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

The Senate and the House approved a plan on May 13 that suspends a payment of $300 million to school districts until the next fiscal year and instead allows them to tap into their excess cash balances to cover ongoing expenses. The plan is part of a two-bill package aimed at solving a $650-million budget deficit in fiscal 2009.

Lawmakers on a House panel generally agreed an emergency measure intended to repair the fiscal 2009 budget amounts to bad policy, but the bill still managed to gain approval along a party-line vote. One by one, legislators explained their objection to using accounting gimmicks and raiding funding in schools' bank accounts.

Last fall, Carol Vandercook and other Democrats in District 10 received a copy of a contract between Valley political consultant Larry Davis and House candidate Doug Quelland that raised suspicions that Quelland had failed to report critical campaign finance information to state election officials.

Legislative leaders have been stymied for more than a month in their effort to coax Gov. Jan Brewer to divulge how she intends to spend federal stimulus money, despite several informal requests and a letter signed by the House speaker and the Senate president.

Dear Governor Brewer: For the last two months, we have met with your staff on a regular basis to discuss ongoing budget issues, tax reform and progress related to the federal stimulus funds. Concurrently, members of the House and Senate Appropriations Committees have continued their work toward a legislative budget proposal. We have spent considerable time with the members providing educational opportunities so that they would have the information needed to make budget decisions

The biggest differences between the Republican budget proposal released April 27 and a draft leaked to the press a month earlier were two components designed to generate more than $500 million in revenue without raising taxes. And those two ideas have created the biggest backlash against the latest proposal.

The Citizens Clean Elections Commission has postponed a decision that could result in the removal from office of Rep. Doug Quelland, buying commissioners more time to unravel a soured relationship between the north Phoenix Republican and a Valley political consultant.

The Citizens Clean Elections Commission on April 30 postponed a decision that could result in the removal from office of Rep. Doug Quelland, buying commissioners more time to unravel a soured relationship between the north Phoenix Republican and a Valley political consultant.

The Citizens Clean Elections Commission this morning could decide to take the monumental step of beginning a process to remove north Phoenix Rep. Doug Quelland from office.

Gov. Jan Brewer and other state leaders urged Arizonans on April 29 to "stay out and stay alive" when it comes to abandoned mines, which have claimed 10 lives in the past decade. "We need a safe place, we need safe mines and we need education," Brewer said. "Let's keep everyone alive."