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October 18, 2002

Host: Michael Grant
Topics:
The "Journalists' Rountable"
In-Studio Guests:
Robbie Sherwood, "The Arizona Republic"
Howard Fischer, "Capitol Media Services"
Le Templar, "East Valley Tribune"

>> Michael: It's Friday, October 18, 2002. And the headlines this week, Independent gubernatorial candidate Dick Mahoney says he's received death threats because of his controversial campaign ads that talk about Colorado City.

>>> A Maricopa County superior court judge has ordered the state legislature to reverse a $90 million budget cut to school facilities funding.

>>> And Governor Hull is close to a decision whether she will call a special session over the budget crisis.

>> Good evening, I'm Michael Grant. This is the journalists' roundtable. Joining me is Robbie Sherwood of the "The Arizona Republic," Howard Fischer of "Capitol Media Services" and Le Templar of the "East Valley Tribune." With just a couple weeks to go before the election, the Arizona Governor's race remains a fairly heated contest. Latest poll results we've got, Robbie, indicate Mahoney split them a little bit. Do you think it's a direct result of the negativity?

>> Robbie Sherwood: That's the prevailing wisdom. You would think once he goes on the air with the advertising that the needle might move upward, but the tenor of the ads we're familiar with now, dealing with polygamy and questioning the fitness of his rivals over that issue, and particularly Matt Salmon over his LDS faith. And the -- what you saw in the polls was a degradation of about 3 points for Dick Mahoney. He was around 8% for most polls. He swears higher but most of the polls are 8%. It dropped to 5%. That's within the margin for error, but it's heading in the wrong direction.

>> Michael: Interestingly enough, Howie, his latest spot on this issue is not -- doesn't mention either Napolitano or Salmon, but hits the Colorado theme and talks about a strong Governor should protect these people, that kind of thing, but it's playing against this entire backdrop.

>> Howard Fischer: That's the problem. This is the ad he should have run first. He's standing in front of some class blocks with a flag on either side. There is two versions of this, saying there are problems here. There is child abuse. There is rape, and that the Governor of this state should be able to defend the weakest of the weak and any person unwilling to do that should not be Governor. Good ad. Good subject, but he's so poisoned the water, particularly with the anti-Salmon ad. When you've got a group of Rabbis coming out who say Matt Salmon should not be attacked, you've gone overboard. You can't attack and then come back with a reasonable ad.

>> Robbie Sherwood: Dick Mahoney came out earlier in the week and revealed that he had been getting death threats over the ads and that his campaign headquarters has been being cased by a mysterious vehicle. He reported that stuff to the police.

>> Howard Fischer: That was my car.

>> Robbie Sherwood: Well, we know about you and the Mahoney campaign.

>> Michael: Le, anythig to the old adage about I don't care what you say about me as long as you spell my name right?

>> Le Templar: Well, certainly, let's face it, we're talking about this thing. Mr. Mahoney has had a complaint because he is running independently, he isn 't getting the same attention as the two major party candidates. He solved that problem, but virtually all of the commentary on his advertising now is how negative he's being and how unfair he's being. I can't imagine that this is doing his campaign any good, given that's what everybody is saying. I have to agree with Howie, if he can get people to stop talking about the first ads and focus on his latest ads, since he's decided this is his campaign from here until November 5th, he might start rebuilding some good impressions.

>> Howard Fischer: This is truly important coming into next week. There are two debates next week. The first at Dobson high school, the second around this desk here. And this is his last chance to convince the people of the state that he has a broad program, a broad agenda, is not simply about attacking people, and this is his last chance to show that he has the backing of more than 5% or 8% or 10% or whatever number you want to believe. This is it.

>> Michael: Well, we had dueling visiting dignitaries on a couple of races this week. Senator Kerry came in support of Janet Napolitano.

>> Le Templar: He stopped by the memorial wall for Vietnam at the capitol. Task is a chance to honor veterans. I thought they did a good job of keeping to that theme, but it was campaign style with signs and reference to why he thinks she would be good for state. I thought the disappointing part of that appearance was, what exactly would Janet Napolitano do for veterans that any other candidates wouldn't do. It wasn't clear from that presentation, but even Rick Romley, the Republican Maricopa County attorney, a former veteran came and said, you know, she seems to at least care about us, and that's probably all a lot of us want to hear is to know if she is elected Governor, we'll have her ear on these issues.

