Civic Engagement

Thank you to all those who attended the Water Gathering at Granada Park last Saturday and signed petitions then. More signatures are needed by Saturday, Sept. 25 before final submission on Sept. 28. These 8 referendum and initiative petitions are necessary to overturn recent legislation devastating to education, voters’ rights, and medical debt. Find a place to sign and have your voice heard!

Referendum Petitions, Fall 2021

The AZ Legislature passed bills this year that will:

1. cut deeply into voter-approved education funding, and
2. make it harder to vote

These bills will go into effect at the end of September UNLESS we get enough registered voters to sign petitions to “refer” them to the 2022 general election. This would put the bills on hold until citizens get a chance to approve or reject them. The petitions must be turned in by September 25th. 

You will have a chance to sign these six petitions at the outdoor UUCP event at Grenada Park on Saturday, September 11, from 9:00-11:00 am. If you cannot attend that event, you can find another place to sign them at a location near you, or email us at civicengagement@phoenixuu.org if you need someone to bring the petitions to you.

Education-Related Referendums

If a sufficient number of signatures is obtained on all three of these, the effect would be to:

• Restore billions in critically needed funding cut by the legislature in June 2021. This would solve the teacher shortage crisis, lower class sizes, add more aides and counselors, and expand career and technical education.
• Prevent Arizona legislators from overturning the will of 1.7 million Arizona voters in a bait-and-switch scheme to destroy Prop 208 by exempting their rich friends from paying taxes that Arizona voters passed.
• Ensure Arizona invests in its schools and infrastructure, instead of handing a billion dollars to millionaires in the form of massive tax cuts. Stronger schools mean a strong economy.

Do I have to sign all three petitions? YES, because Gov. Ducey and 47 Republican legislators used a combination of three bills and workarounds to cut education funding, including the “flat tax” scheme and SB 1783. To fix what they destroyed, we need to recall all three parts.

Voting Rights Referendums

If a sufficient number of signatures is obtained on these three petitions, the effect will be to: 

• Keep the “Permanent” in the Permanent Early Voting List (PEVL)
• Allow state and local election officials to continue to supplement the insufficient funds they receive by obtaining outside grants for voter registration and election administration.
• Block proposed ten “ballot fraud countermeasures,” including bar and QR codes, which could violate the ballot secrecy guarantee of the AZ Constitution.

Again, we hope to see you at the outdoor UUCP event at Grenada Park on Saturday, September 11, from 9:00-11:00 am. If you cannot attend that event, you can find another place to sign them at a location near you, or email us at civicengagement@phoenixuu.org if you need someone to bring the petitions to you.

• The IRC Welcome Center in Phoenix is beginning to receive refugees from Afghanistan in addition to the hundreds per week from other countries. Help is needed there more than ever. Find a way you can help by donating money, ordering needed items from an Amazon wish list, or volunteering in person.
• The Welcome Center does not have laundry facilities on-site. Another much-needed way to lend a hand is to use your home washer/dryer to launder one bag of dirty items once a week. Contact us at civicengagement@phoenixuu.org if you can help with this.