Arizona Lottery

Our Turn: Lawmakers are Raiding Parks (Again)

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PNI 0712 hike wenima.jpg[Source: Arizona Republic,  February 29, 2016] –Wildlife’s political life seems to have come full circle since 1990 when by a 2-to-1 margin Arizona’s voters gave us the Heritage Fund, $20 million from the Lottery to be spent solely for Arizona’s parks and wildlife.

Half of the money was given in public trust to the Arizona State Parks Board, to support and manage Arizona’s park system. This money was taken by the Legislature in 2010 for budget balancing.

SERIES: Arizonans love state parks, lawmakers don’t

The other half of this money was given by the people to the Arizona Game and Fish Commission, again in public trust, to administer on behalf of Arizona’s wildlife. Twenty-four percent of this money was dedicated exclusively for acquisition of habitat for the benefit and conservation of sensitive wildlife species. Over the past 25 years, Game and Fish commissioners battled hard to protect those funds, especially the Acquisition Fund.

All past commissions believed that these funds — they amount to about $2.4 million a year — needed to be protected at all cost. After all, this fund was one of the crown jewels of the Heritage Voter Initiative. In the state parks half, there was $1.8 million available for such wonders as Kartchner Caverns, the San Rafael Ranch and the Sonoita Creek Natural Area. Such purchases are no longer possible following the legislative sweep.

RELATED: Parks experiencing record visitors

The acquisitions of Sipes White Mountain Ranch, White Water Draw, Wenima and other similar properties resulted from careful spending of Game and Fish’s funds. Now, sadly, those funds are in serious jeopardy.

In this legislative session, the commission has proposed Senate Bill 1361, which would deplete the acquisition fund by up to 50 percent to pay for operations and maintenance of the 16 properties it has acquired. Yes, operations and maintenance are important when you buy property, but it takes a good, full public process — not a legislative sweep — to help solve that problem.

In 2014, the commission made a good start by appointing the Heritage Working Group to study and make recommendations for these solutions. This group studied for months. It made recommendations, lengthy ones, which are now either being misrepresented or ignored altogether.

Among other things, the group recommended that 5 percent of the acquisition fund could be moved (with more public input) to the greater part of the Heritage Fund where operations and maintenance are in statute already. That’s 5 percent, not 50 percent, and with more public process.

MORE: Top 10 state and national parks in Arizona

After all, this is not the commission’s money — it is the people’s money. The voters created this fund and directed the commission, as public trustees, to spend it in a specific manner.

Is this concept important anymore? It is now up to the people to speak up and stop this latest – the 40th, we think – raid of the Heritage Fund. If you value the Heritage Fund and its importance to Arizona’s wildlife, please make your voices heard as the bill, now in the Senate, moves through the Legislature.

Bill McLean, Beth Woodin, and Bob Hernbrode are former members of the Arizona Game and Fish Commission. Woodin is the president of the Board of the Arizona Heritage Alliance, and Hernbrode is vice president of the Tucson Audubon Board and a biologist. (Photo: Mare Czinar/Special for The Republic)

7 ways to pay for great state parks

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[Source: Arizona Republic Editorial] – The ominous clouds hanging over Arizona State Parks need to start raining money. Parks managers struggle to protect valuable resources with no money from the General Fund. Unique remnants of Arizona’s heritage have lost dedicated money streams meant to protect them.

At risk are playgrounds for urban Arizonans and sources of tourism for rural residents. At stake is the chance for your children and grandchildren to travel through time from cave formations that began 200,000 years ago to prehistoric Indian ruins to a Spanish presidio to a territorial prison — and wrap it all up by waterskiing across a man-made lake.

What’s at stake is something irreplaceable and beloved. “It’s time people got their dander up and told the Legislature this is one thing that touches their lives,” says Ken Travous, former executive director of Arizona State Parks.

