Sen. Katie
Hobbs, Senate Democratic Leader
Sen. Steve
Farley, Asst. Senate Democratic Leader
Sen. Martin
Quezada, Senate Democratic Whip
Sen. Lupe
Contreras, Senate Democratic Whip
Rep. Rebecca
Rios, House Democratic Leader
Rep. Randall
Friese, Asst. House Democratic Leader
Rep. Charlene
Fernandez, House Democratic Whip
STATE
CAPITOL, PHOENIX – Democratic
leaders of the Senate and House released the following statement on the
introduction of budget bills:
"Yesterday Governor Ducey and legislative
Republican leaders introduced their budget bills, including a separate bill on
university bonding.
"Republicans have known they don't have enough
votes of their own members to pass university bonding, so we have been
negotiating in good faith to support it in exchange for a clean restoration of
the cruel and unnecessary TANF cut made in 2015, and diverting the governor's inequitable
results-based funding to go toward teacher raises of 4%.
"Instead of working across party lines, they
have decided to play partisan politics and pulled university bonding out of the
higher education budget bill with the hope that enough Dems will be willing to
leave struggling families and teachers behind to pass the bonding.
"That will not happen.
"Dems have always and will always stand up for
our state's universities, which have been seen their budgets negligently
slashed by Republicans for years. But we have also always stood up for
Arizona's poor families and hard-working teachers who have been scapegoated and
sacrificed in the name of conservative ideology.
"There is still an opportunity to work together
to achieve both of these goals. We do not disagree with Governor Ducey's
university bonding proposal. So long as our cities and towns are held harmless,
it is a reasonable way to put a meaningful band aid on the damage that years of
Republican neglect have caused.
"But rather than work with Democrats in true
bipartisanship, Governor Ducey and Republican legislative leaders have decided
they would rather risk university bonding than make a humane gesture to poor
Arizona families and give our teachers a truly meaningful raise.
"Until they are willing to put ugly partisan
politics aside and work with us, they will lose that gamble."
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