Key Points:

• Teacher pay hike stalled over GOP demand for school vouchers

• Governor Hobbs rejects tying voucher expansion to education funding plan

• Special election unlikely as attention shifts to budget before July deadline

Arizonans won’t get to vote this year on a plan to raise teacher pay.

Efforts to schedule a special election collapsed when Republicans demanded that any package going to voters also put a provision in the Arizona Constitution guaranteeing the right of “school choice.” And, from their perspective, that includes the ability of parents to get vouchers of taxpayer funds to send their children to private and parochial schools.

Gov. Katie Hobbs has pronounced that a non-starter.

Strictly speaking, lawmakers do not need the governor’s consent or approval to put what they want to voters in a special election.

But the constitutional amendment, by itself, cannot include all the necessary changes in state law to implement the plan. And the Arizona Constitution says statutory changes can only be presented to voters at a regularly scheduled election.

So unless Hobbs agrees to sign legislation to implement the voucher provisions, something she has vowed not to do, that means lawmakers have to wait until November 2026 to send the package to voters.

That means it would not be until 2027 that the additional $350 million that the measure would raise could be put into classrooms.

And there’s something else standing in the way of a special election this year.

Lawmakers have just 40 days to craft and approve a new budget to keep the state from shutting down on July 1 when the new fiscal year begins. It’s actually even less than that, with some GOP lawmakers already planning to be gone in June, leaving the party without the necessary majority to approve a spending plan if Democrats object.

And that makes the budget a much higher priority.

Sen. J.D. Mesnard told Capitol Media Services on May 21 that there already was a sense that there is no way to craft an education ballot plan – much less reach a deal with Hobbs – in time to schedule a special election. Anyway, the Chandler Republican said, pushing the vote off until the regular election in 2026 precludes the need to spend $15 million on a one-issue election.

But less clear is whether the plan, in whatever form it takes, is more likely to succeed in a stand-alone election or be buried beneath a host of other items on the 2026 ballot.

Voters approved Proposition 123 in 2016 to take additional dollars out of a special trust account to provide extra funds for education. That has generated about $3.5 billion for K-12 schools.

That authorization ends this year.

Regardless of what happens next, there will be no loss to schools. Lawmakers agreed to build the extra funds that had been raised into the basic state budget.

That leaves the question of what’s next.

Fiscal studies have shown that the extra withdrawals in the past decade have not hurt the ability of the trust to grow. That fund consists of revenues earned from the sale and lease of lands given to the state by the federal government when Arizona became a state in 1912.

And with those studies showing there’s cash to be had, there now is a consensus to continue those extra withdrawals.

It’s how to spend those dollars that remains in dispute between Republicans, Democrats and the governor.

Republicans want to divide up the money solely among teachers, saying there’s enough there for $4,000 across-the-board raises.

Hobbs also wants money for teacher pay raises. But her plan would not require universal raises, instead allowing schools to use the funds for compensation any way they want.

And she also wants dollars for things like support staff salary increases, school safety and security, and some funds without restrictions.

Republicans don’t like that idea.

“While all those other things are important, there’s nothing more important than making sure we attract and retain good teachers,” Mesnard said.

The bigger hurdle, however, is the new demand by the GOP to link more K-12 money to vouchers – formally known as Empowerment Scholarship Accounts – despite the fact that Hobbs, in her State of the State Address, actually asked lawmakers to pare back the program.

“It’s unfortunate that the majority has continued to play politics with this,” the governor told Capitol Media Services on May 21. Now, she said, given the July 1 deadline, the budget has to be the prime focus, not the plan to tap the trust account for more K-12 dollars.

Despite her support of more education dollars, Hobbs said she is not dismayed that efforts to send some sort of a plan to the ballot later this year have stalled.

“I think it’s good news that a plan that hurts public schools didn’t get rushed through without the scrutiny that it deserves,” she said. Putting off the debate, the governor said, provides more time to negotiate.

Mesnard, for his part, called it “a shift in focus,” saying that the looming deadline to adopt a budget has to take precedence.

Anyway, he said, if the issue really can’t get onto the ballot until November 2026 – there’s that need for statutory changes beyond the constitutional amendment that can’t be approved at a special election – there’s no need to rush now to craft a plan.

“Part of the thinking was we can always wait until closer to the election,” Mesnard said. “It’s not going to get there any sooner.”

That, however, raises another question: Is whatever measure that is placed on the ballot more likely to attract voter support if it’s the only question?

“I’ve heard arguments both ways: that it should be a stand-alone issue or that it should be part of an election where far more people are paying attention and turning out to vote,” Mesnard said.

Turnout for the original Prop. 123 was just 31.7%. And the measure was barely approved despite widespread support by politicians, businesses and the education community. 

By contrast, nearly 75% of registered voters turned out for the regular general election later that same year.

Hobbs, for her part, said she can’t say whether putting the issue to voters in a special election is more likely to result in success than saving it for a regular election. But she said that, given the failure to advance the issue now, her views about that are irrelevant.

“It is what it is,” the governor said. “And the 2026 ballot is going to be what it is.”

But she is disappointed by the delay.

“I would have preferred that we provide relief and much-needed investment in our public schools now,” Hobbs said, rather than funding that could not start before 2027. “It’s unfortunate that some folks decided to play politics and not get that done.”

Mesnard, however, said he doesn’t consider it to be “playing politics” to add the guarantee of open enrollment, including vouchers, to the plan. And he rejected the idea that voters will reject a measure that links more K-12 money to vouchers if it is presented to them on a single take-it-or-leave-it basis.

“It could be a poison pill to some,” Mesnard said, acknowledging the narrow margin of victory of the 2016 measure which had no organized opposition. But he has his own theory about all that.

“The fact that it was so close is a reason why I think it’s a good idea to have this be a little bit broader and find different areas where someone can point and say, ‘I may not be in love with the part over here but this is a reason why I’m going to vote yes,’” Mesnard said. And he said the “average parent” loves the various school choice options available.

Hobbs, however, said she has a different reading of the public sentiment, particularly on universal vouchers where any student can get state money to go to a private or parochial school. And particularly galling to them, she said, is the fact that parents who had been able to pay tuition themselves are now getting public dollars.

“It’s a billion dollar boondoggle,” she said, one that has engendered animosity particularly in rural areas.

“They tell me, ‘Hey, our tax dollars are going to Phoenix to pay for Paradise Valley kids to go to schools they can already afford,”’ Hobbs said.

The governor has had no luck rolling back universal vouchers which were approved in 2022 by her predecessor, Doug Ducey. So this year, she instead proposed a form of means testing: Full vouchers for any family with income up to $100,000 a year, with reduced amounts above that, to the point where vouchers are not available for those with $200,000 income.

That plan has been rejected by Republicans.

All that still leaves open Mesnard’s suggestion that voters, anxious for money to increase pay for public school teachers, will be willing to take the package, vouchers and all. Even Hobbs could not bring herself to say she would oppose such a combined plan.

“I am not going to speak to hypotheticals,” she said. “This is not in front of us right now.”

And then there’s the question of whether a combined plan can even get on the ballot.

It will be up to the Supreme Court to decide whether putting the two issues together violates a provision that bars multiple constitutional changes being on the same take-it-or-leave-it ballot measure.

The justices recently have taken a liberal approach, deciding as recently as last year that amendment with multiple provisions can to go voters if the provisions are “topically related and sufficiently interrelated” to the point where there is a consistent and working proposition that “logically should stand or fall as a whole.”

Republicans have said their lawyers are crafting language they believe will pass muster. But Hobbs is predicting “multiple court challenges” if the two issues are wed together.