Here’s what people should tell lawmakers:

• Restore the State Parks share of the Heritage Fund. In 1990, voters approved $10 million a year from Lottery revenues for parks. During the recession, lawmakers took that funding. Several attempts to restore it have failed at the Legislature. It’s past time to give it back.

• Restore the authority of State Parks to spend money raised from gate fees, gift shops and other money-making enterprises. Park managers used to put increased revenue to work for the parks. Now they need legislative authorization to spend the money the parks make. Beginning in 2003, that enhancement fund was swept by lawmakers and used to supplant General Fund appropriations.

• Encourage innovation and resource development through parks’ concessions and development. Parks Director Bryan Martyn is looking at a plan to contract with a single concessionaire for all the state parks. It could result in more investment in the parks if the private contractor serving big money-makers, such as Lake Havasu, also is required to develop resources in less-visited parks. The State Parks Board needs to carefully scrutinize any contract to make sure it serves the public’s best interest.

• Recognize the need to create additional sources of permanent dedicated funding. A 2009 Morrison Institute report put the cost of operating and maintaining the parks at $40 million to $44 million a year. The current budget is half that. In addition, the parks have at least $80 million in capital needs. The idea of a surcharge or voluntary donation on vehicle registration has been floated — and rejected by lawmakers — since 2009. It is a painless way for people to add $5 or $10 every year to benefit state parks.

• Dedicated means dedicated. Protect funds that benefit the parks from legislative raids or sweeps.

• Restore the authority of the State Parks Board to hire and fire the parks director. That position became a political appointee with 2012 changes in the state personnel system. The director now serves at the pleasure of the governor. The parks board lost clout. The director lost the independence of being insulated from a governor’s whims.

• Face facts. “No state parks system in the United States pays for itself from earned revenue,” according to the Morrison Institute report, “The Price of Stewardship: The Future of Arizona’s State Parks.” Parks need more than they get from Arizona’s Legislature. They deserve more.

Arizonans demonstrated their support by establishing the Heritage Fund in 1990, and they reiterated that sentiment nearly two decades later when a Gallup Arizona poll released by the Center for the Future of Arizona found that “the state’s natural beauty and open spaces are seen by citizens as our greatest asset.”

It’s time to stop stiffing state parks.

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WHAT YOU CAN DO

Arizona State Parks are a resource for today and a promise for tomorrow. But short-sighted funding decisions imperil their future. You can help change that.

  • VISIT. Arizona’s state parks offer dazzling natural wonders, family recreational activities and authentic windows into Arizona’s history and prehistory. azstateparks.com
  • BE A CHAMPION. There’s an election coming up. Ask candidates for state office how they plan to support Arizona’s parks and let them know you want this to be a priority issue.
  • GET INVOLVED. More than a dozen parks have volunteer “friends” groups that provide fund-raising and other services for their chosen park. For information on joining or starting one: azstateparks.com/volunteer/v_foundation.html

Arizona State Parks Foundation is a non-profit that engages in advocacy, fund-raising, and other support. Visit their website at arizonastateparksfoundation.org  The Arizona Heritage Alliance is a non-profit that promotes and protects the Heritage Fund and its goals: azheritage.org

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ABOUT THIS SERIES

Arizona State Parks are a valuable resource in great peril. Stripped of funding during the recession, they struggle without state money and stagger under deferred maintenance. Yet they offer open spaces and outdoor recreation for a growing urban population and an economic engine for rural communities. Popular with the public, but lacking political support, funding solutions can help the parks deliver on their remarkable potential.

Bring back the state parks Heritage Fund

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[Source: William C Thornton, Arizona Republic Opinion] – As negotiations continue between Gov. Jan Brewer and legislative leaders, questions remain about what will or will not be included in the new budget. One thing is certain. The budget will not contain a dime of new funding for State Parks nor will it restore the parks Heritage Fund.

The people of Arizona are the big losers.

