For the second time this year, the Legislature has put the spotlight on First Things First, an early childhood development program funded by revenue from tobacco taxes.

The Arizona Early Childhood Development & Health Board has collected more than $300 million since its inception, a pot of money that lawmakers are eying as they work to close an estimated $3 billion budget deficit in 2010.

Senators grilled the board's officials in a committee hearing Feb. 11, peppering them with questions regarding the board's expenses, its mission and its relationship with other state agencies that  also provide services to children and families.

"What if everyone in Arizona stopped smoking?" asked Sen. Al Melvin, a Republican from Tucson.

The board is looking very closely at the revenue source and has predicted that it would decline, said Karen Woodhouse, First Things First's deputy director.

"That's why we have carefully planned to have a fund balance," Woodhouse said.

The Legislature has already swept $7 million from the early childhood fund's interest earnings when lawmakers fixed a $1.6 billion gap in the fiscal 2009 budget.

The decision to sweep the interest earnings was expected.

"You are going to have a challenge," Sen. Carolyn Allen told one of the board's officials during a committee hearing last month.

"You have money, and we have appropriations chairs that are going to eye all potential funding. It is not a threat, it is a reality," Allen said. "And although I hear in my right ear that it is voter protected, we also know there are very clever people here."

During the Feb. 11 hearing, Sen. Jim Waring of Phoenix wanted to know if the board is using its money productively.

It is a lot of money when "we are going to be possibly reducing budgets for things that are important," Waring told the ~Arizona Capitol Times~ after the hearing.

Lawmakers have been told the early childhood development fund cannot be swept because it is voter-approved.

"Right now conversations that the board has had around this at our meetings show they are very committed to retaining this money to further the initiative," Woodhouse said.