Arizona Capitol Times Your Inside Source for Arizona Government, Politics and Business

The state Supreme Court says parts of a proposal to transform Arizona's primary election system fit together as one proposal and didn't have to be kept off the November ballot.

Two well-funded ballot initiatives went down in defeat last month, but as their final finance reports showed, their campaign coffers had perhaps foreshadowed the elections’ outcome.

The clerical error that led to two different versions of a ballot measure was an honest mistake that did not confuse voters, and thus didn’t warrant Secretary of State Ken Bennett’s decision to bar measure from going to voters, the Supreme Court said in an opinion published today.

Despite facing virtually no opposition, Proposition 116, an initiative to dramatically lower the property taxes that Arizona businesses pay on equipment, was rejected by voters.

Proposition 118 – a constitutional amendment which would change the way the state distributes state trust land income to public institutions, including schools, colleges and prisons – was still too close to call on Thursday, November 08.

After seven failed attempts during the past two decades, Arizonans voted heavily in favor of Proposition 119, a ballot measure that will allow the state to swap state land for federal trust land in order to protect military bases from encroachment, as well as preserve sensitive land areas, such as the San Pedro River, in the process.

Voters overwhelmingly favored approving a constitutional amendment barring criminals from suing their victims. The Crime Victims Protection Act has a lead of 80 percent to 20 percent with 90 percent of precincts counted.

Arizona voters aren’t interested in declaring sovereignty over its land and natural resources under control of the federal government.

A proposition to change the way Arizona picks its judges lost resoundingly.

Voters rallied behind a proposal that is meant to check wild swings in property tax bills, the initial count by the Secretary of State’s Office shows.