Enacted by voters in 1990, the Heritage Fund directed $20 million in Lottery money to be divided equally each year between State Parks and the Department of Game and Fish. The $10 million for parks often served as seed money for matching grants. The total yearly impact was typically $20 million or more.

Heritage Fund grants developed new parks, and built and improved trails, campgrounds, picnic facilities, boat docks and ramps. Historic restoration grants helped preserve important parts of our rich cultural heritage such as the Riordan Mansion in Flagstaff, the Tombstone Courthouse, Mission San Xavier del Bac in Tucson and the historic Yuma Crossing.

If you hunt, fish, hike, camp, boat, picnic or share my love of Arizona history, the parks Heritage Fund benefited you.

Even if you’ve never visited a state park or historic site. you’ve benefited from the Heritage Fund-fueled economic engine that brings dollars and supports jobs. A 2007 study estimated that 224 jobs were directly supported by parks Heritage Fund grants.

State parks and historic sites attract more than 2 million visitors, about half from out of state, who add $266 million to our state’s economy each year. These visitors support an additional 3,000 jobs, mostly in rural areas heavily impacted by the economic downturn.

In response to the economic downturn and a decline in tax revenue, the Legislature swept the state parks allocation into the general fund in 2010 and, inexplicably, eliminated the fund in July 2010.

Thanks to former Rep. Russ Jones and Rep. Ethan Orr, bills to restore the parks Heritage Fund were introduced in three consecutive legislative sessions. In each case the bill was voted out of committee with unanimous bipartisan support only to die in the House Appropriations Committee.

If Arizona legislators and business leaders are serious about attracting companies such as Tesla Motors, they may want to think about the message we send when we fail to invest in our parks. Low taxes aren’t the only consideration when companies decide where to locate a new facility. Outdoor recreational opportunities consistently rank near the top of quality of life issues that attract high-paying jobs, and our parks play a major role.

As the legislative session winds down, House Speaker Andy Tobin’s proposed monument to the 19 Granite Mountain Hotshots who died fighting the Yarnell Hill Fire seems certain to pass. It should.

The question of how to pay the estimated $500,000 cost must be addressed. A restored parks Heritage Fund could have been the solution. Let’s bring it back.

William C. Thornton is a second-generation Arizonan and member of the Arizona Heritage Alliance Board.

Story Highlights

  • The Heritage Fund provided $10 million to state parks until the Legislature eliminated the program
  • The fund supports the sort of quality of life that helps attract high-paying jobs
  • The Legislature should restore the fund

State parks: Arizonans love them, lawmakers don’t

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[Source: Arizona Republic Editorial Board] – Hollywood made dozens of movies about Tombstone. “None of them are accurate,” says Tombstone City Councilman Don Taylor.

Tombstone’s 1882 courthouse remembers the Wild West reality those movies can’t portray. Sheriff’s office, gallows, creaking wooden floors. But Tombstone Courthouse State Historic Park can’t tell the full story, either. Not without all the guns.

When recession-era cuts closed parks statewide, Tombstone and its Chamber of Commerce entered an agreement with the state to keep the courthouse open.

“We had to take some of the artifacts out when they took over,” says Jay Ream, deputy director of Arizona State Parks. Some Wyatt Earp-era guns were put in the vault because of security concerns. Territorial records that had been available to history buffs were also locked away, for security concerns of a different type. “They are doing an outstanding job,” Ream says of the local folks managing the courthouse. “Is it the best it can be? I’d say no. We’re better equipped to manage a museum.”

But the state can’t afford to take back the courthouse. It can’t afford to create modern, interactive exhibits to tell the stories that shaped Arizona. Parks around the state can’t afford to offer ranger-led hikes or interpretive tours much anymore, either.

We may think we know Tombstone. The gunfights. The violence. The dust. But Hollywood doesn’t get everything right. A look at the many facets (some more historically accurate than others) of the Town Too Tough to Die.

People love the parks. Politicians don’t.

The state parks system was stripped of resources during the recession. Efforts to restore or replace funding have been rejected at the Legislature and by Gov. Jan Brewer.

