Free Republic

$42 Billion Transit Proposal Moves in Wrong Direction Byron Schlomach, Goldwater Institute Daily Email, April 30, 2008 After months of rumblings around the state capitol, a private coalition called TIME – Transportation and Infrastructure Moving AZ’s Economy – has unveiled a $42 billion solution for Arizona’s transportation problems. It can be summed up as “tax and spend.” Under the proposal, the state’s sales tax would increase by one cent. By itself, a cent seems small, but this would make Arizona’s state sales tax rate the fifth highest in the nation according to the Tax Foundation. Arizona already has the nation’s...

Blaming Feds for Budget Deficit Passes the Buck Darcy Olsen, Goldwater Institute Daily Email, May 01, 2008 In the opinion column "'Stimulus' and the States" (Wall Street Journal, April 24), Arizona Gov. Janet Napolitano blames Congress for state budget deficits: "Even if the federal government paid up on only a few of its debts mentioned here, Arizona would not be in deficit this year." Without question, unfunded federal mandates have plagued the states for years, but overall they constitute less than two percent of state budgets. Most state spending rests squarely in the hands of our state capitols. Like most...

‘Tax Cuts for the Rich’ Dangerous Rhetoric Thomas C. Patterson, Goldwater Institute Daily Email, April 29, 2008 The presidential candidates are promising some pretty pricey stuff. But you and I aren't going to have to pay for it. No, the free health care, free college, subsidized mortgages, and other goodies can be paid for by repealing President Bush's “tax cuts for the rich.” But here's the problem. There were no Bush tax cuts for the rich. The rates were cut, but the rich pay more taxes than ever. The top 1 percent of earners now pay 36.9 percent of all...

Non-Alignment of Standards Not Culprit for Low Scores By Matthew Ladner, Ph.D Recently I appeared on the Horizon public affairs program together with State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Horne, to discuss the No Child Left Behind law and our state AIMS test. During the discussion, Superintendent Horne said the main reason Arizona students perform poorly on the national NAEP test, also known as the Nation's Report Card, is due to a non-alignment of standards. If, for example, Arizona does not teach the math concepts in fourth grade that appear on the fourth grade math NAEP, one could expect lower...

The Empire Strikes Back With Massive Attorneys’ Fee Request in CityNorth Case Clint Bolick, Goldwater Institute, April 24, 2008 While the Goldwater Institute’s legal challenge to the CityNorth subsidy moves to the Court of Appeals, one issue remains before the trial court that upheld the subsidy. Not content merely to demand $97.4 million of taxpayer money, the developers now are seeking hundreds of thousands more for their attorneys’ fees—from the Goldwater Institute. The City is, too. Rather than using the same huge in-house legal department that negotiated the deal, the City hired a high-priced private firm to defend it. The...

Compromise on Arizona state budget makes 2009 a year of reckoning Byron Schlomach, Goldwater Institute Daily Email, April 23, 2008 Well, blow me down, they did it--and with two and a half months to spare. The legislature and the governor have agreed on a fix for the fiscal 2008 budget. Both sides can claim victory and defeat, so the deal appears an artful compromise. Going into the negotiations, the state faced a $1.2 billion budget shortfall, with budgeted spending projected to exceed revenues by almost 13 percent. Let’s look at the math of the new deal: • A quarter of...

Emphasizing class size over teacher quality is a poor choice Matthew Ladner, Goldwater Institute Daily Email, April 21, 2008 Indiana Jones returns to the big screen this summer. In Indy's last movie, he was in pursuit of the Holy Grail. The ancient crusader guarding the Grail revealed that one could gain it only by drinking from the correct cup. The villain drank from the most ornate cup and suffered a horrible death. Quoth the crusader, "He chose, poorly." Indiana Jones chose the simplest cup. The knight noted approvingly, "He chose, wisely!" When it comes to education, we have chosen poorly....

It’s time to end the Government Property Lease Excise Tax Michelle Bolton, Goldwater Institute Daily Email, April 22, 2008 Fair and equitable taxation is key to economic freedom and prosperity. Rules that favor a few special interests create an un-level playing field and put other businesses at a disadvantage. The Government Property Lease Excise Tax (GPLET) is a case in point. It allows cities to take title to land and buildings and then lease them back to a private company for a nominal fee. These businesses then pay a fraction--often one tenth--of what their property taxes would otherwise be. GPLETs...

Borrowing to build universities will not help economy Byron Schlomach, Goldwater Institute Daily Email, April 17, 2008 Arizona’s public universities have proposed issuing $1.4 billion in bonds for a university building program. The universities have been asking the legislature for this money for a few years, but the construction downturn provides an opportunity to market it as a “Construction Stimulus Plan.” This plan is fundamentally flawed. First, any stimulating effect will come too late. Proponents of the program say it would “immediately create 14,438 jobs for construction workers.” But the spending would be done over several years, so most of...

Fighting for Lexie : Court of Appeals Should Reject Latest School Choice Challenge Timothy Keller, Goldwater Institute Daily Email, April 16, 2008 The fate of Lexie Weck’s education is in the hands of a three-judge panel. The Arizona Court of Appeals will hear arguments Wednesday, April 23 in the nation’s first-ever legal challenge against publicly funded scholarships for children with disabilities and children in foster care. Lexie is a six-year-old girl with autism and cerebral palsy, who uses a scholarship to attend the Chrysalis Academy where she is flourishing. A year ago, she was in a public school making little...

