In summer 2018, the Mingus Union High School District Governing Board sued the Committee for Better Upper Verde Valley Schools, as well as the county school superintendent and the state legislature, alleging that a planned vote on school district consolidation, set at the time for November 2018, was illegal and that the bill passed by the legislature that allowed for that vote was unconstitutional.
Yavapai County Superior Court Judge David Mackey brokered a settlement between the two parties, postponing the consolidation election. The Committee has expressed an intention to seek an election this November instead.
Though the lawsuit was settled in August of 2018, the effects of the lawsuit for both the MUHSD board and the committee remain unsettled. On Jan. 9, Arizona Rep. Bob Thorpe [R-District 6] introduced a bill into the Arizona House of Representatives that could retroactively force the Mingus board members to personally pay for the lawyer fees of the Committee, something that was not part of the terms of the settlement.
“A school district … shall not maintain an action to prevent the enactment of any initiative or referendum measure allowed by law,” Thorpe’s proposed bill reads. “The members of the governing body of a school district … who vote to maintain an action to prevent the enactment of any initiative or referendum measure allowed by law are personally liable for the reasonable attorney fees and other costs of litigation incurred by persons who attempt to enact the initiative or referendum measure.”
Thorpe’s bill, which has been introduced but not yet voted on or officially considered by the legislature, would apply retroactively all the way back to 2015. According to Thorpe, he introduced the bill after speaking with the CBUVVS, specifically with the 2018 lawsuit in mind.
“They’re the ones I ran it for,” Thorpe said. “They’ve had to spend tens of thousands of dollars — I think they’re up to $70,000 or something like that — just to get this on the ballot. I just don’t think that government officials, elected officials or appointed government officials should be using taxpayer dollars to create lawsuits like this that our citizens have to defend. It just doesn’t make any sense.”
“The legal costs to defend this litigation was well over $85,000,” Bob DeGeer, a member of the CBUVVS, said. DeGeer confirmed that the committee had discussed the bill with Thorpe before it was introduced. “The CBUVVS believes that the voters in any district should be given the opportunity to put any matter or issue on the ballot without being stopped by a five- member school board. The school district’s voters need a voice in this process, and Representative Thorpe agrees.”
Some members of the CBUVVS have donated to Thorpe’s campaigns in the past, including $750 from Andy Groseta in 2018 and $200 in 2016, and $100 from Philip Terbell in 2018, according to the Arizona Secretary of State’s website.
MUHSD Governing Board President Carol Anne Teague [who was not on the board at the time of the lawsuit and there- fore would not be personally liable for legal fees] expressed staunch disapproval toward Thorpe’s bill, though she clarified that she spoke only for herself, not the entire Mingus Board, which had not yet discussed the proposed bill at press time.
“This infuriates me,” Teague wrote in an email. “The Mingus Union High School Governing Board at the time sued the committee to stop this petition and protect our schools and our students, which is exactly what they should have done.
“Mingus wasn’t trying to stop the voters from voting, they were stopping an awful petition that was filled with horrible unintended consequences. In court, the judge agreed with Mingus that the petition had fatal flaws.
“The judgement was that if the committee ever came back at Mingus wanting consolidation that Judge Mackey would oversee their wording to make sure that their petition was no longer ‘confusing and misleading,’” Teague wrote.
“Andy [Groseta] and his committee have gotten another legislator to introduce HB2125,” Teague wrote. “This bill says that they or whomever can attack any of our schools in any way that they want and the school is not allowed to defend our students using school funds, even if we believe that the bill is unlawful or unconstitutional. On top of that, the committee wants Mingus to pay them back for stopping the mistake two years ago. Give me a break.”
Thorpe said that the bill was still tentative and that he had not seriously discussed its potential to pass with other lawmakers in the legislature. He also said it would likely change before it passed in order to deal with any unintended consequences that might occur as a result of it.
“I’m not taking sides in the consolidation battle,” Thorpe said. “I’m just concerned about the process. If a group wants to put it on the ballot, they should have the opportunity of doing so without ending up with $70,000 in legal fees. They need to have that opportunity to bring it before the voters and then give the voters the opportunity to weigh in, to decide whether it’s a good idea or not. As far as whether consolidation is a good idea or not, no, I’m not really expressing an opinion on that. I’m just concerned about the process.”
