Like their constituents, Arizona legislators said their hands are tied by the slumping economy.
That’s why they say legislation not related to the 2010 budget will have to wait until the next legislative session as concerns over the deficit dominate talks at the Capitol.
Senate President Bob Burns, R-Peoria, has kept the upper house of the Legislature from hearing any bills not related to the budget this session.
Lawmakers who support Burns’ decision said their most important job is managing taxpayers’ money, which is why it is so important to focus on the budget while the state is faced with a massive deficit or massive cuts in spending.
“I didn’t even attempt to draft a bill [this session] at all, said Sen. Manny Alvarez, D-Phoenix. “To me, the most important thing is getting the budget out of the way.”
Controversial legislation aimed at banning photo-radar enforcement of speeding laws, equalizing state funding to the universities and allowing state health-care workers to turn down abortion patients on moral grounds will have to wait until the next legislative session begins in January, lawmakers said.
“We all have important issues we’d like to see addressed — everyone down here would say that,” said Rep. Chad Campbell, D-Phoenix. “But I’d say, right now, we have to focus on the budget. It’s by far the overarching issue [this session].”
Campbell said House Speaker Kirk Adams, R-Mesa, has taken less of a hard-line stance than his Senate counterpart, allowing some bills not related to the budget to travel as far as passing through the committees.
Other legislators are not happy about the complete focus on finance. Rep. Doug Quelland, R-Phoenix, said legislators not on the appropriations committees, which are responsible for passing initial drafts of the year’s budget, have been inactive in the early stages of the process of drafting the budget.
Quelland said the committees he sits on, including Banking and Finance, Water and Energy and Environment, have done very little this session. Although the committees are allowed to meet on nonbudget matters, most members have been wrapped up in doing research and writing reports related to the projected 2010 deficit, Quelland said.
“We haven’t met for three weeks,” Quelland said. “So what do you think I’ve been doing for three weeks? I’ve been saying, ‘Does anybody know of a meeting going on right now where I can go learn something?’ And that’s kind of sad, coming down to the Capitol and not knowing what to do.”
Quelland also said he had hoped to accomplish a lot outside of the budget this session, including reforming the state’s health-care system and looking into the possibility of investing in solar energy.
“I’ll be running a lot of bills next [legislative] session, that’s for sure,” he said.
Rep. Ed Ableser, D-Tempe, said Burns’s moratorium on nonbudget bills actually benefits members of the Democratic minority.
Ableser said it has kept bills that he characterizes as “far right-wing,” from passing. He cites as an example a controversial measure that would allow state health employees morally opposed to abortion to turn down patients. The Republican majority in both houses of the Legislature would allow such measures to pass without much support from Democrats.
“When you have a budget, that’s something Democrats and Republicans have to work closely together and find compromise on,” Ableser said. “You don’t get these extremist, ideological pieces of legislation passing.”
Reach the reporter at derek.quizon@asu.edu.