The Myth of Helplessness : Those who accept no excuses get results Matthew Ladner, Goldwater Institute Daily Email, April 14, 2008 On April 4th, Arizona School Board Association analyst Michael T. Martin wrote a column opposing the state takeover of the Roosevelt school district. He asserts that widespread lead poisoning is the cause of Roosevelt’s problems. Lead poisoning has been much diminished since the elimination of lead paint and lead gasoline, but not entirely eliminated. An examination of the evidence is in order before writing off these kids. In our state of 6 million people, the Arizona Department of Health...

English Language Learning It's time to end judicial mandates in education By Tom Patterson The Flores lawsuit to compel the state to spend more money on English language learners is lumbering, in its 16th year, toward its next manufactured crisis. The plaintiffs' attorney insists that the key to English language learning is massive funding. U.S. District Court Judge Raner Collins has vowed that if lawmakers won't provide funding that he, Collins, deems sufficient by Tuesday, he will begin imposing daily fines of $2 million on the state. The Legislature and the Department of Education have made good-faith efforts to comply...

The Buck Should, Quite Literally, Stop Here : Only the Governor can prevent a tax increase Byron Schlomach, Goldwater Institute Daily Email, April 10, 2008 On Tuesday, the Senate barely passed a bill that would permanently repeal the County Equalization Tax (CET) on property. Unfortunately, a gubernatorial veto is very likely. In 2006, when the state was swimming in surplus funds, the tax was suspended for three years. The CET was one of the finance streams that flowed to schools. Since then, other state money has made up the difference to schools. Today, analysts for the legislature estimate the CET...

Regulation Is the Wrong Answer : Mortgage market will correct itself without Washington’s help Thomas C. Patterson, Goldwater Institute Daily Email, April 09, 2008 Since 2001, the number of employees in government regulatory agencies has grown from 172,002 to 244,000. Their funding has increased 44 percent, inflation-adjusted. As a result, Americans face $30 billion more annually in regulatory costs than they did seven years ago. All told, we pay about $1.1 trillion for regulation and compliance costs, about the same as we pay in federal income taxes. In spite of its massive costs, regulation has been unable to prevent market...

Sophistry from the Superior Court : Ruling on CityNorth amends the state Constitution Without A Vote by the People Robert Robb, Goldwater Institute Daily Email, April 08, 2008 The Superior Court decision upholding the massive subsidy Phoenix gave CityNorth is an exercise in legal sophistry. Judge Robert Miles held that there were considerable public benefits from the building of the shopping center, and so there wasn't a violation of the state Constitution's gift clause. There is not, however, a public purpose or benefits exception to the gift clause ban. It states that no Arizona government "shall ever give or loan...

Breaking the Link Between Poverty and Low Achievement: Why Jeb Bush should be on Mount Rushmore Matthew Ladner , Goldwater Institute Daily Email, April 07, 2008 Imagine if we carved a Mount Rushmore for successful progressive governors. Since the root word of “progressive” is “progress,” I nominate former Florida governor Jeb Bush to make the cut. Progressives are concerned with the welfare of the poor. But a better definition, one might argue, would be someone who actually makes progress toward solving the problems of the poor. Like Jeb Bush. The Florida governor is a right-winger, to be sure, but he...

KJ Come Home! : Kevin Johnson turns on the heat for school choice Matthew Ladner, Goldwater Institute Daily Email, April 03, 2008 Former Phoenix Suns point guard Kevin Johnson didn’t consider himself benched when he retired from the game. Johnson, an NBA all-star who in 1993 helped bring the Suns as close to an NBA championship as they’ve ever been, is now jumping through hoops to bring school choice to the nation’s kids. Johnson grew up in Sacramento, California. After retirement he returned and founded a system of high-quality charter schools known as the St. Hope Academies. Johnson turned a...

Who’s in Charge? : Core duties of County Sheriff’s Office should be more clearly defined Clint Bolick, Goldwater Institute Daily Email, April 02, 2008 Did the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office recent use of Racketeering Influence and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO) funds to send staff members to Honduras violate the law-enforcement purposes to which such funds are limited? Did the sheriff’s highly publicized “saturation patrols”—comprised of nearly 200 deputies and “posse” members—trespass the jurisdiction of the Phoenix Police Department? The feud between the Sheriff’s Office and local police departments, bereft of coordination or agreement over priorities, threatens to devolve into law...

Don’t Give Up on Toll Roads : The Private Sector Can Pave the Way Byron Schlomach. Goldwater Institute Daily Email. April 01, 2008 The Arizona Senate recently rejected bills that would have allowed new, state-owned roads to be constructed with private money as toll roads. Let’s hope the idea resurfaces soon. Toll roads make sense. They provide access to large sources of private capital – a real boon to a financially strapped state. Arizona could get several highways built today without spending a penny, if it would simply let the private sector help. Private companies tend to insist that roads...

Opting Out of No Child Left Behind : Now Arizona must get its own house in order by Matthew Ladner, Ph.D. It looks like Arizona is set to opt out of No Child Left Behind. Arizonans need transparency and accountability in public schooling, but they do not need NCLB. The Goldwater Institute has written extensively about the flaws of NCLB. Chief among them is the fact that NCLB creates an entirely perverse incentive for states to lower their academic standards in order to meet a federal goal of 100 percent proficiency by 2014. A recent University of California Berkley study...