20% raise for teachers was just 100% bull

The Legislature passed Gov. Doug Ducey’s plan to give teachers a 20 percent pay raise by 2020, which Ducey said would “codify” the salary increase.

Not really.

Television ads being run on Ducey’s behalf say the same thing. Nope.

The number crunchers disagree. The state’s Joint Legislative Budget Committee didn’t buy it.

And an analysis by The Arizona Re

public — based on the state auditor general’s numbers — indicates that 59 school districts wouldn’t get enough money through the law to give all of their teachers the promised raise.

In other words, that 20 percent pay hike for all teachers was 100 percent bull.

Sure, some teachers will get raises, but apparently not all of them, and not at the level that was promised.

In addition, the devastating education-spending cuts made for years were not reversed. Support-staff salaries were not guaranteed an increase. And there was no moratorium on tax cuts.

If the #RedForEd people want to accomplish their goals, they’re going to have to do it on their own.

With a ballot initiative. Perhaps it will be one that has been put forth by coalition of teachers, parents and education advocates led by the Arizona Center for Economic Progress.

The plan, called the Invest in Education Act, would increase taxes for individuals earning more than $250,000 a year and couples earning more than $500,000.

A group of local CEOs, along with the Chamber of Commerce — people who earn that kind of money — would rather place the tax burden for education on our poorest brothers and sisters by boosting the sales tax.

The chamber is prepared to spend a ton of money to fight the income tax proposal.

(They’d rather do that, apparently, than put the money into public education.)

Joshua Buckley, a Mesa high-school teacher chairing the ballot effort, told

The Republic, “We’ve waited for the politicians to ... make education and our children a priority in this state. But year after year, they failed us. So now, it’s our time to act.”

The group will need a little more than 150,000 valid signatures by July 5.

Some groups already have stepped forward to help.

The Pima County Interfaith Council said it could collect 55,000 signatures in southern Arizona.

Ernie Galaz, the head cleric at St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church in Nogales and a former school principal, said, “As

a man of faith, and a priest in the church, I cannot stand by silently any longer. This is a moral issue.”

The protesting educators in the #RedForEd movement tried to teach that lesson.

The governor and Legislature failed the exam.

They’re going to need a make-up test.