John --

Welcome to our latest weekly update from the state capitol! We have started Week 4 of the legislative session, and it’s about this time of the year when things really start to pick up.

The deadline to drop bills in the Senate was yesterday, so other than strikers down the road, there will be no more bills formally introduced. Including this week, there are three more weeks to hear bills in their chambers of origin, meaning we are likely to have very long committee hearings next week and the following week (Appropriations meets one extra time the week after that, and is usually our longest hearing of the year).

With the deadline to drop bills passing yesterday, that means I have officially dropped all my bills for the 2022 session. In total, I introduced twelve bills and one resolution, which is a bit on the low side compared to previous sessions.

Here are details on the bills I dropped since my last update:

SB 1400 – Tax Credit Review; Committee; Repeal – This makes some minor modifications to the legislative committee that oversees tax credit reviews and would require annual meetings and regular reviews of whether tax credits should be extended.

SB 1510 – Schools; Bullying Policy; Definition – This bill would require school districts to adopt stronger anti-bullying protections for students and implement policies at the school level.

SB 1511 – Conversion Therapy; Prohibition; Minors – For the fifth and final time, I have introduced a bill that would ban gay conversion therapy in Arizona for children under the age of 18.

SB 1512 – Antidiscrimination; Housing; Employment; Public Accommodations – A bill I run every year that would add sexual orientation and gender identity to the list of protected classes when it relates to discrimination in housing, employment, and public accommodations.

SB 1513 – Criminal Responsibility; Gender; Sexual Orientation – This bill would ban criminal defenses based on what’s referred to as a “gay panic defense,” where defendants claim that assault or other physical violence is justified because of a victim’s perceived sexual orientation.

More good news to report on bills I introduced several weeks ago: SB 1018, my bill to create an Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC), passed the Senate Finance committee last week by a vote of 7-2. As I have covered in recent updates, my idea was picked up by the governor and included in his executive budget proposal last month.

This year is the best opportunity we have ever had to get an EITC signed into law. Including the EITC in the state budget this year (and signing my bill into law) would go a long way towards getting me on the budget, depending on the details of course. Much more to discuss on that in future updates!

I have another bill that will be heard in our Senate Finance committee hearing tomorrow, and that is SB 1222. This is a new bill I’m running this year, and it has to do with greater bankruptcy protections.

Arizona is one of only four states currently where someone who declares personal bankruptcy can have federal benefits like the EITC or the Child Tax Credit seized from them. We have about a dozen exemptions currently in law relating to funds or benefits that cannot be seized, and we are adding federal benefits to that list.

My bill has bipartisan co-sponsors, and I hope it will have a smooth path to passage!

What else is going on at the capitol? We had our first floor action this past Tuesday, where we voted on a handful of non-controversial bills. We expect more substantive bills and floor debates to occur later this week, and the action will really pick up through mid-to-late February.

One of the biggest issues we are faced with at the capitol right now is something called the Aggregate Expenditure Limit (AEL). Essentially, back in the 1980’s Arizona voters approved the expenditure limit for K-12 schools where if funding for K-12 went over a specific cap, the legislature could override that cap with a simple vote.

In the budget that was passed last year, because of inflation funding and other K-12 funding, the total amount of funding that went over the cap was about $1.2 billion.

That is $1.2 billion that has *already been approved* for our K-12 district schools. If we do not vote by March 1^st to raise the aggregate expenditure limit, schools by law cannot use that $1.2 billion.

The impact would be staggering. The five school districts in my district alone (Chandler Unified, Kyrene, Mesa Unified, Tempe Elementary, and Tempe Union) account for about $177 million of that $1.2 billion total.

This should be a no-brainer, right? Why can’t we just raise the cap so schools can disburse these dollars?

We are still trying to figure that out. My worry is that some of my colleagues will demand policy changes in exchange for lifting the cap. I hope we will do the right thing and vote to raise the cap before March 1^st, but it’s too early to tell.

Please know that I will be doing everything I can to raise that cap before the deadline to help support our local public schools. Closing schools, laying off employees, and sending kids home certainly isn’t something we should be considering, especially after the year that we have had.

Expect to hear more about this in the run up to March 1^st. I will share more updates with you as we get closer to the deadline and hopefully have some good news for you by the end of the month!

That’s all for this week – thank you as always for reading! And a reminder that you can follow me on Facebook and Twitter for more regular updates.

Sean

http://www.seanbowieforaz.com/

Paid for by Sean Bowie for State Senate. Authorized by Sean Bowie.