Arizona Governor Katie Hobbs and the Radical Left have made it clear that they want to dismantle school choice in our state. Despite getting trounced in November’s election where teachers’ unions and other anti-school choice groups made it a referendum on educational freedom, Hobbs has doubled down on her same tired and out-of-touch efforts since the start of this year.
Once again, it hasn’t worked. Arizona’s Empowerment Scholarship Account (ESA) program continues to grow—with enrollment now over 87,000 students. So, Hobbs and her buddies in the teachers’ unions have resorted to employing one of their favorite tricks: relying on activist reporters in the corporate media to give their anti-school choice messaging an extra boost.
In early March, a coordinated attack was launched against Primavera, an online charter school serving thousands of K-12 students across the state. It began with a story from Craig Harris, a Red4ED activist that calls himself a reporter, who claimed that Primavera received a ‘D’ letter grade from the Arizona Department of Education for the past three years. According to the report, the school failed to meet the minimum academic requirements for a traditional charter school. Harris’ column then went on to complain about the owner of Primavera and how much money he has made while operating the school.
After the story was published, the Arizona Charter School Board convened a hearing to review the allegations against Primavera. In a span of just a few hours, the board imposed the most severe punishment at their disposal, revoking the schools’ charter and setting them up for eventual closure. In effect, Primavera was given the charter school death penalty after one meeting.
On the surface, this might make sense. After all, if a school is failing its students, it deserves proper accountability. But as so often happens with today’s corporate media, an important fact was omitted from this manufactured takedown. It turns out that Primavera was being graded as a traditional school even though it operates as an “alternative” school. And this is an important distinction. In an alternative school, a large portion of the student population is either struggling with performance or trying to catch up on their requirements in order to graduate. Because of this, alternative schools are graded differently.
For years, Primavera was given the designation as an alternative school from the Arizona Department of Education with the school receiving a ‘B’ grade. But in 2021, their alternative school designation lapsed, which resulted in them being graded as a traditional school for three years. When the administrators at Primavera realized the mistake, they reapplied and were once again approved as an alternative school for this current school year.
So yes, this big saga over a “failing” charter school that was given the harshest punishment imaginable by the charter school board is literally due to a paperwork error. It’s one big nothing-burger that was all triggered by an activist reporter who has an endless supply of axes to grind with charter and private schools.
It does look like Primavera failed to file the correct paperwork, and if the charter school board sees fit to punish Primavera for this mistake, fine. Go for it. But to go from offering no warning to the school to giving it the death penalty is obvious overkill—especially since the Arizona Department of Education granted Primavera’s application to be redesignated as an alternative school.
The reality is that none of this would have happened if Primavera was a district school. Just look at Isaac Elementary School District, which has been mismanaging funds for years and currently faces a budget shortfall of over $12 million! Or Mesa Public Schools, which failed to explain where $32.3 million of their federal emergency funds slated for COVID expenses went. None of these district schools have ever faced the sort of consequences imposed on Primavera. And they also seem to conveniently avoid the attention of these same activist reporters.
It’s time for the charter school board to make the situation right. They should rescind their action against Primavera and come up with a more appropriate remedy that doesn’t displace thousands of students because of a paperwork error.
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PHOENIX, ARIZONA – Today, the Arizona Senate Government Committee passed HB 2518, which “prohibits a public service corporation or public power entity that is regulated by the Arizona Corporation Commission from employing or entering into an independent contractor agreement with an individual who served as a commissioner in the preceding two years.”
“I applaud lawmakers for continuing to move this commonsense legislation forward in the process,” said Scot Mussi, President of the Arizona Free Enterprise Club. “HB 2518 provides protections for ratepayers by ensuring that elected members of the Corporation Commission can’t go from regulating utilities to working for them.”
HB 2518 previously passed the Arizona House of Representatives with an overwhelming bipartisan vote of 51-2. It will now be considered by the full Arizona Senate.
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Arizona needs to have a unified voice promoting economic freedom and prosperity, and the Free Enterprise Club is committed to making that happen. But we can’t do it alone. We need YOU!
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PHOENIX, ARIZONA – Yesterday, President Donald J. Trump issued an executive order to preserve and protect the integrity of American elections. In the order, the president announced his intention to enforce the citizenship requirement for federal elections, which follows our state’s model championed by the Arizona Free Enterprise Club.
“President Trump campaigned on a promise to improve the integrity of American elections, and he has followed through on that commitment,” said Scot Mussi, President of the Arizona Free Enterprise Club. “This order from the president is a tremendous start to enforcing our nation’s laws and fostering more confidence in our elections from people on all sides of the political aisle. We look forward to working with the White House and other states to help implement the Arizona proof-of-citizenship model across the country.”
In addition to the proof of citizenship component, the order also sets in motion certain actions to provide other assistance to states verifying eligibility, improve the Election Assistance Commission, prosecute election crimes, improve security of voting systems, comply with federal law setting the national election day, and prevent foreign interference and unlawful use of federal funds.
President Trump’s order states, “Despite pioneering self-government, the United States now fails to enforce basic and necessary election protections employed by modern, developed nations, as well as those still developing… Free, fair, and honest elections unmarred by fraud, errors, or suspicion are fundamental to maintaining our constitutional Republic. The right of American citizens to have their votes properly counted and tabulated, without illegal dilution, is vital to determining the rightful winner of an election.”
