A new Arizona law is supposed to establish an independent office to provide oversight of state prisons, but lawmakers didn’t approve the funds necessary to implement it.
The push for greater accountability stems from an uptick in inmate murders and assaults, including a triple homicide at a Tucson facility earlier this year.
The original version of the legislation, Senate Bill 1507, included $1.5 million for the office, but that money was not included in a budget lawmakers approved at the end of June.
The final language of the bill says “the corrections oversight fund is established consisting of legislative appropriations, federal monies and private grants, gifts, contributions and devises.”
Republican lawmakers, including the bill’s sponsor, Sen. Shawnna Bolick (R-Phoenix), accused Democratic Gov. Katie Hobbs of rejecting funding requests and creating the “illusion of oversight without real action.”
“Signing a bill and refusing to fund it is like buying a car and not putting anyone in the driver's seat," Bolick wrote. "Hobbs can't claim credit for reform while actively preventing it from happening. If she believes in this office, she needs to fund it. I'm calling on her to identify immediate funding – whether from her own office, or through reallocation from another agency within her cabinet," she said.
A spokesperson for Hobbs did not respond to multiple requests for comment.
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