Governor Napolitano and two legislators say she they’re not giving up on getting trust land reform on next year’s ballot.

“I’ve reiterated to the leadership that we need to have something prepared for the ’06 ballot,” Ms. Napolitano told reporters at her weekly news conference March 8. She said she is going to meet in the next couple of weeks with leaders of a coalition that has been working on trust land reform for almost four years.

“We’ll see where we go from there, but I think we need to get people back at the table and really look at overall state trust land reform,” the governor said.

Rep. Tom O’Halleran, R-1, and Sen. Carolyn Allen, R-8, say a citizen initiative to place a constitutional amendment on the 2006 ballot is worth pursuing if enough valid signatures (183,917) can be gathered and agreement can be reached on language for the proposition.

Talks on numerous issues related to the state’s 9.3 million acres held in trust to benefit public schools, universities and other institutions broke off last month amid disagreements on at least two major issues: insistence from education groups that a new, educator-dominated board be created to oversee the Land Department’s disposal of trust land and conservationists’ call for preservation of vast expanses of open space.

“There was a desire for more land and a desire on the other side for more control, and we couldn’t get our arms around it,” said Rep. John Nelson, R-12, who had introduced a House version of trust land legislation.

***Arguments Over Conservation Space***

Key elements of the original package would have included setting aside approximately 700,000 acres for conservation as open space either without compensation for the trust or at discount prices and giving the Land Department new powers to plan and dispose of land.

But the latest draft legislation would have designated only 44,000 acres of trust land in the Phoenix and Tucson areas as eligible for sale for preservation as open space at what would effectively be a discounted price.

Senate President Ken Bennett is pushing a $6 million appropriation to beef up the Land Department so it can accelerate the sales of trust lands in Maricopa County. He was asked for his reaction to the governor’s hope of rekindling talks.

“There’s always hope and there’s always a chance,” he said.

A ballot measure next year is “a likely possibility,” Mr. Bennett said, because concerns of some of the stakeholders can only be addressed with changes to the state Constitution. Ms. Napolitano said, “ I would prefer to do it through the referendum process [whereby the Legislature places the issues on the ballot], but if that’s not possible, other options will have to be looked at.”

Mr. Bennett said, “We would have preferred to do so as well, except that, so far, the groups trying to find commonality have not been able to do so, including what would be put on the ballot.”

Mr. O’Halleran said he thinks it is too early to dismiss another attempt at a legislative referendum during next year’s session, which could come in time for the 2006 ballot.

Ms. Napolitano has expressed her opposition to Mr. Bennett’s plan to speed up land sales by adding more personnel to the Land Department. She said the plan would result in “fire sales,” which would depress the market.