FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

September 21, 2026

GOSAR HOLDING SCHOOL FUNDS HOSTAGE

FLAGSTAFF, AZ – There are evidently no lines that Rep. Paul Gosar will not cross in order to do enact his ideological agenda on the people of district one. This week, the Prescott Daily Courier reports that Gosar is working to hold up renewal of a critical program that has funded Arizona schools for nearly a century.

The Daily Courier reports:

Schools would take a hit. "This would be a devastating blow to Yavapai County students," Yavapai County Superintendent of Schools Tim Carter said. He pointed out that, aside from specific projects funded by Secure Rural Schools, the money also pays for a grant writer, "which can substantially compound the positive financial contributions and services that are provided directly to students and their teachers."

Carter said loss of federal funding would shift the cost to taxpayers. "If this funding is ended, the financial burden of these services would not go away," he said.

But U.S. Rep. Paul Gosar, R-Ariz. District 1, a member of the Natural Resources Committee, one of two committees that oversees the program, is not on board with the current plan. He wants to throw it out and return to one tied directly to revenues from national forest land.

"(The GOP) is trying to use the poor state of the economy to go after every environmental protection possible," said Sandy Bahr, of Arizona's chapter of the Sierra Club. "It's a bad idea, and it isn't sustainable. Anyone who knows Arizona's forests knows that."

The plan would first establish how much money each national forest would need to generate, then give 75 percent of that money to a new County, Schools and Revenue Trust, 20 percent to the U.S. Forest Service, and 55 to the U.S. Treasury.

Bahr said that's not workable. "Arizona's logging program lost money. It did not make money for the Forest Service. And that was back when there were still a few big trees left to log."

“Paul Gosar is holding funding for our children’s schools hostage in order to mandate a massive expansion of logging in our national forests, and I will not stand for it,” said Ann Kirkpatrick. “In Greater Arizona, we believe in using our natural resources wisely, and this proposal fails common sense for anyone familiar with these issues.”

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