Help Protect Freedom in Arizona by Joining Our Grassroots Network
Arizona needs to have a unified voice promoting economic freedom and prosperity, and the Free Enterprise Club is committed to making that happen. But we can’t do it alone. We need YOU!
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Every time the Republican-controlled legislature considers cutting taxes, the biggest obstacle is the taxpayer-funded lobbyists representing cities, towns, and counties. They come down to the legislature year after year accusing lawmakers of “defunding” local government. And, of course, it is always police, fire, and public safety on the chopping block and never DEI programs, art projects, or other unessential and unnecessary spending projects.
The problem with this narrative is that it is completely false. Cities and towns are flush with cash and have actually received enormous windfalls, not cuts, from the legislature. The result has been hundreds of millions in new revenue for the cities in just the last 6 years. Most of it from two sources—online sales and enhanced state shared revenue.
Online Sales Tax Windfall
In 2019, the legislature passed legislation responding to the Wayfair decision, allowing the state and local governments to tax online sales from sellers outside of this state. At the time, it was sold as a “meager” $85-million-a-year tax increase. But now, five years since the legislation was enshrined into law, taxpayers are doling out over one billion dollars in total collections each year to state and local government.
The most recent full fiscal year shows that cities alone collected $250 million directly from taxing online sales in FY24. They pocketed an additional $70 million in shared revenues from the state’s collections, resulting in a net increase of $320 million in revenue that they did not have five years ago.
Income Tax Windfall
If that wasn’t enough, in 2022 the legislature passed landmark tax cuts benefiting every tax-paying Arizonan, consolidating our previous four bracket income tax rates into one, single bracket of 2.5%. At the time, the cities claimed it would bankrupt them. Why? Because cities and towns receive 15% of state income tax collections, known as Urban Revenue Sharing (URS). So, the legislature increased that to 18% to hold cities “harmless.”
The cities like to claim that the 18% has barely held them harmless, going as far as claiming that they think they still lost a little revenue in the deal. But, five years ago, URS totaled $750 million. Last year? $1.5 billion. In other words, the share of income tax cities receive has doubled in the course of just five years. How many Arizona residents have seen their income double in just five years?
This increase was not anticipated. The Arizona budget five years ago projected that cities and towns would be receiving roughly $900 million by now, not nearly a billion and a half. This means they are reaping a windfall compared to what was anticipated in the amount of $600 million. Not only were they completely held “harmless,” they have far outpaced expected revenue growth.
That’s $320 million from taxing online sales and a $600 million windfall from income tax collections, for a total windfall of $920 million.
Municipal Budgets Are Out of Control
As city revenues from the state have exploded, so has the size of their budgets. If the state had defunded the cities, we would expect to see budget cuts. Yet year after year, municipalities have seen their budgets grow bigger and bigger.
Just take a look at the city of Phoenix. In 2019, Phoenix had a General Fund budget of $1.39 billion. Five years later, their budget has nearly doubled to a whopping $2.13 billion! It’s obvious that no amount of revenue can satiate their appetite to spend, evident by their current attempt to impose another tax increase on their already overtaxed residents to avoid any sort of fiscal sanity.
And yet, they continue the same talking point and continue to send their lobbyists down to the capitol to block commonsense taxpayer protections, all on the taxpayers’ dime.
This year they are opposing Senate President Peterson’s bill (SB1013) that would require cities, towns, and counties to obtain a 2/3 majority before raising taxes and fees, a policy that applies to the legislature, and now to the people, who must get to a 60% vote threshold on the ballot to raise taxes after the passage of Prop 132 in 2022. Though the cities might bank on a veto from Katie Hobbs, President Petersen has also introduced his bill as a referral to the ballot, SCR1008.
The cities should be careful in their opposition. If Hobbs vetoes the bill, the voters will likely support it on the ballot, putting the protection behind the Voter Protection Act, which means they won’t be able to change it in the future without going back to the ballot.
Instead of spreading misinformation about being “defunded,” the cities should tackle their own bloated budgets.
Help Protect Freedom in Arizona by Joining Our Grassroots Network
Arizona needs to have a unified voice promoting economic freedom and prosperity, and the Free Enterprise Club is committed to making that happen. But we can’t do it alone. We need YOU!
Join our FREE Grassroots Action List to stay up to date on the latest battles against big government and how YOU can help influence crucial bills at the Arizona State Legislature.
PHOENIX, ARIZONA – Tonight, voters in the City of Tucson rejected the Safe & Vibrant City ballot measure. This proposition would have increased sales taxes by a half-cent, accumulating approximately $80 million in revenue over each of the next ten years. Scot Mussi, President of the Arizona Free Enterprise Club, released the following statement:
“Voters from all sides of the political aisle made the correct decision in Tucson today. This tax increase was another failed attempt by Tucson’s radical leaders to take more tax dollars from hard-working men and women to fund an insatiable leftist agenda. We have seen over the years how Tucson officials have embraced globalist environmental, energy, and social justice propaganda and policies to steer their municipality – and even our state – into that camp. Tonight, Tucson voters rejected these efforts, rightly deciding to keep their tax dollars for themselves.”
Help Protect Freedom in Arizona by Joining Our Grassroots Network
Arizona needs to have a unified voice promoting economic freedom and prosperity, and the Free Enterprise Club is committed to making that happen. But we can’t do it alone. We need YOU!
Join our FREE Grassroots Action List to stay up to date on the latest battles against big government and how YOU can help influence crucial bills at the Arizona State Legislature.
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