They're back at it again.Β
You'll see them in front of libraries, near shopping centers, knocking on doors, carrying clipboards and often wearing the familiar red T-shirts from the old days of 2018.
They're petition circulators, collecting signatures to try to overturn the state's new voucher program. Once again. They say this program, which would allow any family to take $7,000 per student in public money to pay for private school or home-school expenses, could further degradeΒ the state's beleaguered public schools.Β
They're people like Wes Oswald, a teacher at Manzo Elementary in Tucson. He's now a veteran of several petition campaigns trying to protect or boost Arizona's public schools.
"Itβs a very easy ask in Tucson," he said. "People seem to understand the issue and people want to vote against it."
If you think you've seen this before, you have. Some of the same people collected signatures in 2017, which led to voters overwhelmingly rejecting that era's voucher program in 2018.
And some of them, like Oswald, worked on Invest in Ed version 1.0 in 2018 and Invest in Ed 2.0 in 2020. The first was thrown out before it reached the ballot; voters passed the second, but the Arizona Supreme Court ruled it unenforceable this year.
Some of the same signature-gatherers also worked on last year's effort to overturn a flat-tax law that many feared would end up stripping money from public education. They got enough signatures to put it on this year's ballot, but, once again, the state Supreme Court intervened, blocking voters from the chance to reject it.
So now they're at it again. Save Our Schools Arizona, which led previous drives, is leading this one as well. Teachers, parents, retirees and others are out there, collecting signatures till the Sept. 23 deadline to turn in 118,823 valid signatures.
Opponents organize early
This time, the main difference is that they've encountered organized opposition to the signature-gathering itself, not just in the courts after the fact.
People who support the voucher program, called Empowerment Scholarship Accounts, have been showing up at places where petitions are being circulated, encouraging passers by to "decline to sign."
Christine Accurso, of Gilbert, helped start the anti-petition effort. Her son, she told me, has received an ESA voucher for nine years and attends a private school.
"When the Save our Schools group announced they were going to put this to the ballot and do a referendum, many of us parents said, 'Oh no you don't.' "
The Goldwater Institute helped them put up a website, and the American Federation for Children provided signs and materials. Goldwater, of course, is the libertarian-conservative think tank based in Phoenix. The federation advocates for school choice and voucher programs, and was founded by the billionaire DeVos family, of which former Education Secretary Betsy DeVos is a member.
Former state senator Steve Smith heads the Arizona chapter of the American Federation for Children and told me the politics have changed in the last couple of years.
"The parents are much more outraged, especially in the wake of COVID," he said. "Theyβre outraged that Save Our Schools think they know whatβs best."
Indeed, the "Decline to Sign" groups appear to be getting much of their energy from the parents and others who protested against alleged "critical race theory" and sex education and LGBTQ materials at school boards last year.Β
Accurso and Smith both described their movement as representing "the parents," as if Arizona parents were unanimous in support of them. But of course that's not the case. They probably represent a passionate minority, including a high percentage of home-schooling families, who also stand to gain up to about $7,000 per child per year if the voucher program remains law.
Unending struggle
The last time Arizonans voted on a voucher-expansion passed by the Legislature, in 2018, voters rejected the program by a 65-35 margin. The political dynamics have changed since then, for sure, but probably not that much. Just enough for the opponents of a referendum to get started earlier this time.
A couple and their five children, home-schoolers from Sahuarita, protested Oswald's signature-gathering earlier this month in Tucson, near Barrio Bread, he told me.Β
"They were civil to us," he said. "We engaged in some conversation."
Not all the encounters have been civil, though. Dr. Cadey Harrell was collecting signatures with her daughter near the Rillito Farmer's Market on Sunday when a man sitting at a vendor's table nearby, not apparently part of any group, repeatedly got up to intervene in her conversations with voters, she said. At first it was civil, then it wasn't.
"He continued to try and come over and interrupt. He tried to argue with me about it," she said. Finally she said, loudly "No, I donβt want to talk to you. I said no. You need to leave."
That drew a crowd and ended the interaction finally, she said, but it left a bad impression on her child.Β
The protests can sometimes backfire, too, by attracting voters who want to sign the petitions, several petition circulators told me. But the protests, which have not been as common around Tucson as in the Phoenix area, also add to the sense of infinite struggle felt by some people who have been gathering signatures for public schools over and over.
They've succeeded over and over on the ground, only to be defeated in the courts.
Chelsea Acree, a choir teacher at Marana Middle School, told me she hasn't been working as hard to gather signatures as she did in the past, preferring to focus on her own district.
"I have been collecting signatures for the last 3 or 4 years," AcreeΒ said. "Nothing Iβve ever collected signatures for has ever panned out, which is very devastating."
But as some activists drop away, others pop up ready to engage, Beth Lewis, director of Save Our Schools, told me.Β
"People are passionate about defending our public schools," she said.
And so the same dynamic of punches and counterpunches over education is likely go on beyond this year.
