PHOENIX — State lawmakers adopted a $9.1 billion budget for the coming fiscal year early Saturday, but not before more than eight hours of debate and a series of changes to what Gov. Doug Ducey had proposed.
Those changes became necessary to line up the required votes for the package. But in some ways they represent a defeat for the new governor in his first attempt to get the Republican-controlled Legislature to adopt a spending plan of his design.
For example, the final budget includes $102 million in new spending on K-12 education.
But Ducey will not be able to crow, as he did when he released his budget in January, that he is putting $134 million into classrooms.
Ducey was not offering new money but simply making an accounting maneuver: Force schools to shift 5 percent of non-classroom funding into the classroom, effectively taking the money from themselves.
The version adopted says the intent is that schools increase what they are spending on the instructional side of the equation. But it no longer limits that to “classroom” funding — mainly teacher salaries — but now also includes everything from librarians and counselors to teacher training and curriculum development.
And there is no specific requirement to move 5 percent of the budget from one side of the ledger to the other, with each district deciding how much it can shift.
Rep. T.J. Shope, R-Coolidge, who serves on a school board, said schools could not live with the lack of flexibility proposed by the governor. He also said the change recognizes there is far more to educating students than just teachers.
“We have school psychologists, we have speech pathologists, things like that,” he said. “If those positions don’t exist, you can’t even get into the classroom.’
And Rep. Karen Fann, R-Prescott, said the original plan would hit rural areas particularly hard, potentially forcing schools to cut back on transportation.
“We have miles of bus routes,” she said, saying picking up students is necessary to “getting them in the seats.”
The final deal also restores $1.6 million the governor sought to take from Central Arizona College.
Conversely, Ducey wanted to cut state aid to Pima and Maricopa community colleges by half. The final budget cuts it all.
At the university level, the governor had asked to cut state aid by just $75 million. But the final package boosts that to $99 million.
The decision to take more from the universities than Ducey wanted was driven by Senate President Andy Biggs rejecting the governor’s call to nearly double the current $8 a year Arizonans pay to register their vehicles. That charge, above the license tax based on a vehicle’s value, would have raised $30 million.
Ducey argued that did not violate his pledge not to hike taxes, calling it a fee. Biggs disagreed.
“That’s a tax increase,” he said.
Ducey’s proposal to contract for 3,000 new private prison beds also did not survive.
Instead, lawmakers agreed to seek space for 1,000 medium-security inmates, leaving the door open for Ducey to ask for 1,000 more in 2017. And the package permits county sheriffs who say they have unused space in their jails to bid to provide some of these beds.
Lawmakers also voted to cut reimbursement to health care providers and ambulance services that serve Medicaid patients by 5 percent; Ducey had sought just a 3 percent cut.
And lawmakers put a one-year lifetime benefit on Temporary Assistance for Needy Families. That program aids parents or caregivers with children, with benefits for a family of three of $277 a month.
That issue produced one of the more emotional discussions.
Rep. Rebecca Rios, D-Phoenix, said 38 states have five-year limits, with Arizona one of only four states with a two-year cap. Now, she said, Arizona will be alone with that one-year limit.
“To me this is shameful,” she said.
Rep. Kelly Townsend, R-Mesa, said the Book of Isaiah commands people care for widows and the fatherless.
“I am a widow,” she said. “And my children are fatherless.”
Townsend said, though, she reluctantly is supporting the measure as a method of balancing the budget. But she said colleagues must find “creative ways” to generate money, including taking lands from the federal government.
“I don’t think anybody’s happy with this budget,” said House Majority Leader Steve Montenegro, R-Litchfield Park.
But he said if the state doesn’t cut expenses this year, in two or three years there will be no money at all for Temporary Assistance for Needy Families.
Elsewhere in the budget, Ducey had asked for money for caseload growth at the new Department of Child Safety. Virtually all of that is gone, with Biggs insisting there’s no proof the agency needs the cash.
“DCS has received several hundred million dollars in the last 15 months,” he said, and now has an $850 million budget.
“We don’t even know what’s been going on with them,” Biggs said. “We need some transparency, we need some accountability.”
And lawmakers voted to make counties pick up a share of the cost of running the quadrennial presidential preference primary.
In 2012, when only Republicans had a primary — the Democrats had incumbent Barack Obama — the Legislature agreed to fully fund the election. For 2016, with both parties seeking a nominee, the state will pay only $1.25 per registered voter, a figure county officials say covers only a fraction of the cost.
Even before the budget was approved, Ducey was philosophical about the changes. He said the budget, even if not what he proposed, moves the state in the direction he wants.
“Step one is to live within our means,” he said. “And that means that we balance a budget.”
And of having to give up some of what he wants?
“We’re going to respect the Legislature and our co-equal branch” of government, he said.
There were some other last-minute additions to the budget in an effort to gain needed votes.
For example, Biggs inserted $1.2 million for transportation projects on the Navajo Nation, represented by Sen. Carlyle Begay, D-Ganado. In the end, Begay provided the 16th vote Republicans needed in the Senate after Republicans Jeff Dial of Chandler and Steve Pierce of Prescott refused to go along with the majority on several bills in the package.
The House, with 36 Republicans, did not need Democrat votes even though several Republicans were not on board.
Rep. Chris Ackerley of Sahuarita balked after expressing concern about several issues, including shifting costs to counties. But Ackerley has a political reason to break party ranks if he hopes to get reelected: He is a freshman in a district where Democrats outnumber Republicans.
The GOP also was unable to get the backing of Reps. Kate Brophy McGee of Phoenix or Bob Robson of Chandler.
While some GOP lawmakers held out for changes, others agreed to go along without getting what they wanted.
For example, Rep. Bob Thorpe, R-Flagstaff, said in a news release he, along with Rep. Brenda Barton, R-Payson, and Northern Arizona University President Rita Cheng, “stand united to support the governor’s original budget proposal regarding Arizona’s universities,” meaning a cut of just $75 million.
“I’ve been working in the background,” Thorpe said, but found Republican leadership unresponsive. “I’m very frustrated about that.”
Thorpe conceded his frustration did not translate into threatening to withhold his vote for the package unless funding was restored.
The vote on the package came after lawmakers rejected a series of amendments offered by Democrats.
One would have restored $1.7 million in Lottery funds that now go to Pinal, Yavapai and Mohave counties. The two largest counties lost their share in prior years; smaller counties remain unaffected.
Another would have eliminated the requirement to contract for 1,000 new private prison beds and reinstated a requirement for the Department of Corrections to analyze whether private prisons actually save any money.
House Democrats, unable to block the package in their chamber, managed to slow the process a bit by reading letters from children who were opposed to the spending levels.
