LD21 Democratic Candidates Stress Education, Water and Affordability Issues

Democratic candidates for Arizona’s Legislative District 21 debated affordability, education, water and data centers in a virtual candidate forum.

Forum and candidates

The July 14 forum was hosted by LD 21 Democrats and moderated by longtime Democratic activist Larry Bodine, who described the district as a rural, border jurisdiction spanning Santa Cruz County and parts of Pima and Cochise counties, with Democrats outnumbering Republicans by nearly 17 percentage points. Voters there will elect one state senator and two state representatives.

Participating were:

• Rep. Stephanie Stahl Hamilton of Tucson is running for re-election for a fourth term. She is a Presbyterian pastor, a longtime youth advocate and a former Save Our Schools Arizona organizer.
• Rio Rico educator and business owner Maritza Higuera is a lifelong educator, rancher, small-business owner and community advocate.
• Miranda Lopez is a community organizer and public policy advocate who has served as the executive director of the Pima County Democratic Party and represented college students at the Arizona Legislature.

Rep. Consuelo Hernandez had a scheduling conflict and was not able to participate in the forum.

Affordability debate

Asked how they would address the rising costs of rent, housing, food, fuel and medicine, the candidates offered different policy emphases but largely agreed that working families are being squeezed.

Stahl Hamilton said her top priority remains paid family and medical leave, which she has introduced in the last three legislative sessions. “Employees should have an assurance that when they take time off from work … they should have the assurance of being able to go back to their job,” she said, arguing the policy would also help small businesses by reducing turnover and training costs.

She also pointed to energy and housing policy, saying lawmakers should support “smart legislation on solar,” expand the state’s energy portfolio to keep utility costs down, and back low-income housing tax credits to increase supply.

Higuera, a former Head Start teacher and health and nutrition coordinator, said childcare affordability should be a central focus for lawmakers. “Expanding childcare assistance … for working families, that will be wonderful,” she said.

She also called for stronger support for rural entrepreneurs and local agriculture, saying legislators should help farmers, produce distributors and small businesses in district communities to lower grocery costs and strengthen local supply chains.

Lopez blamed “corporate greed” for much of the affordability crisis. “We have … special interests and corporations that not only are buying up housing, but are also buying our politicians and making it more difficult for us to enact legislation that would improve the lives of our renters, of our first-time home buyers,” she said.

Lopez said she would eliminate Arizona’s universal voucher program, freeze tuition at public universities, expand long-term housing funding and revive the state housing tax credit while updating groundwater law and limiting mega data centers that she said primarily benefit investors.

Public schools and vouchers

Education emerged as one of the sharpest points of agreement against Republican policy, though the candidates varied in how they described the state’s crisis.

Higuera, the mother of four children who attended public schools, said the state must keep public education strong while respecting parental choice. “We must ensure that our public schools remain as strong … because at the end … they educate the majority of Arizona children,” she said.

She said lawmakers should invest in teachers, classroom resources, special education and rural schools, while making sure “our public funding stays within our public schools.”

Stahl Hamilton rejected the moderator’s description of Arizona as having the “worst schools in the nation,” saying the more accurate problem is chronic underfunding. “What we have are the worst-funded schools in the nation, and there is a difference there,” she said.

Stahl Hamilton said vouchers were originally intended to help students with the most severe educational needs, but she sharply criticized using public money to subsidize families already paying private tuition. “Public dollars belong in the public schools, period,” she said. “They do not belong in private schools. They do not belong in private religious schools.”

She also said Arizona’s school funding formula is outdated and too complex, describing it as a “patchwork quilt” rooted in policy from the 1980s that no longer fully funds teacher salaries and other essential school staff.

Lopez called vouchers “yet another Republican answer” to a broken school finance system and said charter-school choice often excludes working families. “Education is a right, and if something is a right, that means everyone should have the same access,” she said.

She said she would eliminate the voucher program and reinvest the money in public schools, including special education and after-school programs that she said have been cut for years.

Skeptical of data centers

The candidates were also broadly skeptical of large-scale data center expansion in southern Arizona, citing water scarcity, electricity demand and limited long-term economic benefit.

Lopez said mega data centers are “a billionaire problem” driven by speculative investment in artificial intelligence and pledged to “prevent the expansion of data centers as much as possible.” Higuera said she does “not support” large-scale data centers in areas where water resources are already stressed and called for tougher sustainability rules.

Stahl Hamilton said the issue is “very nuanced” but backed a pause on tax credits for new data center development and warned that Arizona lacks the energy infrastructure to support “hyperscale” facilities without shifting costs onto families. “Most certainly, we do not have the infrastructure energy-wise to sustain the power necessary for these hyperscale data centers,” she said.

On water, Lopez said Arizona should update the 1980 Groundwater Management Act to stop corporations from pumping unchecked groundwater, while Stahl Hamilton said the state’s water law is among its most complex policy areas and argued Arizona must resolve tribal water rights and continue conservation before seeking costly new supply arrangements.

Higuera said she would focus on listening to ranchers, local officials and rural communities about water rights, conservation and drinking water needs.

The Primary Election is Tuesday, July 21.