Republicans agree on worst budget deal in Arizona history

STATE CAPITOL, PHOENIX – Republican Gov. Jan Brewer and Republican lawmakers succeeded today in agreeing on the worst budget deal in Arizona history.

Brewer, who for the last several weeks vowed to not make deep cuts to vital services like education, has reportedly agreed to cut more than $600 million, including deep funding cuts to K-12 education. Republican lawmakers allowed Brewer’s tax increase of $438 a year for the average Arizona family after months of condemning it.

Both decided to harm middle-class families, Arizona’s economic engine, by increasing their income taxes on top of the sales tax increase.

“This is the worst budget deal Arizonans could have asked for,” said House Democratic Leader David Lujan. “It cuts education and vital services to children and middle-class families, the elderly and the disabled while burdening them with high tax increases.”

Brewer had six months to solve the budget crisis, but she sat on her hands in the executive tower, waiting until the last minute, while Republicans planned massive cuts to education and vital services.

Then Brewer planned massive cuts herself — $60 million to health care for children and adults, $30 million to the elderly, disabled and others and $30 million from services for people like children with life-threatening conditions. But Brewer said otherwise, appearing in public and championing how her plan protects education and these vital services.

“After six months of wasting Arizona’s time and money, Gov. Brewer gave in to Republican lawmakers and decided to sign their budget that devastates education, children and middle-class families in Arizona,” said Assistant House Democratic Leader Kyrsten Sinema. “Arizonans wanted a better economy, jobs and education, but instead they got a destructive short-term plan that depletes stimulus money and creates an unstable revenue system, leaving a budget hole next year that makes us worse off than today.”

Instead of addressing the need to create a stable revenue system to ensure the state has adequate funding for education, Republicans’ plan appears to give away huge tax breaks to corporations and the wealthy, while forcing the middle-class families to pay higher income taxes.

All the while, Republicans, including Brewer, refused to include Democrats in negotiations, isolating themselves in crafting a purely partisan Republican-ideological budget that furthers their own destructive January budget cuts.

“As Democrats, we recognized from the beginning that to solve Arizona’s budget crisis, we needed to work together to create a bipartisan, common-sense and comprehensive budget solution to create a stronger Arizona,” said House Democratic Whip Chad Campbell. “Republicans, including Brewer, exhibited stubborn behavior, refused bipartisanship and now set Arizona on a path to economic destruction.”

School's out for summer...and they might be cut from the budget

It’s no shock that many states, and the nation, are facing large budget deficits. In order to combat these deficits, many legislatures are erring on the side of large budget cuts – often looking into making cuts in areas where people are most vulnerable, like education and healthcare.

Governor Jan Brewer’s plan would only mean cuts these areas. Just to go into education, decreased spending is very dangerous. The best way to communicate to legislators why education cuts can absolutely not be cut is to communicate values. Values associated with education include opportunity and future. If you’re lobbying for your state to not make cuts in education, make it clear that every child needs a great education in order for our country to remain competitive with other growing nations in the future. It also will provide them with more opportunities in the future, which inevitably will help affect our nation’s future economy as well.

As far as Arizona goes, budget cuts only mean that our education system will continue to be one of the worst in the nation, and will ultimately leave more students unprepared for college and future career opportunities.