- Image courtesy of shutterstock.com
In a long-awaited ruling — and one long-feared by Republicans — Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Katherine Cooper ruled that the legislature has to add $317 million to K-12 funding in Arizona right now and something on the order of $2.9 billion over the next five years.
This goes back to a 2000 ballot measure where the voters said school funding has to increase to keep up with inflation, which the lege hasn’t done on a regular basis.
Where is the legislature supposed to get the money? The judge said that’s not relevant to her ruling.
“Cost does not defeat jurisdiction,” she wrote.
[snip]
“This court cannot (and will not) tell the Legislature or treasurer how to fund the adjustments, past or future,” she wrote. “The court assumes that the Legislature will do what the law requires to enable the state to comply with the Supreme Court decision.”
Stay tuned. This story has legs. It’s going to be around for awhile and will most likely become a factor in some 2014 campaigns.
This article appears in Jul 10-16, 2014.
Long feared? You generally take the position that Republicans are against education. It is interesting how liberals embrace environmental conservatism but are sneer at fiscal conservatism. True conservatives believe in conserving all resources and using them to the maximum benefit for all.
They can always cut back on Medicaid, welfare to work programs, food stamps, environmental protections, public safety, roads and transportation, etc., etc., etc. More than one way to balance a budget!
I am very happy about this ruling, but now the bickering and the bartering begins. We are going to see the full ugliness of our legislature and many of our elected officials come out over the issue of where the money comes from. I firmly believe that if the state of Arizona didn’t a)pass so many unconstitutional laws that then need to be litigated and b)make every underhanded effort to remove money from our public school system that ultimately needs to be litigated we could save enough money on legal costs to pay off this bill. But I am guessing that those points won’t be raised by the Ledge……
Arizona’s Legislature, Governor and Superintendent of Public Education have a Constitutional obligation to fund public education. Instead, they appear to be hell-bent on destroying public education in Arizona by any means necessary. Unfortunately, instead of complying with this Court order, and the Arizona Constitution, these enemies of public education will spent more of the taxpayers money by appealing this Court order.
Voters must pay attention and elect officials committed to public education; who know that “education is the key to unlocking the golden door of freedom,” as George Washington Carver said many years ago.
Has anyone counted all the tax cuts given out in that time?
It may end up being short-lived, but I am going to bask in this one little victory for education in Arizona. I knew the court would get around to spotting the lack of consistency in funding public education here. But yeah, it will probably get ugly up in the “center of the universe,” and we can be sure the legis will find ways to make this dream of educational funding into a nightmare of red tape and conditions, conditions. We really need to get some changes at the “top”. We need to get out and vote, for what it is worth.
It won’t affect TUSD’s future very much, might even hurt education in some respect if the money increases going primarily to central administration and it delays needed cuts at TUSD’s 1010.
TUSD spends much more on administration than other schools districts, and this is a huge problem that is going to get worse as TUSD’s student population is expected to shrink. Currently, 49,000 students attend TUSD schools, 66% of the 74,000 school age kids in TUSD’s boundaries, expected to fall to 44,000 students in a decade. The percentage drop is worst for TUSD’s middle schools.
Sanchez wants to talk about increasing the size of elementary schools, even though small school size is helpful for students, especially elementary school age kids.
TUSD needs to drastically cut 1010’s budget, forget about promoting highly controversial and divisive programs, as the Grijalvas have for decades, and focus on high quality small elementary schools to win over parents, and improving the quality of middle schools. Building bigger elementary schools is just eyed by 1010 as a way of preserving the bureaucrats budgets at all costs.
I think that Adelita made a mistake by planting solar panels all over TUSD schools on the playgrounds, they’ll only pay for themselves in 20 years (at which point solar tech will be advanced), and they are a nuisance for kids on the playground given the sharp edge of the I-beams, though they do provide some shade, trees look a whole lot better. Why aren’t they over the parking lots? The solar panels are expected to save TUSD just 1.5% of energy costs.
The most important vote I’ll ever make will be this November to vote Adelita out of office, don’t much care who I vote for as long as it’s not her. It’s time to end decades of the Grijalvas using TUSD as their personal political football.