Local ballot measures, Arizona

School bonds fared lower approval ratings with nearly $8 billion voted on in 2011

Click on any state for information about its laws governing school bond and tax votes 2011 elections School bonds & taxes (Part 1) & (Part 2) 2011 Election stats County website evals.

By Bailey Ludlam

The number of state ballot measures that appeared before voters in 2011 was certainly on the slim side. Local measures, however, skyrocketed. The number of measures more than doubled in 2011 from 1,490 to 3,778.

Despite the vast increase in ballot proposals, the total average approval rating of measures stayed practically the same as 2010's 72.5% rating. It dropped slightly by 0.8% in 2011.

Of the thousands of local school issues observed in 2011, a grand total of 993 were school bond and tax issues. School bond questions carried $7.79 billion in bonds. Roughly 38% or $2.95 billion was approved.

"Despite the increase in local measures up for a vote, it's clear that residents favored passing proposals unrelated to school bond and tax issues. Those issues saw a much lower approval rating in 2011," said Johanna Herman, the lead researcher for the study.

As a whole, school bond & tax measures when compared to all local measures (city, county, school bonds, etc) that were up for a vote in 2011, had a lower approval rating. Local measures were approved by 71.7%, while school bond & tax measures had an average approval rating of only 66.3% for the year (46.6% for August-December 2011).

In 2011, a total of 658 school bond & tax measures were approved, 335 were defeated. The total approval rating for school bond and tax measures is roughly 66.3% for the entire year of 2011.

Compared to bond questions that appeared before voters during the period of August and December in 2010, 2011 certainly saw a small increase of +4.8% in approval ratings. The approval rating is also a shift from the January-August period in 2011 when the rating was -7.4% compared to the same period in 2010.

In order to provide a consistent look at local measures, Ballotpedia analyzes the same 11 states every year. According to Herman, the 11 states included in the study were chosen because of their relative ease of access to information about school bond and tax elections.

States included in the study: Arizona, California, Colorado, Michigan, Missouri, Ohio, Oregon, Washington and Wisconsin.

However, it must be noted that in some states, although detailed coverage of local measures is not available, at time results are in state government databases. In such cases, we supplement our statistics with the additional information in order to provide a better picture of local measure approval ratings.

References

School bond and tax votes

• See also: School bond and tax elections in Arizona

Arizona requires school districts to hold elections for issuing new bonds or to override a school district budget. School districts are given up to five percent to override on a school district budget. Any override over five percent needs voter approval. Override is similar to exceeding a levy limit which is commonly called in other states. Arizona laws require school districts to have a substitute budget on hand in the event a budget override measure gets defeated. Arizona also has a debt limit protected by the Arizona Constitution with regular school districts having a six percent debt limit while unified school districts have a thirty percent limit based on the district's total value of taxable property.

Prescott Controversy

A controversy arose in the city of Prescott in late 2009 when residents tried to have an initiative placed on the November 3, 2009 ballot. The issue stemmed from the necessary signatures needed to put the initiative up for a public vote. City Clerk Elizabeth Burke told petition gatherers that they needed to get 2,058 signatures. This number represented 15 percent of the voters in the previous election. However, Gary Kidd, the City Attorney, disputed that the effort required at least 25 percent of voters' signatures.

The dispute began when officials pointed out that there was conflicting initiative procedures between the Arizona Constitution and the state statute. The initiative could appear on the November ballot, but legal action could be taken afterwards.^[1]

A letter from Councilwoman Lora Lopas can be read here, along with other case-related document. In her letter, Lopas described her discontent with the way the situation on this issue was handled.

Laws governing

• Filing of Petition and Election Initiative and Referendum in Cities, Towns and Counties