Group opposed to vouchers is a force
One year ago, six strangers decided to take on the state’s power set.
They had met at the state Capitol, seen how things worked and decided to remind those we elect who is boss.
Of course, they would not be successful. Political sages pronounced that they had no chance. Esteemed columnists (and even the not-so-esteemed ones like me) opined that wishing didn’t make it so.
They had no money behind them. No organization. Just six women and a belief that that creating a universal school voucher program would be another step in undermining Arizona’s already underfunded public school system.
One year, 111,540 signatures and one Supreme Court ruling later, Save Our Schools Arizona has turned this state’s political establishment on its ear.
It started with six women who began attending legislative hearings last year to urge our leaders to vote against expanding the voucher program that diverts public money to private schools.
“We didn’t know each other but we started going to hearings on the bill and keep seeing each other, time after time,” Dawn Penich-Thacker told me.
“We were all there when they actually passed it that night despite everything we did to try to stop it. We walked outside the House, sat in circle and just looked at each other and said what now?
“One of us, Alison, said, ‘We could undo this. We could stop this and let voters decide’ and we all decided, ‘OK, let’s do that. What does that mean?’ We exchanged phone numbers.” And so they began.
Sharon Kirsch, a college professor of literature; Melinda Iyer, who trained camp counselors; Beth Lewis, a fifthgrade teacher; Alison Porter, a retired software engineer; Dawn PenichThacker, a college English professor and former Army public-information officer; and Cathy Sigmon, a retired account manager.
They researched the law and found that citizens of this state have a constitutional right to referendum — to gather signatures and put the work of our leaders on hold, giving voters the final say in whether it will go into effect. It’s no easy task, nor should it be. They had just 90 days from the day of adjournment to collect 75,321 valid signatures to freeze the expanded voucher law and put it on the November 2018 ballot.
This, with volunteers working in the stifling heat of an Arizona summer. Translation: They had no chance. But a most unusual thing happened on their way to inevitable disappointment.
They prevailed, collecting easily enough signatures and drawing the attention of the Republican establish-
ment and their big-money backers.
The school voucher lobby, unglued at the prospect of a public vote, immediately challenged their petitions and sued — twice — to try to keep the referendum off the ballot. They want school choice, just not voter choice.
So high-profile lawyers from the Goldwater Institute, the Alliance for Children and Americans for Prosperity marshaled their considerable forces to regain the upper hand.
And lost.
Earlier this month, Republicans at the Capitol quietly worked on a plan to repeal the voucher law in order to knock the referendum off the ballot (knowing they could return next year and pass a new voucher law).
And failed.
The result is Proposition 305. Expect a big-money campaign to pass Prop. 305 and allow the universal voucher law to go forward.
The Koch brothers network of gazillionaires see Arizona as ground zero in their push to privatize education. Gov. Doug Ducey, meeting with the Koch bankrollers in January, talked up the need to defeat the citizens referendum and allow the voucher law to take effect.
“This is a very real fight in my state,” Ducey said. “I didn’t run for governor to play small ball. I think this is an important idea.”
Ducey and the Kochs will take on a mostly grassroots effort to defeat Prop. 305 and send a strong message that our leaders should concentrate on fixing the public schools that 95 percent of Arizona’s students attend.
I don’t know if they can win, given the money they’ll be up against. I do know that they have changed things.
Color me shocked ... and strangely invigorated by the work of these six women and their network of 3,000 volunteers.
“We didn’t know (if we could do it) and in fact we were one of the groups who thought we were never going to make it,” Penich-Thacker told me. “The signature goal, the court case with all their money. We always consoled ourselves that even if we don’t do it, at least we got people talking about public education.
“We put education policy on the front burner across the state. We started the conversation in regular circles, with regular teachers, regular parents
“Clearly the root of the problem is dark money, in terms of unaccountable voucher expansion and people who incredibly continue voting for it despite what their constituents want.”
and regular folks not just policy wonks and politicos.”
Now, Save Our Schools Arizona is ready to take on the root problem: dark money.
This week, the group announced it will be working on the Outlaw Dirty Money initiative, the bipartisan proposal to require the disclosure of those who contribute at least $10,000 to a political campaign.
While polls show that people support dark money disclosure, our leaders have actually allowed more dark money spending and this year, voted to block cities from requiring disclosure in municipal elections.
Maybe that’s because Ducey got elected in 2014 with $5.2 million in dark money support — money that mostly came from the Koch network, we would later find out from IRS filings.
“Dirty money is behind the voucher expansion across the nation,” PenichThacker told me. “It is a top priority for the Kochs and the American Federation for Children. These are all groups with billions of dollars. We don’t know where the money comes from and who benefits from it. Clearly the root of the problem is dark money, in terms of unaccountable voucher expansion and people who incredibly continue voting for it despite what their constituents want.”
The Outlaw Dirty Money initiative has until July 5 to collect 225,963 valid signatures to put the proposal on the November ballot.
I’d say that’s impossible but ...