#RedForEd

We need more of this – in Arizona

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The national RedForEd teacher revolt against red state legislatures began in West Virginia and spread to Kentucky, Colorado, Oklahoma and Arizona.

Oklahoma has been the reddest of red states for years, but that is changing. Vote against teacher pay comes back to bite six more Oklahoma Republicans:

Six more Oklahoma state House Republicans lost their primary run-offs on Tuesday after having voted against raising taxes to give teachers their first raise in a decade. That’s after two others were defeated in June primaries. In fact:

Of the 19 House Republicans who voted against the tax hike, eight have now been defeated. Seven others decided not to run. Only four have advanced to the general election.

On top of that, two Democratic teachers flipped Oklahoma legislature seats from red to blue in 2017, and both Democratic and Republican teachers have won primaries this year—including a school administrator who won one of Tuesday’s run-offs, defeating a six-year incumbent who voted against the teacher pay increase.

Once again we see that public education funding and teacher pay are bipartisan issues among voters even if elected Republicans don’t get that.

In Arizona, this accountability for a governor and GOP legislature who have for years underfunded public education, including teacher pay, will have to come in the November general election.

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GOP candidates demonstrate contempt for their GOP primary voters: no debates!

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There has been an interesting reveal from the The Arizona Republic fka The Arizona Republican this week.

Its editorial board is currently conducting interviews with candidates for the purpose of making primary endorsements.

It turns out the GOP candidates for governor and U.S. Senate are willing to meet with the editors of the The Arizona Republican, but they are not willing to debate one another in the GOP primary.

These GOP candidates demonstrate contempt for their GOP primary voters by refusing to debate. The Arizona Republican should withhold its endorsement of any candidate who refuses to debate his or her opponent and demonstrate such contempt for primary voters. (The Arizona Republican will, of course, endorse the Arizona Chamber of Commerce and Industry approved establishment candidates Doug Ducey and Martha McSally, because rubber-stamping the chamber endorsed candidates is what they have always done).

This is why editorial endorsements carry so little weight these days.

In any case, Gov. Doug Ducey, challenger Ken Bennett meet for first time before Arizona GOP primary:

In what will likely be their only face-to-face discussion of policy issues before the Republican primary election, Gov. Doug Ducey and his challenger, former Secretary of State Ken Bennett, exchanged polite verbal jabs Friday during a meeting with The Arizona Republic editorial board.

Ducey has declined to debate Bennett at two forums next week: one co-hosted by The Republic and Arizona PBS, and another sponsored by the Clean Elections Commission.

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Damning Polls: 59% of All Arizona Voters Reject Gov. Doug Ducey

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Gov. Doug Ducey is a stooge of the Koch Brothers, who fund him with Dark Money and instruct him on how to destroy life in Arizona.
Gov. Doug Ducey is a stooge of the Koch Brothers, who fund him with dark money and instruct him on their anti-education agenda.

In a stunning new poll of Arizona voters, 59 percent of Republicans, Independents and Democrats combined said that they want someone else to lead the state besides incumbent Doug Ducey.

Only 26 percent of voters said Ducey should serve another term and 15 percent said they were unsure in the new June 26, 2018, NBC-Marist poll.

Confirming how fed up Arizonans are with Gov. Ducey, a June 25 Emerson College ePoll reports that Ducey has a lower approval rating (31%) than President Trump (43%) in Arizona and that a majority of voters (64%) think education funding is not enough.

Devastated public schools

Under Ducey, Arizona ranks 48th for public school funding and dead last in the nation for teacher pay. Arizona has cut more from education funding than any other state in the nation, a decline of more than 35%.

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Rep. Pamela Powers Hannley with Handmaids

What Did the 53rd Arizona Legislature Accomplish? (video)

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Rep. Pamela Powers Hannley with Handmaids
Handmaids visited the Arizona Legislature frequently in 2018. Here they are on opening day with Rep. Pamela Powers Hannley.

It has been a little more than a month since the 53rd Legislature ended with a 40-hour marathon, passing the budget in the middle of the night, under the watchful eye of Red for Ed teachers and supporters.

What did the Legislature do in the 53rd Session?

  • We passed the comprehensive Arizona Opioid Epidemic Act, to attack the opioid epidemic in Arizona.
  • We passed dental therapy, expanding access to affordable dental care for urban and rural residents and creating new healthcare jobs. (Video.)
  • We stopped several corporate tax giveaway bills that would have further drained the general fund and taken money from public education. (Video.)
  • We stopped an untested technology from being used on Arizona workers. After Uber and Theranos, hopefully we have learned our lesson on putting untested technologies into statute. (Video.)

What didn’t we do?

  • We failed to adequately fund k-12 public education, community colleges or the university system. In fact, the Republican response to the Red for Ed movement was to make 50 fund transfers to pay the teachers a bit more (but not as much as they deserve). It’s time to restore k-12 public education funds for personnel and infrastructure to pre-recession levels. Funding education is economic development. (Video.)

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LD 23 State House Candidate Eric Kurland sees 2018 as a Referendum on Public Education.

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Educator and Democratic LD 23 State House Candidate Eric Kurland

Democrat Eric Kurland described his reasons and goals for seeking one of the LD 23 State House seats from orthodox conservatives John Kavanagh and Jay Lawrence.

Over breakfast at the Scottsdale restaurant Randy’s (very good food and service) at Chaparral and Hayden, he said he was motivated by his advocacy for children and the misdirection of our Dark-Money-serving Republican state leaders in promoting private school vouchers rather than fully funding public education, Kurland, an educator with the Scottsdale Unified School District, has launched a campaign, fueled by his army of education supporters, emphasizing education, campaign finance reform, and reforming the private prison system.

A legislative district that encompasses all or parts of Scottsdale, Fountain Hills, Paradise Valley, and Rio Verde, there has not been a Democratic representative from LD 23 in recent years. Eager to break that trend, Kurland will be running for one of two state house seats against incumbent State Representative Jay Lawrence and Senate Pro Tempore John Kavanagh.

Kurland feels that both Lawrence and Kavanagh are on the “opposite end” of what the people who elected them want, living in “an ivory tower who do not feel the pulse of what a community requires.” If elected, Kurland states, that unlike his opponents, “it will not be the last time they (the people) will hear from him.”

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