>> Michael: Christie Todd Wittmann, the EPA administrator showed, up for Matt Salmon. Is it my imagination, or -- incidentally, we'll get to CD1 in just a minute where perhaps it's more understandable, but we've had a flurry of national trips to Arizona this year. It seems to me, Howie, more than we've ever had before.

>> Howard Fischer: We've had a lot, and it's interesting, you point out, you know, CD1 versus something else. There are two reasons you have a nationnal figure in the state. One is to raise money. Bush came here, raised money. Cheney came here and raised money for the Rick Renzi campaign. Christie Todd Wittmann hangs around a classroom. Kerry goes out to the veterans memorial, all you're trying to get is some ink. I'm not sure how much good it really does. Does it hurt? No. I'm not sure how much good it really does. Now, clearly both parties believe the races in Arizona are very critical. I mean, I know the Republican party is still sensitive to the fact that Clinton was here one time. They say how can that happen in a Republican state?

>> Michael: Broke the string.

>> Howard Fischer: And they know that in fact, having Napolitano on top of the ticket is very strong in terms of the women's vote that they keep trying to trot out the women for Matt groups and things like that; that's part of the reason Christie Todd Wittmann was here.

>> Robbie Sherwood: I thought she was out here to teach the Mesa school kids about household health hazards.

>> Michael: As Howie mentioned, Robbie, Vice President Dick Cheney was in town to stump for Rick Renzi, raised $100,000 or so.

>> Robbie Sherwood: $100,000 for Renzi and $150,000 for the party. That race is getting more interesting by the second. That money is being put to good use. They are neck and neck, speaking of polls, and there is a lot of fur flying back and forth on both sides.

>> Howard Fischer: It has gotten ugly. I went to a pair of press conferences yesterday. A group of people who invested in one of George Cordova's holding company partnerships for olive oil came out, just coincidentally 2-1/2 weeks before the general election, and said, we want to tell people that George Cordova or Jorge Cordova, as he was calling himself then, you know, that he is not honest, he's not fit, he is a congenital liar. These are the terms these folks were using and trotted out their lawsuit against him, which was settled with a is secrecy agreement. Cordova then has another press conference saying I'm happy to reveal the secrecy agreement, it was settled in my favor. These people didn't want to make the last payments on the partnership, and anyway, they are a bunch of Republicans. Among the group, you've got Anne Symington, Fife Symington's wife, Jay Fife Symington the fourth, who is Fife's son. His charges, look, this is Renzi with another source.

>> Robbie Sherwood: We're asked to believe that the reason why they showed up this close to the election was that they didn't realize that it was that Cordova running for office but Jorge Cordova. One of them said no, that's not right, we knew this was politically motivated.

>> Michael: Both sides are also exchanging carpetbagger charges Cordova saying Renzi is from Virginia; Renzi saying, he was a registered Democrat in San Francisco up until recently. Now, given the fact that those charges didn't impact at all during the primary, are they going to impact at all during the general?

>> Le Templar: Well, I can't imagine, because now you have two carpetbaggers running against each other. You've got --

>> Michael: Does that cancel itself out?

>> Le Templar: You pick whichever one is your carpetbagger, I guess. As we were talking about before, it could come down to the eastern part of this district and the more rural Republican stronghold versus -- excuse me, the western part of the district versus the eastern portion with the Navajo Nation and the mining areas which are much stronger Democratic stronghold.

>> Michael: And possibly, Robbie, the turnout for the gaming proposition helping Cordova?

>> Robbie Sherwood: Right, because he did very well in the Navajo Nation and amongst the Indian tribes there. You brought up a point before the show, that he has a stance on guns that's curious for some gun control. And you know, I'm from that area. I know what kind of Democrats are there, and they are armed. So I don't know how well that plays.

>> Howard Fischer: Is that a bumper sticker? I'm Democrat and I'm armed?

>> Michael: Let's see, let's move to the Secretary of State race. Jan Brewer attacking Chris Cummiskey's legislative record, Robbie?

>> Robbie Sherwood: Yeah, on the face of it, it's a strong attack. She's saying Chris Cummiskey has no legislative record. He only passed one bill as a senator.

>> Robbie Sherwood: What's wrong with that --

>> Le Templar: In 12 years.

>> Robbie Sherwood: What's wrong with that is Chris Cummiskey was a smooth operator as a minority. He had a tactic of teaming up with Republican -- well respected Republican lawmakers like Tom Freestone and Marc Spitzer to move some pretty significant legislation, putting their name out front, because if it was said it was a Chris Cummiskey bill it would die. He was in the minority and that was the atmosphere of the place. He does have some record to stand on.

