PHOENIX — Arizona’s top Senate Republican accused Democrats Friday of hampering the state’s recovery by complaining about its public education system.
Senate President Andy Biggs said Democratic claims that the Republican-controlled Legislature has cut $4 billion in education funds in the last five years are “dangerous and erroneous.”
Biggs said that while there were cuts for several years early in the recession, the state is now spending more than it ever has. And he said Arizona provides “a good education,” though it may have “a ways to go.”
“But if you want to consistently say to business: ‘Hey, you know what? We have a crappy education system,’ you’re not helping the state, you’re not helping our education system, and you are hindering our economy,” Biggs told an audience of business executives at a forum just ahead of the new legislative session, which begins Monday.
House Minority Leader Eric Meyer said he never used that language, but he did not dispute that Democrats have complained about cuts in education funding.
And he said that when adjusted for inflation, the state is spending less on each student now than it did before and that the figures for the accumulated dollars of those cuts are accurate.
“The facts are the facts,” said Meyer, who served on the board of the Scottsdale Unified School District. And he said that points up the need for improvement.
“If we don’t develop a long-term plan to ensure that our kids are successful, the statistics show, the test scores show that our kids are not meeting the standards that we need to meet to be successful in college and in the workforce in our state,” Meyer said. “And we need to change course.”
Newly elected Gov. Doug Ducey, speaking earlier to the same audience, did not specifically address the question of education funding.
Ducey repeated his stance that he will not increase state revenues, even though projected revenues for the coming budget year do not match anticipated expenses. But Ducey hinted that he will not seek further cuts to education, saying he will propose “a responsible and balanced budget that protects what’s most important in Arizona in terms of public safety and classroom spending.”
The new governor said what will eventually balance the budget is economic growth. And Ducey, who just this past Monday extended an existing moratorium on new regulations, said he now wants to start eliminating some of those already in place.
“I’m going to call on the business community to help me identify areas of overregulation that we already have on the books so we can improve our fiscal situation ... and we can improve the business climate,” the governor said, although he provided no specifics on what rules he thinks might be unnecessary.
But the more immediate problem when lawmakers return is school funding.
It starts with a court order to immediately give schools an additional $317 million, to make up for what state aid would have been had lawmakers not ignored a 2000 voter-approved law to adjust per-student funding each year to account for inflation.
A separate demand for more than $1 billion in missed additional aid is pending.
But there are other cuts that were made in how schools are funded.
Figures prepared by legislative budget analysts put state aid to schools in 2006 for basic maintenance and operation at $3,909 per student. For the current school year, that figure is just 3 percent higher, at $4,040.
But after inflation, that amount actually is now worth 13 percent less. And even when local and federal dollars are added in, the report shows per-student funding has not kept pace with inflation.
Biggs said that education “is the first and most legitimate function of government.” And he said the Republican-controlled Legislature has lived up to that obligation to the extent possible given the recession and the drop in state revenues.
Meyer, after the presentation, said it’s not like what the Democrats are saying is a surprise to anyone in business here or looking at relocating to Arizona.
“I was at a guy’s business yesterday who does manufacturing,” he said.
“He can’t hire trained people to work in his business,” Meyer said. “And he’s going to move to L.A.”
