Education Finance

KOLD News 13
Barbara Grijalva
TUCSON, AZ (KOLD) - Arizona's new budget is hitting a lot more high school students in Pima County.


The state is making, what is being called a devastating budget cut, to JTED, the Joint Technical Education District.

That is the voter-approved high school career and technical education program that serves some 24,000 high school students in Pima County.

Career and technical education in Pima County isn't the old shop class you might be used to.

There are traditional vocational programs, all the way to engineering and bio-technology classes and labs.
ABC 15 News
Rudabeh Shahbazi
PHOENIX - There is a new pledge to save education, as the governor plans to cut millions of dollars, but it’s not from lawmakers. Arizona ranks 49th in the nation for K-12 investment and has one of the highest dropout rates. An organization called “Arizona Education Commitment” is urging lawmakers to find other ways to balance the budget, saying the State Constitution explicitly prioritized education.

The Arizona Republic
Sherry Anne Rubiano
Voters have one week left to decide how they will vote in Dysart's override election.


The Dysart Unified School District is asking voters to approve a 15 percent maintenance-and-operations budget override.


If approved, it would replace the district's current 10 percent M&O override and 5 percent K-3 override and would continue funding programs supported by those overrides.


Justin Olson, senior research analyst at the Arizona Tax Research Association, said school districts like Dysart will have real challenges going to the ballot this month.
The Arizona Capitol Times
Griselda Nevarez, Cronkite News Service
A state lawmaker is proposing a new diploma that would allow high school students to attend community colleges or technical schools as early as sophomore year.


Rep. Rich Crandall, a Mesa Republican and chairman of the House Education Committee, said the Grand Canyon Diploma would address the problem of high school students who meet the AIMS test standards early and simply coast toward graduation.

The Arizona Republic
Jahna Berry
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Jack Kurtz/The Arizona Republic


The old Ramada Inn in downtown Phoenix has been a hotel and a dorm and is now vacant.


The same week that Phoenix leaders imposed a 2 percent food tax to prevent layoffs and painful cuts to city services, City Council members agreed to spend $6 million to buy a vacant motel so Arizona State University can expand its downtown campus.

The Arizona Republic
Emily Gersema
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Emily Gersema / The Arizona Republic


Several windows in the administration and gym buildings at Power Ranch Elementary have cracks in the corners of the stucco and concrete that frames them. Higley Unified School District officials say this has allowed rain water to seep in.

The Arizona Daily Star
Rhonda Bodfield
A conservative think tank and a taxpayer-advocacy organization have backed off plans to sue the Tucson Unified School District in an attempt to clamp down on the millions of dollars it gets every year in desegregation funding.


The Goldwater Institute and the Arizona Tax Research Association had been readying for a bid to challenge the constitutionality of the district's levy to help bring schools into racial balance, preparing to argue that it's illegal to levy unlimited property taxes for an unlimited time without voter approval.

The Arizona Republic
Alex Bloom
The economy apparently was on voters' minds Tuesday when they walked into Valley voting booths to address school-district spending through bonds and budget overrides.


Valley voters supported only 20 of the 36 school-district bonds and budget overrides on the ballot in Maricopa County, according to unofficial results. That was down considerably from last year, when voters supported 28 of 31 budget measures. Voters' action comes amid a period of deep cuts to state education spending because of the state budget crisis.

The Arizona Republic
Justin Olson
The Arizona Republic's report of a charter school under investigation for inappropriately receiving state funds for educating private-school students highlights a pervasive problem throughout Arizona's school-finance system.

Arizona Capitol Times
Jim Small
Lawmakers may shift the responsibility for education funding to local property owners as a way of coping with staggering budget deficits in the near future, even though it would translate to higher property taxes.


“It may have to be (an option) because I just don’t know where we’re going to find money,” said Rep. John Kavanagh, a Fountain Hills Republican. He chairs the Appropriations Committee in the House of Representatives.


“We may well have to require local governments and taxpayers to pick up more of the burden.”