Officials hope to increase revenue base through Equal Footing lawsuit
What if you could grow revenue for schools without increasing taxes, and increase the State Land Trust holdings without compromising the environment? That is exactly what Arizona Superintendent of Public Instruction Diane Douglas and State Representative Mark Finchem hope to do.
The two announced the plan at Wesley Bolin Plaza that would leave unchanged the current use of federal lands within Arizona’s borders, but would shift the revenue generate by that use from the federal government to the State Of Arizona.
For example, the BLM granted a right-of-way on January 17, 2014, for the Sun Valley to Morgan Transmission Line Project. The total project spans 38 miles and seeks to connect APS’s Sun Valley Substation near the northern reaches of the Town of Buckeye with the Morgan Substation near the City of Peoria. The BLM will collect payment for the use of the land. Under the Douglas-Finchem plan, that land would be returned to the State Land Trust.
The State Land Trust is at the core of the election voters will decide in May. Revenue from the Arizona State Land Trust is primarily used to fund education and support schools throughout Arizona.
“Regaining land that is rightfully ours would create a larger state land trust,” said Superintendent Douglas. “When the land is returned to our state, Arizonians can determine how to more effectively leverage the land’s value and better fund education.”
The federal government currently owns nearly half of land in Arizona and loses 27 cents for every dollar they spend on land management, a loss to the taxpayers of approximately $2 billion per year. States, on the other hand, generate on average $14.51 for every dollar they spend on managing public lands.
“There is absolutely no reason to waste all of this land when it could provide critical revenues for Arizona education,” Douglas said.
“When it comes to today’s western states, the federal government has refused to honor the same promise made and kept with all other states east of Colorado,” said Rep. Mark Finchem, R-11. “Our state has a proven track record of maximizing the land we do control, so it makes no sense to allow mismanagement of these resources.”
The request to transfer federal lands to the State of Arizona aligns with a provision of Douglas’s AZ Kids Can’t Afford to Wait! plan that was publicly announced on Oct.1, 2015.
“We will work with Congressional members from Arizona and each of the western states to transfer title to all federal lands within the borders of the state―excluding Military Bases, Forts, Magazines, Arsenals, other needful Buildings, and Tribal Lands under treaty,” Douglas said.
The Western Landmark Foundation is working to “shift control of those lands currently controlled by the federal government to county governments in those states.” They are filing a lawsuit based on Article IV, Section 4 of the U.S. Constitution and the federal government’s “denial of equal footing for the western states and the fundamental ideas of equality and fairness for all.”
The group has gathered some of the best legal scholars to develop the legal argument and they intend to “demonstrate that the management practices of the federal government are endangering the public’s health, safety and welfare within the local communities, and have monetarily damaged the same communities.”