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EGT1 Task 3

Decent Essays

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The Arizona Legislature is now at day 32, which is more than 30% of the way towards the “mythical” 100-day legislative session. Arizona is one of a few states whose legislature has no constitutional or statutory end date. The Legislature starts the year off with a rule stating session shall last 100 days, the rule is often amended and the 100-day goal missed.

Major policy debates are what normally cause the Legislature to miss the 100-day goal, e.g. Governor Brewer’s work to expand Medicaid in 2013. This year, major healthcare debates at the Arizona Legislature are unlikely due to the uncertainty surrounding the repeal and replace of the Affordable Care Act. However, there are always healthcare issues debated at the Legislature. Some of the issues on the forefront this year include proposals to address “surprise billings”, mandatory flu vaccines, newborn screenings, and behavioral health transportation.

Looking into the crystal ball, there two policy debates which might take significant time and energy:

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Governor Doug Ducey included the proposal in his FY18 budget, and it has garnered pushback from fiscal hawks in the Republican caucus and scrutiny from government debt and taxpayer watchdog groups. Chatter that ASU would attempt to use the proposal as an alternative to pay for its share of a proposed new arena for the Arizona Coyotes only confused the issue. ASU and the Coyotes originally proposed a sales tax mechanism to pay for its share of the arena, but when that hit significant opposition speculation turned to the bonding package as a potential financing source. To quiet speculation and avoid negative PR, ASU announced over the weekend that it was pulling out of the arena

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