State Representative David Livingston (R-28) issued a statement condemning Governor Katie Hobbs' (D-AZ) mismanagement of the Department of Child Safety's (DCS) Congregate Care program.
Congregate Care is Arizona's program that assists in funding group homes for foster children. As ABC15 reported, it is expected to go bankrupt soon, which Arizona Republicans blame on mismanagement by Gov. Hobbs.
However, Christian Slater, a spokesperson for Gov. Hobbs, said the program will not go bankrupt, and the request for additional funds is a routine line-item diversion of funds for other programs into the DCS's Congregate Care.
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Rep. Livingston, however, was not buying it.
As a press release from the Arizona House's Joint Legislative Budget Committee (JLBC) explained, DCS was supposed to use existing funds in its budget.
"Governor Hobbs's repeated failures to manage the budget responsibly have pushed agencies into crisis after crisis. Her administration's approach is to overspend, ignore reality, and then demand a last-minute bailout. That's not leadership—that's recklessness," said Rep. Livingston.
Additionally, he emphasized that the Legislature is not there to address executive mistakes and that "DCS already has the money it needs to address this failure, and today, we made sure it can use those funds."
"It should never have come to this," the Arizona Congressman continued, "Her administration had the ability to fix this months ago, but instead, they sat on it—waiting until just 19 days before bankruptcy to sound the alarm. Arizona families have to live within their budgets, and we expect the Governor to do the same."
As a result of the impending collapse, Arizona Speaker of the House Steve Montenegro (R-29) assembled an Ad Hoc Committee on Executive Budget Mismanagement on Monday, saying, "We care deeply about the children in DCS' care. That's why we acted quickly today. The JLBC's directive ensures that children in need will continue receiving care, but the Legislature will not reward fiscal irresponsibility by throwing more taxpayer dollars at a crisis of the Governor's making."
