On Sunday, June 9, an organization that calls itself Save Our Schools (SOS) mass emailed what constitutes its latest salvo on the war against parental school choice.
This time they are asking their readers to contact Speaker Toma and President Petersen, and demand “Voucher Reform,” which is code for ESA defunding, with the pretext that it will solve the current budget shortfall. This is what they want voters to do:
Demand Voucher Reform
House Speaker Toma: 602-926-3298
Senate President Petersen 602-926-4136
Governor Hobbs: 602-542-4331
We agree that these three individuals should be contacted, but to request, not demand, that as much of the ESA program be preserved as is fiscally possible. Here is why.
The SOS communication contains so many half-truths and outright lies that it is difficult to determine where to begin. For the sake of brevity, we will mention only a few.
The first, blatant lie that the reader will notice is found in the SOS’s characterization of the ESA program.
“…the program has zero guardrails, zero accountability, and zero transparency…”
This is patently false. In fact, anyone who has actually read the regulations associated with ESA’s will agree that there is plenty of guardrails, accountability and transparency. All they have to do is go to https://www.azed.gov/esa/resources
Another blatant lie is contained in a statement attributed to a third-grade school teacher named Stacy Brosius, and used to justify defunding ESA’s
“Over the years I’ve watched as the funding for public schools is chopped and chopped again,”
That lie is so huge that it should be submitted to every Pinocchio contest in AZ, since Brosius would be a sure winner.
The fact is that school funding in general, and K-12 in particular, has been increasing by leaps and bounds over the last few years. The increases have been so huge that in 2023 the legislature’s education appropriation far exceeded the voter-imposed Aggregate Expenditure Limit. In order to make sure their generosity reached the school district schools; the legislature invoked a loophole in the legislation that allows them to waive the voter-imposed Aggregate Expenditure Limit by a super-majority vote of both chambers. With substantial support from Republican members, the legislature succeeded in overriding the limit.
It should be noted that this Aggregate Expenditure Limit is not peanuts. Here is how it works. Every year, the limit is calculated by taking the previous year level of funding and applying these increases:
- The percentage increase in the number of students
- The percentage increase in the cost of living.
- An extra 10%, regardless of enrollment or inflation status.
How many people reading this material get an automatic cost-of-living raise, plus an extra 10% raise every year?
Teachers like Brosius, and others of the SOS’s ilk, should be shouting from the rooftops their appreciation for the Republican-controlled legislature’s efforts to increase funding to the maximum consistent with sane budget policy, instead of bitching and moaning about not enough funding.
Those folks who are considering putting ESA’s on the budgetary chopping block as a means of balancing the budget should be aware of how infinitesimal an amount that will be. Even if we were to believe the numbers provided by the SOS, and we were to scrap the whole ESA program, we would be looking at a “saving” of less than 2%.
There is a misguided belief, fed by unscrupulous individuals, that the current opposition to ESA’s is to save taxpayer money because universal ESA access is way too much. These same unscrupulous individuals claim that they are OK with ESA’s in their initial form, which was only to benefit students with special needs.
This is all Bovine Scat. Democrats, including Hobbs and SOS types, have vehemently opposed ESA’s from day one. Here is how the votes in the legislature have been cast long before the legislature passing of universal access in 2022.
| YEAR – BILL NUMBER |
WHAT THE BILL DOES |
FINAL VOTE |
HOW DEMOCRATS VOTED (*) |
| 2011 – SB1553 | Establishes rules and requirements for SPECIAL NEEDS children | SENATE = 21-7-2 HOUSE = 40-19-1 | NO = 7 YES = 0 NO = 19 YES = 0 |
| 2014 – HB2150 | Expands eligibility to children of eligible MILITARY families |
SENATE = 17-10-3 HOUSE = 38-18-4 |
NO = 9 YES = 0 NO = 18 YES = 3 |
| 2017 – SB1431 | Gradually expands eligibility to K-12 Increases assistance to children of LOW INCOME FAMILIES |
SENATE = 16-13-1 HOUSE = 31-28-1 |
NO = 12 YES = 0 NO = 24 YES = 0 |
(*) NOTE: If you go to azleg.gov to fact-check this material, you can see that Hobbs voted NO on all three bills, once as representative, and twice as senator.
Additional Reading: A lot has been written about the ESA program and how it really works. Here are some examples for further reading:
Horne Schools Hobbs On Policies Involving ESA School Choice Program
Those folks who are inclined to contact elected officials may do so via telephone as shown at the beginning of this piece, or by emails as follows:
Speaker Toma btoma@azleg.gov
President Petersen wpetersen@azleg.gov
Governor Hobbs https://azgovernor.gov/contact/form/contact-governor-hobbs