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Shirking responsibility
We write today to express our vigorous opposition to FY10-FY11 budget proposals to shift responsibility for state programs and costs onto county governments. Especially disturbing is a component of the Executive's Budget Recommendation to shift responsibility for the incarceration, treatment and education of convicted juvenile offenders onto counties from the Arizona Department of Juvenile Corrections. As the chief elected law enforcement officials of our respective counties, each of us recognizes that such a flawed shift of responsibility away from the state onto county governments is impracticable, jeopardizes public safety and threatens both the short and long-term financial solvency of county governments across Arizona.
Arizona's counties continue to experience drastic reductions in property and sales tax revenues and continual cost-shifts from the State are exacerbating an already desperate financial situation for every county government. In the last twenty months alone, Arizona's county governments have been forced to absorb nearly $120 million of the state's budget deficit through direct state cost shifts and county revenue diversions.
Local government finance system and criminal justice or detention education infrastructures are not designed to provide for long-term incarceration, treatment and education of convicted juvenile offenders. Cost to local governments and taxpayers will be far more than the $63.3 million the Executive has scored to save the State.
News that Arizona's cities would be required to pay $22 million toward the cost of a county juvenile detention system does nothing to deter our opposition and it exacerbates our frustration that the State is choosing to abdicate its public safety responsibility by pushing cost and management responsibilities of state programs it no longer wishes to fund onto local governments with no capacity to do so. The State of Arizona cannot recover form the economic recession by forcing local governments into deeper financial crisis.
Larry A. Dever
Cochise County Sheriff and Arizona County Sheriffs
Arizona's counties continue to experience drastic reductions in property and sales tax revenues and continual cost-shifts from the State are exacerbating an already desperate financial situation for every county government. In the last twenty months alone, Arizona's county governments have been forced to absorb nearly $120 million of the state's budget deficit through direct state cost shifts and county revenue diversions.
Local government finance system and criminal justice or detention education infrastructures are not designed to provide for long-term incarceration, treatment and education of convicted juvenile offenders. Cost to local governments and taxpayers will be far more than the $63.3 million the Executive has scored to save the State.
News that Arizona's cities would be required to pay $22 million toward the cost of a county juvenile detention system does nothing to deter our opposition and it exacerbates our frustration that the State is choosing to abdicate its public safety responsibility by pushing cost and management responsibilities of state programs it no longer wishes to fund onto local governments with no capacity to do so. The State of Arizona cannot recover form the economic recession by forcing local governments into deeper financial crisis.
Larry A. Dever
Cochise County Sheriff and Arizona County Sheriffs
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