>> Michael: The finance committee --

>> Robbie Sherwood: As to his missing some votes, he's in leadership, he's here, he's there. There were votes he missed towards the end of the session last year that the Cummiskey people are going to come back on. His wife had given birth. His child was hospitalized and had a heart problem. He missed several days and votes and meetings in order to attend to his family. You'll see them come back and say how dare you make --

>> Howard Fischer: Janet is getting desperate. When a couple of prominent Republicans like Rick Romley and Grant Woods come out for your Democratic opponent, what have you got left to do except go on the attack mode. That's what it's come to.

>> Robbie Fischer: From polling that we've heard is that she's winning.

>> Le Templar: Pretty well.

>> Le Templar: I don't know why she does it.

>> Howard Fischer: She's scared. It's pure and simple fear. Grant may be overexposed. He is supporting half a dozen Democrats and the medical marijuana initiative and Matt Salmon, and I don't know what the commonality is of all of that. I don't know how much a Grant Woods endorsement is worth anymore.

>> Michael: Speaking of the gaming propositions, Robbie, we've got a new group running ads on 200 and through 202. But this time it isn't vote yes.

>> Robbie Sherwood: It's vote no on everything. It's Len Munsil's Center for Arizona Policy. Very active in the primaries for your far right wing candidates. They are going to throw some money in to vote no on everything and it could be -- it could have an effect because there is a good chance that all three could lose. The last polling we saw, 202, the 17-tribe initiative is hanging on by its fingernails at a 52% margin. The Munsil people if he gets them to the polls, they are pretty high efficacy voters, they might degrade that and have to remake this maybe into a situation where they like it a little better, bingo and the type of gaming they had on the reservation before that.

>> Howard Fischer: One thing that I don't think that the group understands is without getting technical, there are things that look and act like slot machines that technically because of the way the program are what they call class 2 devices, they are like bingo. So even if all of the gaming measures were to go down, and if the next Governor were not to sign a new gaming compact, we're still going to have slot type machines here. The difference is, they won't be regulated by the state. And the difference is the state won't get any money.

>> Le Templar: One thing that the proposition 201, the racetracks have been hammering the last two weeks, that if it works, this is what I think will work, is the weakness of proposition 202, the 17-tribe initiative, is the fact that their books are still secret for the individual tribes and the revenues they raise.

>> Michael: Secret to the public.

>> Le Templar: That's right. I'm not saying it's a valid argument, because the government has access to those records. The public wants to see them. So there is a lot of mistrust about why won't they let us see those records. Other industries have to disclose.

>> Robbie Sherwood: We have a sovereignty issue. If 201 wins, it doesn't mean they will open up their books.

>> Howard Fischer: Well, more to the point, the Interior Department has suggested that they will not force upon Indians a gaming plan where they have to share revenue where they don't have substantial exclusivity. If you have two gaming locations here at tracks in Maricopa County, two in Pima County, perhaps Yuma and Flagstaff, I think the Interior Department is going to say it's real simple. We're going to allow to you do anything you want and you don't have to do revenue sharing.

>> Le Templar: If 201 wins, the polling shows it has never gotten support. What could happen is it could push 202 over to not enough votes for it to pass either.

>> Howard Fischer: Although, one of the things that's pushing 202, curiously enough, is the either gaming initiative, the CRIT initiative, Prop 200. You have this guy reading from "The Arizona Republic" and saying this handful of tribes is trying to screw the poor rural tribes, which isn't true. All of the measures allow for revenue sharing between the urban and rural tribes, but as a 30-second ad, people say, ah, the poor rural tribes are being shafted by the Salt River Pimas.

>> Michael: Robbie, I'm starting to wonder, you've got enough cross-fire going on here, that it's entirely possible that no one of the three might be standing.

>> Robbie Sherwood: You're going have the last scene of reservoir dogs in which they are shooting each other and laying down dead.

>> Michael: Well, superintendent of public instruction, a significant development with the release of the report card on Arizona schools, and we've got one in five that are underperforming.

>> Le Templar: That's right, and even those that are doing well or classified as maintaining or improving, which a lot of districts and parents are resentful about, they think it casts aspersions on some of the best school districts in the state, because they are not considered excellent or excelling. And in a very close superintendent's race that, could tip the stale for the candidate that opposes the program, particularly the possibility that if schools are declared failing two years in a row faces state intervention.

