MARK BRODIE: When the state Legislature ended its 2020 regular session last month, lawmakers went home under the assumption they would be called back sooner rather than later. A special session or even multiple special sessions seemed inevitable. But now Gov. Doug Ducey seems far less likely to bring lawmakers back to the Capitol anytime soon to finish their business as the state's COVID-19 caseload spikes. With us now to talk more about this is Hank Stephenson, editor of the Yellow Sheet Report. Hey there, Hank.
HANK STEPHENSON: Hey, thanks for having me on.
BRODIE: Well, so what changed in just a couple of weeks in terms of lawmakers thinking they would be coming back, you know, just a few weeks ago when they ended their session and now that seems like maybe not the case.
STEPHENSON: Well, a couple of things changed. I think it's partly political, partly policy. On the policy side, the revenue numbers are not coming in as bad as expected. So we had basically assumed that there was going to be a special session. Lawmakers had ostensibly received some sort of a promise from the governor that he would call them back for a special session, at very least, to deal with the budget. Lawmakers started the year with money to burn, a lot on their plates, a lot of policies they wanted to pass in an election year, and the whole legislative session got cut short. Budget analysts said that the COVID pandemic was going to leave the state $1 billion, give or take a half-billion in deficits for next year. But they're revising that down. They haven't officially revised it, but all the numbers that we're seeing so far — sales tax revenues are down, for example, 10% from last year when budget analysts were expecting it to be closer to, down 45% from last year. So I think the governor is looking at that and lawmakers are looking at that and saying, "Well, hey, maybe we don't need to call a special session to revise the budget right now." And then on the political side, if you call a special session to revise the budget right now, there are going to be questions about what you're doing to address police accountability, to address criminal justice reform. Just politically, it doesn't make a lot of sense to open up a special session if you're not going to address these issues that are just all over the headlines right now. It would just not be good optics to focus on that and do absolutely nothing while we've got thousands of people still marching in the streets nearly every day.
BRODIE: Now, Hank, we've seen in the past when a governor and lawmakers call a — when a governor calls a special session and there isn't agreement on a particular bill, the session can drag out for weeks and weeks. Two issues I want to ask you specifically about briefly. One is the issue of liability reform for businesses, churches, other types of places. The other is flexibility in funding for schools, especially if students are taking online or remote classes as opposed to doing it in person. Those seem like two things that, there's at least some consensus something needs to happen on.
STEPHENSON: Yes. Liability reform, I think there's a little bit less of a consensus. The Republicans in the Legislature were really pushing this idea because they wanted to do something about COVID They had already given some kind of emergency money, but they wanted to do something to, you know, go back to their constituents and say, "Hey, look, we protected your small businesses from unnecessary lawsuits." But the truth of the matter is, those lawsuits are going to be really hard to bring and to make successful. And I think that there's a bit of an optics concern, too, as we're reopening restaurants, to have the legislature go back into session and say, "Oh hey, by the way, even if a restaurant acts recklessly, you can't sue them." So I think that the smart political minds would wait for an egregious case, to point to and say "We have to fix this problem," rather than going in there proactively. The schools is a whole ‘nother issue. Schools are now funded on current year enrollment. So basically, schools don't know how much money they're going to get for the year until they know how many students are showing up for the first hundred days. Every school in the state is expecting a massive drop of students next year just because parents at this point, anyway, aren't convinced that it's safe to send their students back to school. So the education groups really want some sort of a hold harmless in funding, saying like, "Maybe if enrollment drops, we can drop enrollment-based funding by, say, 2% rather than a 20% drop that schools are expecting." So that is something that they really feel needs to get done. And now that we're no longer really talking about a special, special session before July to tinker with the budget, I think all eyes are kind of focused on after the August primary, which would be enough time to fix this issue for schools before the next school year, but would also kind of allow some cooling off period after the legislative session. There are still divisive battles being fought online now that they're no longer at the House and Senate, that I think the governor just wants to avoid and frankly, legislative leadership wants to avoid.
BRODIE: Interesting. All right. That is Hank Stephenson, editor of the Yellow Sheet Report. Hank, as always, thanks for your time. We appreciate it.
STEPHENSON: Anytime. Thanks a lot.
