PHOENIX — State funding for Arizona’s crucial disability services runs out next month, but a fix remains out of reach.
Democrats in the Arizona House tried on Tuesday afternoon to bring House Bill 2816 up for a vote. The bill would cover the Division of Developmental Disabilities' shortfall, but Republicans blocked the vote.
“My members want to get to work,” said Majority Leader Michael Carbone, R-District 25. “We have bills. We want to get into Committee of the Whole.”
The House then moved on to other business, discussing other legislation and voting on other bills.
Governor Katie Hobbs' spokesperson Christian Slater said in a statement that Republican lawmakers are holding Arizonans with disabilities “hostage to their political games,” adding that it’s time for Republicans to pass a bill to fund DDD instead of forcing through drastic cuts to the program.
“Their failure to act is both inhumane and fiscally irresponsible,” he said. “They’re more focused on scoring cheap political points than delivering services for some of our state’s most vulnerable.”
State Rep. David Livingston, R-District 28, told ABC15 that the Legislature would not pass standalone legislation known as a supplemental bill without changes to the program, saying mismanagement led to the budget hole.
“There is no way in hell that we're passing a supplemental with just the money and no reforms, because the mismanagement caused this,” said Livingston, who leads the House Appropriations panel. “So the only way we can pass a supplemental is with the House and Senate agreeing on reforms that the governor signed.”
The other option, he said, is to work the reforms and supplemental funding into the Legislature’s main budget package.
However, it’s not clear if a budget deal will be reached before DDD runs out of money next month.
Brandi Coon, the co-founder of Raising Voices Coalition, said mothers like her feel betrayed because DDD funding has become a partisan issue, saying Arizona has long seen bipartisan support for disability services.
"Unfortunately, they are using it as a polarizing argument and a way to negotiate their desires and needs for the budget, at the cost of putting disabled people at risk and having their way of existing in their homes and communities put on the line at the same time,” she said.
Democrats had introduced Arizonans with disabilities and their caregivers who were in the audience, reading letters from them.
“Please do not dismiss our daughter as a budget-line item that can be cut,” read state Rep. Quantá Crews, D-District 26. “She is a human being with so much to offer. Her potential should not be erased by funding cuts.”
Coon said it was important for lawmakers to hear the stories of Arizonans living with disabilities.
Some legislators left their desks while the letters were being read. Patricia Huber, who wrote in her letter that she needs a caregiver to help her with everyday tasks, told ABC15 that seeing lawmakers walk out as her community’s stories were being read made her feel, “honestly, angry, angry and not happy.”
DDD, which is short about $122 million, serves more than 59,000 Arizonans with developmental disabilities and their families. It’s projected to run out of money in late April – threatening services in May and June, the final two months of the state’s fiscal year.
