Weekly Report

Another week of stalled negotiations concerning the English Language Learner mess, and another $3.5M in fines. With the federal judge in the case agreeing that the fines will be put to ELL programs, the Governor has no incentive to negotiate -- she'll get all that she wants to spend in the fines.

Last Monday (2/6) was the last day to introduce bills in the House. There were over 900 bills and resolutions submitted this year, with another 600 or so in the Senate. A record year! Some will never see the light of day, but it's still an awful lot of paperwork for the House staff to process.

Two of my bills will be heard in committee this week. Last year we passed legislation that allowed a receiver to take over the Colorado City School District. He started in December, and we've talked several times since then. He's doing a great job of cleaning up the problems, but he needs some assistance. My bill will allow the district to pay back a loan over more time and will also appropriate $1M as an interest free loan to be paid back over five years from the funds they would already receive from the State. (Call or e-mail me if you want more details on the situation there.)

The second bill will be heard when the Health Committee goes to Yuma on Friday. This is a loan program to establish medical residencies in our rural hospitals, who will partner with accredited medical schools in Arizona. The hope is to attract more doctors to our under-served areas and that they will stay after they have completed their residencies. Again, there will be no cost to the State, as the hospitals will repay the loans when they start receiving Medicare reimbursements from the federal government.

I hope I can report next week that both of these passed their committees and are on the way to approval by the full House.

Until then,

Nancy