The Arizona Supreme Court recently ruled that a Phoenix light rail ballot initiative can proceed to the polls in August 2019. According to the Court, the proponents of the ballot initiative did not violate ARS 19-118.01(A) by paying signature gatherers per signature because that prohibition only applies to statewide ballot initiatives, not city initiatives. Nor did the initiative supporters violate ARS 19-102(A) through a misleading 100-word descriptive statement.
The ballot initiative before the Court in Associated General Contractors v. City of Phoenix and Building a Better Phoenix seeks to end all funding for the expansion of the city’s light rail system. If passed by Phoenix voters, current light rail operations would remain, but planned expansions would be scrapped (listen to this AZCentral podcast for more details).