Arizona State Law Journal Blog

By Kylie Horne. On January 21, 2022, Arizona Governor Doug Ducey sued the Biden administration in an ongoing battle over Arizona’s use of American Rescue Plan funds for schools that do not mandate masks or utilize virtual learning, even in the face of large COVID-19 outbreaks. The outcome of this case could have wide implications regarding the ways other states can use federal funding to promote their COVID-19 response priorities. Where Did the Disputed Funding Originate From? In March 2021, Congress passed the American Rescue Plan. The U.S.  Secretary of Education, Miguel Cardona, said the plan’s K-12 funding was designed to help schools, students, and teachers get past and recover from the pandemic. He further elaborated that the intent of the funding is to ensure “that the schools have the…

By Claire Newfeld. A Phoenix couple is considering divorce and wants to ensure the best outcome for their children. A criminal defendant in Tucson has been charged with a low-level misdemeanor, and paying the fine if convicted would burden them financially. A tenant in Flagstaff has been calling their former landlord trying to get their security deposit back, but to no avail. These people have almost certainly heard the same advice over and over again: “Get a lawyer.” Their likely response? “Can’t afford it.” Luckily, all of these people could potentially take advantage of a new opportunity in Arizona that provides some clients more affordable representation. Arizona is one of a few states that is leading the charge to address access to justice issues by allowing legal paraprofessionals to represent…

By Ben Martin. I suppose requiring all high school gym teachers to bench press 250 pounds might in some sense increase the quality, or at a minimum, the strength, of the average gym teacher. Requiring all high school English teachers to have a Ph.D. in literature might increase the quality of the average English teacher. But from a student’s perspective, raising the certification requirements naturally creates barriers to entry which might limit the number of teachers available and their relative tenures. I don’t think it's controversial to say that education regulation needs to be fine-tuned towards both the number of available teachers and the qualifications of those teachers. Arizona is facing a teacher shortage. In response, schools may scramble to fill vacancies with people who don’t meet standard teaching requirements,…

By Sean Krieg. If you’ve traveled in the last decade, you have likely considered staying in a short-term rental.  Largely due to the success of peer-to-peer rental platforms like Airbnb and Vrbo—which digitally connect property owners with potential renters—short-term rentals now make up nearly a third of the U.S. lodging market. This rapid introduction of lodging into the “sharing economy” has given travelers more options, and owners the opportunity to turn properties into sources of revenue.    The rise of short-term rentals has not only had a direct effect on travelers and property owners, but also on the communities where the rentals are found. Some evidence suggests Airbnb guests stay at a destination longer and spend more at local businesses than hotel guests. But this increased spending may come at a…

By Spencer Shockness. Who can take a sunrise? Sprinkle it with dew? Add a taste of chocolate and make an e-cigarette or two? Not the Candy Man, nowadays, but the large vape brands can. The modern state of the tobacco industry encourages us to ask the question: are flavored e-cigarettes a dangerous threat to the American youth? As of 2021, the FDA has denied marketing applications for over 946,000 flavored e-cigarette products citing the dangers presented by youth usage of these products. The Agency has issued marketing denials left and right for products featuring flavors such as Apple Crumble, Cinnamon Toast Cereal, and more. However, the Agency has yet to rule on the marketing applications from some of the major e-cigarette manufacturers. One e-cigarette company whose flavored products are popular…

By Sean Krieg. In October 2021, the Mayor, Councilmembers, and City Manager of Mesa received a threat. It was not sent by an anonymous troublemaker nor was it from a disgruntled citizen. Instead, it was sent by three members of the Arizona State Legislature. They were threatening to withhold all of the state-shared revenue owed to the City of Mesa—a sum of more than $190 million in the current fiscal year. What possible reason could the legislature have for threatening to torpedo the budget of one of the largest cities in Arizona? Food trucks. The three legislators claimed that a Mesa zoning interpretation, which suggested restrictions on a large-scale food truck operation located a few feet from residential property, violated Arizona’s “Food Truck Freedom” bill, passed in 2018 to streamline…

By Gabriela Berigan. In 2019, Arizona Public Service (APS) filed a Rate Application with the Arizona Corporation Commission (ACC), in which APS requested an increase to the  rate it can charge customers for usage. It requested an increase of around 5%, to recover $215.5 million spent on pollution control upgrades. During a three-day hearing in October 2021, the five-member ACC heard APS’s arguments for the proposed rate increase. In a 3-2 decision, however, the ACC cut the company’s equity from approximately 10% to 8.7%, or about a decrease of $119 million in annual revenue. The decision was unexpected as APS has not seen a rate decrease for 25 years. Background All public utilities are required to undergo utility ratemaking. Utility ratemaking is the process in which a public service commission…

By Alicia Curti. Does copyright law apply to data stored by automobile dealers? The Ninth Circuit addressed this question in CDK Global v. Brnovich, which arose from a new state law requiring automobile dealerships to share certain data with third parties. The Circuit Court upheld the state law because it found it consistent with federal copyright law, specifically the fair use doctrine. The structure of the United States government, consisting of a central federal government in addition to state governments, inherently gives rise to tension between federal law and state law. Fundamental constitutional principles and federal statutes are often implicated in state laws, and federal law (almost) always trumps state law. Federal courts often review state laws for consistency with federal requirements, and state laws are sometimes invalidated in this…

By Dewey Warner. On October 29, the Supreme Court agreed to hear West Virginia v. Environmental Protection Agency. The case, a consolidation of four cases brought by coal and energy companies and Republican-led states, will scrutinize the power of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to regulate carbon emissions under the Clean Air Act. The plaintiffs contend that the Act does not provide a constitutional basis for such regulation. The Court’s decision to hear this case is a monumental one. It creates the potential for an outcome that would thwart meaningful climate change action while upending the federal government’s regulatory apparatus. If the Supreme Court rules in favor of these states and companies, it will have profound implications. THE CLEAN AIR ACT AND ITS PROGENY In 1963, Congress enacted the Clean…

By Ben Martin. WikiHow’s fantastic How to Get Out of a Gym Contract reads with the regulatory complexity you might expect from a law class on energy or taxes. And yet it's a complexity that the consumer may encounter when trying to cancel a gym membership. A simple consumer transaction can be made difficult to increase subscriber retention. As WikiHow explains, most states have laws regulating gym memberships. Arizona, for example, has laws mandating some cancellation refunds and preventing contracts of over three years. In April 2021, Governor Ducey signed HB 2697 to allow Arizonans to cancel contracts for gyms through email. Previously, gyms only needed to allow members to cancel through mail or in person. The Governor connected the bill to the pandemic, emphasizing the importance of Arizonans having…