extra funding he’s sending to the voters in Proposition 123 is only a first step. Which begs the question, what’s his next step? It isn’t adding more education funding to the budget. Even a little extra would get in the way of his plan to give his rich friends a tax cut, and a significant boost in funding would require a tax increase, something Ducey promised he would never do. The next step he’s talking about isn’t more funding. So what is it?
Ducey’s plan is to reallocate the existing funding. He says he wants to put more in the classroom, but with our lowest-in-the-nation per student administrative costs, there’s not a lot of money to move. What he really wants to do is take funds away from districts with low income students and give them to districts with high income students. He calls that rewarding success. Ducey’s definition of “success” is schools where students get high scores on standardized tests and take lots of AP classes. Translation: schools with high income students. And in a zero sum game with no new funding, the money for those schools would come from schools with low income students.
Governor Ducey does not support education at the K-12 level or at the college level. He supports starving the schools and cheating our students, though he’d cheat high income children, who are his kind of people, a little less than low income children.
This article appears in Jan 28 – Feb 3, 2016.
TUSD has plenty of money. Sunday’s AZ Star reported that Santa Rita HS has dropped to less than 480 students. That’s grades 9-12. They are spending $56,000 per month JUST on utilities to keep it open.
Close Santa Rita, combine them with another and enjoy the savings.
Poor management is the problem. Not funding.
By the way, Koch Bros do not want Trump, and yet Trump advocates for school choice. How bad can the Bros be?
350 MILLION per year is stolen from Arizona property tax payers to pay for educating the children of illegals. This is the pot of gold that liberals will never admit they exploit to line their pockets.
And still they want more.
Diaz: Immigration status of Mesa man tied to girl found duct-taped in a closet
The lowlife who Mesa police say kidnapped and reportedly sold a 3-year-old girl for sex deserves to burn in hell for eternity….
http://www.azcentral.com/story/opinion/2016/01/21/elvia-diaz-child-abuse-immigration/79125754/
But as long as the public education system is paid by the State via confiscated dollars from the local property owners, $7000/head everything is a-ok.
We can go on and on about education funding, we can divide loyalties between public district schools, public charter schools, private schools and not move forward in providing top notch educational opportunity for Arizona’s children. Until we can “sell” pride into educational opportunity for all nothing new will happen. Where does this fable of millions of dollars are “confiscated” from state property taxpayers to educate “children of illegals” originate? What Again, no facts just more of the same hate, bad people are bad, it has nothing to do with their legal status.
Try this on for size. “A Mesa doctor accused of sexually abusing two patients during medical examinations was sentenced to 15 years probation.”
http://www.azcentral.com/story/news/local/…
Public schools in this state are at a huge disadvantage, great people have moved here from other areas with no involvement or relationship with their local schools. Until the value of public education in all forms is recognized by all across the total population some can continue to selfishly starve school funding. Education to support education is a necessity. An educated population lifts all boats, more higher paying jobs, more social opportunities and more family units staying closely connected, not driven away for employment. Lastly if nothing else makes sense in support for excellence in local education, compare property values if you or your heirs are forced to sell almost always the final sales prices depend on the quality of your local public schools.
hakeson – obviously you are totally ignorant as to how the illegals are paid for.
Here are the facts – if you can read.
Enrollment is reported to the state from the school district. If TUSD has 10,000 students, they get about $7k per head from the state. That amount is assessed to property taxes in the district. So if 8,000 of those students are illegal, it is simply a pass through charge directly to the property owner from the state via the district. No votes, no representation, it is CONFISCATED.
Do you live in Arizona? Or is this just a matter of “someone else’s” money, “public” money, anything but yours.
Biggs, Ducey, and Gowan to Arizona’s one million students in public schools, “Droppen Zie dead!”
hakeson compares the incident with the Mesa doctor to an illegal who sexually abused a three year old, sold her, kept her in a bag locked in a room.
1) The illegal should not even be here, 2) We know what the details of what the illegal did to the 3 YEAR OLD girl, you provided not a wit of the detail for which the doctor got PROBATION. Why didn’t you say it was a touching incident with a 45 year old woman.
hakeson is one sick puppy – to him/her, a three year old getting molested and sold is just fine since the offender is an illegal.
