A Fountain Hills Town councilmember is raising concerns about allegations that a local high school, via a famous football coach, Gary Zauner, has violated Arizona law prohibiting using taxpayer dollars to influence an election.
Fountain Hills Councilmember Allen Skillicorn issued a press release calling attention to an article by the Goldwater Institute entitled “AZ School Illegally Uses Children, Taxpayer Dollars to Influence Election.”
The alleged illegal action by Fountain Hills High School is described in the Goldwater Institute’s blog post as follows:
“Public schools are funded with our tax dollars, and they’re supposed to use their taxpayer-funded resources to educate children—not meddle in politics. But Fountain Hills High School in the Phoenix area used public employees, public property, and even its own students to make a political campaign ad meant to influence an election, in blatant violation of Arizona law.
On September 17, Fountain Hills High School football coach Gary Zauner posted a campaign video urging Fountain Hills residents to vote “yes” on a $25 million bond measure in a special election this November…”
“The video is a clear violation of the law,” said Skillicorn in a press release. “I understand this is an emotional issue and people on both sides of the tax hike question are passionate about their views but illegally using school property to influence an election is inexcusable. I call on school officials to follow the law and scrub their social media channels of all material that illegally uses school property for campaign speech. The end does not justify the means. They need to follow the law.”
The video has been removed by the owner, raising questions about the legality of the matter.
Arizona law, A.R.S. 15-511 reads in part:
“A. A person acting on behalf of a school district or a person who aids another person acting on behalf of a school district shall not spend or use school district or charter school resources, including the use or expenditure of monies, accounts, credit, facilities, vehicles, postage, telecommunications, computer hardware and software, web pages, personnel, equipment, materials, buildings or any other thing of value of the school district or charter school, for the purpose of influencing the outcomes of elections.”
There is no word yet regarding what legal action, if any, may be taken against the Fountain Hills School District.