Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/83243
AT THE CAPITOL YES on 204! Quality Education and Jobs Initiative Braedon Thomas, son of AEA Vice-President Joe Thomas, helps carry in a box of petition signatures to the Arizona Secretary of State's office. The Quality Education and Jobs citizens' initiative (Prop 204) will extend the one-cent sales tax set to expire in 2013 and provide a permanent, dedicated funding source for K-12 education that cannot be cut by the legislature. In 2010, voters overwhelmingly approved Prop 100, creating a temporary one-cent sales tax to fund education. Prop 204 will renew and make permanent this funding stream, creating a long-term, stable, revenue source for education. The revenue from Prop 100 was deposited into the legislature's general fund with no requirement that it fund education. Prop. 204 funds must be spent as voters direct; the legislature cannot redirect these funds. If passed, Prop 204 would generate about $1 billion in the first year and dedicate 80 percent of those revenues to education. In the first year, it would increase K-12 funding for district and charter schools by at least $625 per child. Many AEA members have been involved in supporting Prop 204 and getting it on the November ballot. Association members contributed to the statewide petition signature- gathering effort, which submitted 290,849, the most in Arizona history! 8 Fall 2012 ❘ AEA Advocate "It will allow the voters in one day to do what the legislature hasn't done in years and years, and that's more adequately fund education," says AEA Vice-President Joe Thomas. Read more members' views on Prop 204 on page 40. Prop 204 will create a funding floor for K-12 education and prevent the legislature from making any further cuts to K-12 education. It also prevents the legislature from reducing other funding that benefits education. It does not replace the need for locally generated bonds and overrides, but does prevent the legislature from reducing the amount that local communities can generate for their schools. Arizona's investment in K-12 schools is 21.8 percent below 2008 levels in per-student dollars adjusted for inflation, meaning our state has made the deepest education cuts in the nation, according to a report released this past September by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a nonpartisan policy research organization based in Washington, D.C. Arizona consistently ranks at the very bottom in per-student spending nationwide, according to the U.S. Census, Education Week, and