What Again…twist your story anyway you want. The sick individual you are referring to was not an “illegal” as you described. Quoting from the article you referred to, “suspect got legal status under Obama’s DACA program, the White House executive order that allows immigrants brought as children to stay in the country.” Agree with the President’s order or not, seems you are misleading in your characterization of the man’s status. Getting to state revenue to schools, that money is not from property taxes. Property taxes for school are a local issue not determined by the state as some kind of pass through charges. While the State Legislature has enacted statutes governing local property taxes the local boards and voters {taxpayers} have the final determination of local property tax collections for schools. You are correct in your assessment of me being totally ignorant in attempting to engage in a conversation with someone hiding their real name, pretending to know what they are talking about in school finance and prone to twisting facts.
hakeson – I love your ignorant statements.
How do you think he got here? ILLEGAL
And I’m very happy you showed that thanks to you liberals, and your GOD OBAMA, that 3 year old girl was molested in a way that no human should endure anywhere. That’s what you liberals have caused. It’s a direct relationship. You allowed this POS to come here illegally, you legalized him and he raped, sold and molested this THREE YEAR OLD.
But as long as you can get several thousand dollars per head, it’s all good by you.
I’m glad you show again your total ignorance in how the schools are funded. Local school districts do NOT control the amount of taxation, only in the case of overrides. Just to exhibit the ignorance you are spreading;
“In fact, the Arizona Supreme Court found in Roosevelt v. Bishop that reliance on local property taxes for capital funding was unconstitutional and ordered the state to provide adequate capital funding for all public schools.”
The only control local districts have over the taxation is supplemental funding. Core funding is based on how much per student the state legislature determines. The districts report the enrollment and the state reimburses the dollars to the district that then apportion to the property taxes within the district. The amount for every illegal is directly charged to the property taxpayer without any consent or representation – CONFISCATED!
I’m pretty sure you can’t understand what I’ve said, the Arizona Supreme Court decision or the link below which graphically portrays the payment process, but I’m sure others can.
http://www.centerforstudentachievement.org/uploads/2/0/7/4/20740134/funding_graphic_11x17.pdf
What again, The link you gave was incorrect, however tracking it down a bit you can toss all the sticks and stones you wish but it doesn’t make the case you want.
First of all the incorrect representation of the Court rulings doesn’t make your case, period! Better go back to your source, http://www.centerforstudentachievement.org , wholly owned subsidiary of the Arizona Charter Schools Association and come up with some new more honest facts. Now that part of your cover is removed as you hide behind “center for student achievement” and throw out insults, do your homework and learn more about where state revenue comes from and know that there is no state property tax that funds schools, district or charter. Stupid is as stupid does.
hakeson – you are as dense as can be. Never, never have I said there is a state property tax that funds schools.
The district sends a bill to the state for the number of enrollees. That number is multiplied by the amount per student that has been decided by the legislature. That money is then charged against the property taxes of the district the funds went to.
Currently the estimate is around 50,000 children of illegals in the schools. That’s about $350,000,000 per year. Oops, I better spell that out for you. 350 MILLION per year. Who in the world do you think pays for that?
There is state funding called equalization, proving my point that you weren’t able to decipher the funding and payment processing graphic.
By the way hakeson – the link I provided works just fine. Maybe you just have many incompetencies.
http://www.centerforstudentachievement.org/uploads/2/0/7/4/20740134/funding_graphic_11x17.pdf
It seems like every time I visit the Weekly’s comment pages I’m forced to say to myself, “What, Again, again!?”
Of course, if we didn’t have what,again and rat chiming in with their mindless right-wing talking points drivel all day, we wouldn’t have anyone to laugh at…
A Note To Commenters: At my request, the Weekly went through the comments on this post and removed a number of them that crossed the line from discussion and argument into personal attacks. If you look at the Weekly’s Comments Policy, http://www.tucsonweekly.com/tucson/Comment…, you’ll see that some of the comments were in clear violation.
For the record, I support commenters’ right to remain anonymous. Anonymous writing is a proud, longstanding part of American letters which includes the Federalist Papers and novels by famous authors published under pseudonyms. There are cases where writers use anonymity to disguise a self-serving purpose, and those, I believe, deserve to be exposed, but otherwise, people have the right to express their views without disclosing their identities.
As for the ad hominem attacks in the comments, they descended into a vile back-and-forth. Criticizing one another’s ideas is generally acceptable, but that kind of thing is beyond the bounds.
I am closing the comments on this post.