Questioning APS Maintenance Freeze on KOAT Channel 7

Recently, RGF President Paul Gessing wrote an “open letter” to the APS administration regarding their defeat in the recent bond/tax hike election and their decision to freeze spending on facility maintenance. Among other things I noted that APS’ budget allocates $321.7 million to capital expenditures.

Channel 7 took an interest and Gessing sat down with them for the following story. KOAT doesn’t allow embedding of stories, but you can click on the image before for a link.

If APS really has exhausted their entire $321 million capital budget at this point in the school year it would seem that they are even worse financial managers than we thought. More likely (and as is reflected in the story) it appears that APS is freezing maintenance spending in retaliation for not getting their tax hike.

We’d gladly sit down with APS to discuss or read any information they have to justify this decision, but we have already been told by APS that we are a “faux think tank.” They seem far more willing at this point to call names and whine rather than figuring out how to address the very real issues at APS.