>> Robbie Sherwood: They might have been better if they had chosen a different word than "improving" for the second highest standard. Because in my neighborhood in northwest Mesa, Las Sendas elemenary school is labeled improving. And that's an area that I know people move into because the schools are good. So a label like "improving" indicates that it might have been bad before and it's getting better. And that's not the case.

>> Michael: Yeah, part of, I think, the frustration here, Howie, is people were expecting an overall rating of the strength of the school and really, that's not the purpose of this assessment. It's to assess, regardless of where you started, are you getting better from where you started or are you getting worse, not how you compare against the other guy.

>> Howard Fischer: And it was purposefully done that way, so if you could take a school where the students came in and couldn't read and write, and you got them up to a level where even if they were at the 40th percentile compared to other schools, the fact that they were doing well with what they had would give them a good rating. Whereas if you have a school that starts out well but just sort of staying in the same place, that's a maintaining school. Now what's the better rating? This is not useful to the public, unless you fully understand all of what goes into it. It's like -- you cannot just -- you cannot put a single word label on this and make it meaningful to the public at all.

>> Michael: Following the release of the report on Arizona's schools, the Maricopa County superior court judge added a new wrinkle this week. Howie, what did the judge say about the $90 million cut to the school facilities maintenance fund?

>> Howard Fischer: Basically said the legislature can't do it and put it back. After the Supreme Court declared the school funding system unconstitutional in 1994, they said you can't have rich and poor districts, some that can build Taj Majals and stadiums like where Robbie comes from, which is true, and sorry, Robbie, and us poor folks in Levine with our district there. The state came up with several different plans, one of which the Supreme Court finally blessed. The state would assume construction of all new schools, what they call, you know, building renewal funds, major repairs and deficiencies, which is the one-time collection. Well, the legislature has been looking for some money. The building renewal formula said we're going to give schools $128 million a year for all of these things, and if you don't need it, put it in the bank for when you need to replace the roof. The legislature said oh, there is money here. It took $90 million and said don't worry about it, if you need the money, we'll give it back to you.

>> Michael: Is there any dispute, Howie, that the $90 million truly isn't needed right now? I mean, in other words, is this a debate over the formula or is it a debate over a real need?

>> Howard Fischer: There are some real needs. Tim Hogan who represented districts put on evidence in the courts. Districts came in and testified what was not being done. In some cases administration buildings where the roof is leaking, you can't get to the payroll records. The superintendent that I talked to this week --

>> Michael: Is that a negative or --

>> Howard Fischer: Simply not cutting the checks, I'm not sure is a way of saving money. But the superintendents I talked to each said, we have needs here. We have repairs that need to be done. If you don't do the major renovation on the air conditioning unit, it'll keep breaking down and cost more money.

>> Robbie Sherwood: Lawmakers had a tough choice. They needed $100 million and there is very few chunks lying around that large. The logic that they used was that through Students First, they've put on a billion dollar repair project over the last couple of years, and so schools have been brought up to standards. And so they thought they could slide for a while if they took that money. the Other option was something called "soft capital" which may be taken in the next budget go-around. That's school supplies, buses, software. So politically that was going to be ugly if they went after quote, unquote, classroom spending.

>> Howard Fischer: But the problem as Robbie points out, sure, we got the deficiencies up, but now if you're not going to pay for the ongoing repairs, you are sliding back down the hill, which gets us back to where we started in '94.

>> Michael: Is the answer here that we now move from -- and you can fill this blank in, from a $500 million budget shortfall to a $590 million budget shortfall?

>> Le Templar: Based on the judge's ruling, I think lawmakers, whenever they come back and start to think that way and try to find out where they are going to get the additional money, Governor Hull has said they are going to appeal this decision, and they are repealing similar decisions of previous years, but at this point, the mistake they make is to ignore the charge and say we're going to hope the problem goes away, and when it doesn't, the judge says you've been ignoring me, they are going to have to do something about it.

>> Robbie Sherwood: They are going to have to pencil it in, which is bad, because they don't have the money. There is another billion waiting -- another billion dollar hole waiting on top of the $600 million we have now.

>> Howard Fischer: One of the people I talked to from the Scottsdale school said you know, this may be a blessing in disguise because up until now the lawmakers have said no new taxes, no new taxes, no new taxes. If they can do this under cover of "the courts made us do it," maybe there is enough people to get enough courage to say you can't fund state government on what's coming in.

