Brewer & GOP hurt kids with cuts to health, schools

'No plan' Jan and Rs have axed children's healthcare & schools

TUCSON -- Jan Brewer has never hesitated to attack the welfare of our children. Today, in a stunning display of hypocrisy, she offers only lip service to declare this 'Arizona's Child Health Day.' Yet, her cuts to children's healthcare and education are the meanest and most devastating Arizona has ever experienced.

"At the beginning of this year, Jan Brewer tossed tens of thousands of children off of Arizona's KidsCare health insurance," said Attorney General Terry Goddard. "Her cuts to education, so far, are more than one billion dollars. Now, she is trying to destroy First Things First, our program for early education, which we know is the most effective way to help kids succeed in school."

"Arizona children are forced to suffer for her horrible budget management," added Goddard.

Here is a partial list of the budget damage Jan Brewer has done to children and families:

• Tens of thousands of children removed from the AHCCCS KidsCare program.
• New enrollment in KidsCare remains frozen.
• State support for community health care centers has been wiped out, cutting off programs for the very poor.
• 4,200 children have lost behavioral health services.
• 20,000 poor children removed from the list for child-care subsidies.
• Severe cuts to in-home services, forcing more children into foster care.
• 300 developmentally disabled children have been cut off from state service.
• 850 severely ill children removed from Children's Rehabilitative Services.
• Substance abuse treatment denied to parents, putting a large number of children at further risk.
• Support for grandparents caring for grandchildren has been eliminated.
• CPS is no longer required to investigate all cases of child abuse.

In November, if voters pass Proposition 302, they will destroy the voter-approved program that funds early education in Arizona (First Things First).

"The debate on early education is over," said Goddard. "There is no question that the best way to improve educational outcomes is to ensure - through early education - that children are ready to learn before they enter the first grade. Jan Brewer is willing to sacrifice early childhood support and everything that goes with it - better test scores, higher graduation rates, and a better-trained work force."

"Rather than doing the hard work necessary to balance the budget - without this kind of damage to children - she is giving in to her lobbyist handlers and letting them call the most painful shots."

- adapted from TG campaign