A State Auditor General’s report in 2012 said the parks system faces “risks to its financial sustainability because of a decrease in annual revenues from approximately $54.7 million in fiscal year 2008 to approximately $25.7 million in 2012.”

It’s gotten worse.

In fiscal 2014, the operating budget was $22.5 million. That’s about $20 million less than what Arizona State University’s Morrison Institute for Public Policy said was needed to operate and maintain the system in 2009.

The parks also have $80 million in capital needs, according to Parks Director Bryan Martyn, a Republican whose hiring was approved by Republican Gov. Jan Brewer.

That includes more than $15 million in upgrades just to comply with Environmental Protection Agency regulations. Among those needs: a new main waterline to Kartchner Caverns ($3.75 million), a wastewater treatment plant for Boyce Thompson Arboretum ($1.2 million), a potable water line for Homolovi ($5.5 million), as well as assorted septic systems, dump stations and water storage facilities.

These are not frills. They are vital to protecting public health.

Other top priority needs at parks include stabilizing historic and prehistoric structures so they don’t fall down, maintaining trails and roads, fixing leaky roofs and upgrading restrooms, docks and fish cleaning stations. Also needed are basics such as pavement striping, campground electrification, picnic table armadas and dam repairs.

State parks have received no money from the general fund since 2009. During the recession, the Legislature swept away parks’ funding from a variety of sources, including $10 million from the Heritage Fund.

That’s a relatively small amount of money in a $9 billion-plus budget state budget, but it’s nearly half of what the parks are operating on today.

The Heritage Fund was created by voters in a 1990 initiative to support state parks. But legislators are deaf to the people’s voice. An attempt to restore the money was ignored by lawmakers last year, and two Heritage restoration bills this year appear doomed.

Another bill this session would have redirected money the parks get from the State Lake Improvement Fund. Martyn says it would be “very, very challenging” for state parks to operate without the $6.5 million or so the fund provides. Thankfully, that bill also appears dead. But it demonstrates some legislators’ continued bad attitude toward state parks.

Brewer does little better. Her budget acknowledged “a cumulative list of all capital projects requested by State Parks totaling over $200 million.” But she only recommended spending $3 million over two years from an existing fund. She also proposed eliminating $1 million the parks received this year from interest on the rainy day fund.

Arizona’s parks represent irreplaceable natural and historic treasures. They help rural economies by providing world-class tourist attractions. They reflect our heritage and the bigger-than-life landscapes that shaped Arizona’s spirit.

They have huge needs and scarce resources.

Similarly in need and just as scarce are elected leaders with the foresight to make Arizona State Parks a priority and a cause.

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WHAT YOU CAN DO

Arizona State Parks are a resource for today and a promise for tomorrow. But short-sighted funding decisions imperil their future. You can help change that.

  • VISIT. Arizona’s state parks offer dazzling natural wonders, family recreational activities and authentic windows into Arizona’s history and prehistory. azstateparks.com
  • BE A CHAMPION. There’s an election coming up. Ask candidates for state office how they plan to support Arizona’s parks and let them know you want this to be a priority issue.
  • GET INVOLVED. More than a dozen parks have volunteer “friends” groups that provide fund-raising and other services for their chosen park. For information on joining or starting one: azstateparks.com/volunteer/v_foundation.html

Arizona State Parks Foundation is a non-profit that engages in advocacy, fund-raising and other support: arizonastateparksfoundation.org

The Arizona Heritage Alliance is a non-profit that promotes and protects the Heritage Fund and its goals: azheritage.org

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ABOUT THIS SERIES

Arizona State Parks are a valuable resource in great peril. Stripped of funding during the recession, they struggle without state money and stagger under deferred maintenance. Yet they offer open spaces and outdoor recreation for a growing urban population and an economic engine for rural communities. Popular with the public, but lacking political support, funding solutions can help the parks deliver on their remarkable potential.