>> Michael: In the meantime, Robbie, has the Governor made a decision on a lame duck special session?

>> Robbie Sherwood: No, she finally has gotten all of the numbers she can use to decide, but she won't know until maybe Wednesday, whether or not she's going to call it in. I don't believe anybody wants to come in. She is going to try to get as far as she can administratively by telling people to stop ordering fax paper and whatnot. I have a hard time thinking she can get to $300 million doing that.

>> Michael: Is that her breakpoint? I saw a number this week.

>> Robbie Sherwood: She wants to get to $250 to $300 million. If she does that, she may say sayonara and let the new legislature figure it out.

>> Michael: A couple of aviation related stories, Le, on the east side. Let's start with Scottsdale joining Tempe against Phoenix on 17 Sky Harbor?

>> Le Templar: Scottsdale has concerns all along since they got the flight routes called Northwest 2000. Unlike the other neighbors, they've made an effort to talk to the FAA and say, can we resolve these problems, in large part, because the changes go on at Scottsdale airport as well, and they don't want to make the FAA mad and crimp what they are trying to do with business development. There has been talk now recently that some of the councilmembers don't think they are getting very far. We've gone close to a year now with these changes, and neighbors in north Scottsdale are not happy, and they are willing to join in with the lawsuit. Officially they would be joining in with the people in Cave Creek and Carefree, the quiet skies coalition, because they have already signed up with Tempe.

>> Howard Fischer: Excuse me if I don't shed a lot of tears here. Other neighborhoods, other poor neighborhoods, all along have lived with flights. You want to have an airport in Phoenix, there's got to be flight patterns. You've got to bring people in from the east. They've got to go over some land somewhere. If you want to go to the west, they've got to go over some land somewhere. And all of a sudden the FAA says well, this pattern makes sense and God forbid it goes over these $500,000 homes. Oh, we can't have that, they should go over the poor areas of town.

>> Robbie Sherwood: Like Levine.

>> Howard Fischer: They do go over Levine.

>> Michael: We can arrange that. And also Tempe is suing to stop the asphalt repaving project at Sky Harbor?

>> Le Templar: Right, this is part of Tempe's long range strategy to get Phoenix to come and start talking to their neighbors about long-range plans for Sky Harbor and where does the expansion stop. Tempe said we're going to oppose everything they want to do with any tool we can find. So even if the runway has started construction and all we're doing is paving it with asphalt, we think we've found a hole in the wall that let's us challenge it.

>> Michael: And this isn't payback for the stadium?

>> Le Templar: I don't think it's payback for the stadium, but it is payback for what they believe is Phoenix's arrogance in treating their neighbors in how Sky Harbor is developed.

>> Michael: Panelists we're out of time. Thank you very much. Next week join us for a full week of debates featuring candidates running for statewide offices. We would like to use some of your questions for those debates. To send us your questions, E-mail us at "Horizon" at asu.edu.

>>> One of the most useful features you'll find on the Web site is full information about every proposition on the state ballot. Here's an example of how our Web site can help you determine your vote on a ballot proposition. First, go to the site at www.kaet.asu.edu., when you get there, click on "Election 2002" emblem. Then click on "Arizona Ballot Proposition". Let's say you wanted to find out more about proposition 203. Click on that box. It'll take you to a page with a summary, official ballot language, a fiscal analysis and links to pro and con web sites, as well as other information. There is a lot more to our site. Among the other features you'll find, "my ballot" a checklist of the propositions you can print out and take to the voting booth. A link and resources page that include sites to register to vote, find out which district you live in, request an early ballot and find the location of your polling place. You can view transcripts of all of the shows we do on ballot propositions and request an E-mail reminder on upcoming shows. In addition, you can view Channel 8 ASU polls on candidates and ballot measures.

>>> Monday, in a special start time for "Horizon," we'll be on the air at 6:57 to release the results of the latest KAET poll on statewide races and the Indian gaming initiatives. Immediately following that, we'll have our first clean elections debate for statewide offices. Hear from the three candidates running for superintendent of public instruction. Tuesday, the four candidates 20 running for Governor. Wednesday, the three candidates running for attorney general. And Thursday we wrap up with the three candidates running for Secretary of State. And I'll be out of breath.

>>> Thank you very much for joining us on the Friday edition. I'm Michael Grant. Have a great weekend. Good night.