Planned Parenthood funding in Arizona is under threat in the state budget proposal being debated in the Legislature today.
Arizona funds grants to Planned Parenthood through the Arizona Family Health Partnership. They get the state’s $4.5 million grant and then dole it out to providers. Almost half of that goes to Planned Parenthood for family planning services, but, none of it funds abortions.
The proposed state budget, though, would require the *state to apply for a federal grant for family planning, so, if they got it, the Arizona Department of Health Services — not the Arizona Family Health Partnership — would receive and divide up the grant money.
As KJZZ’s Will Stone reported Wednesday, Jodi Liggett of Planned Parenthood Arizona says existing state law prohibits that money from going to her organization, so that would effectively cut the women’s clinic out of the game.
“Why you would want to exclude the nation’s largest and oldest provider of family planning services from a family planning program is curious” Liggett said.
I spoke with Bre Thomas this morning. She’s the CEO of the Arizona Family Health Partnership. She says if the Department of Health Services was giving out this money, a 2012 state law would bar the state from giving it to agencies that provide abortion services.
