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

Two years ago, Erin Merryn was ready to write of Arizona.

A state GOP senator wants to allow the Arizona Department of Health Services to inspect medical marijuana kitchens without giving notice and blames the marijuana industry for killing the same effort last session.

A special committee wants to revamp Arizona's sex abuse laws to make it easier to prosecute some people who violate their position of trust with their youthful victims.

In Phoenix’s Balsz Elementary School District, students and their parents can access backpacks of food, family counseling, car seats and a clothing closet.

The vice chairman of the House Education Committee wants schools to teach students less about dating, but tighten up laws that require them to recite the Pledge of Allegiance.

A legislative fight over youth vaping kicked off Tuesday in the Capitol rose garden, where two state senators announced bills aimed at keeping electronic smoking devices out of children’s hands while sign-toting, vapor blowing protestors circled their press conference.

A Mesa GOP lawmaker is proposing what he concedes is a very un-Republican thing. Sen. David Farnsworth has introduced two bills to cap the interest rate that can be charged by title lenders at 36 percent. That compares with rates that run as high as 17 percent – a month.

Victoria Steele walked into the Arizona Senate before the sun rose Friday, wearing a purple, white and green suffragette sash over her dark pantsuit and holding the most important piece of legislation she plans to run next year.

Fired state Senate employee Talonya Adams and an attorney for the Senate must spend Monday morning holed up in a room together to work out the details of Adams’ reinstatement, and not come out until they reach an agreement, an exasperated federal judge ordered Friday.

Calling the law a mistake, two House Democrats are leading the charge to repeal a 2016 measure that stripped cities and towns of their ability to regulate short-term and vacation rentals.