The teachers’ union-backed campaign to overturn school-choice expansion in Arizona appears to have flopped, according to think tank projections relying on preliminary vote tallies.
Under the expansion of Arizona's universal-voucher program, known as the Empowerment Scholarship Account (ESA), enacted in June, over one million K-12 public school students in the state would become eligible to receive vouchers to fund their attendance at private, charter or home schools, up from the 11,000 students who are currently eligible. To subject the expansion to a referendum in which it might ultimately be voted down, the anti-school-choice advocacy group Save Our Schools Arizona had to collect 118,823 valid signatures.
As of Monday, the Goldwater Institute and Center for Arizona Policy, who reportedly had observers watching the petitions as they were scanned Friday, claimed that less than 89,000 signatures had been filed.
Anti-school-choice activists submitted 8,175 petition sheets, according to the Arizona Secretary of State's Office, which they needed to fill with about 17.3 signatures per sheet to have their initiative succeed. However, there are only 15 lines per sheet, the AZ Mirror noted, making it improbable that the organization amassed enough support to derail the buildout of ESA. For instance, some sheets only had two signatures, school-choice advocate Corey DeAngelis found.
In an effort to predict the magnitude of the deficit, DeAngelis took a random sample of 100 petition sheets, which he said bore an average of 11.33 signatures per sheet. Multiplying that average by the 8,175 sheets submitted yields 92,622 signatures, which suggests there could be a shortfall of over 20,000 signatures for the school-choice opponents.
“The preliminary results make it clear: Arizona families have rejected special interests' attempts to take away their ability to choose the education that best meets their child's unique needs,” Victor Riches, President and CEO of the Goldwater Institute, said. “Families deserve the right to choose the best education option for their children, regardless of zip code, and now, they'll once again be able to exercise that right by applying for ESAs.”
On Friday, Save Our Schools boasted that it was heading into the counting with 141,714 signatures under its belt, well above the benchmark needed to send the issue to a 2024 referendum. However, on Monday, the situation was looking more grim. “I think we will end up short, yes,” Beth Lewis, the executive director of the group, told AZ Mirror in an apparent concession. She backtracked later and said “our counts were necessarily estimates.”
The final results are expected to be released in mid-October after the Secretary of State's Office conducts a review of the petitions, which he had a window of 20 days to complete.
“Arizona families want choice in education. That is clear by the preliminary low signature count,” said Cathi Herrod, president of the Center for Arizona Policy Action. “If those numbers hold and the measure does not make the ballot, Arizona families can again begin to apply for ESAs to help them choose the best educational environment for their children. ESAs are the end of the one-size-fits-all education that works for some, but not for many others.”
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