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Governor Brewer fattens the Arizona Historical Society during the economic crisis

History museums are important. The question is how important are they relative to other state functions and services? Do they have priority over education and public safety? Over state parks and rest stops? As the chart shows, the AHS budget grew rapidly during the good years. Then, as bad times began, the budged declined somewhat. However, for 2011 they hit the jackpot. Governor Brewer gave them a huge increase in the midst of the great recession.

The trend line in the figure shows this even puts the 2011 AHS budget well above what might have been expected if the economy had not crashed. The 2011 AHS budget is 54% over the 2010 budget and a whopping 85% over the 2004 budget.

Even those huge numbers do not tell the whole story. Historical society museums are a double dipper in the state budget. There is over 6 million dollars in the 2011 budget for the Arizona Historical Society as shown in the figure. There is also an additional $762,000 for the Prescott Historical Society of Arizona. That’s a whopping total of over 7 million tax dollars for historical society museums in 2011.

Is this how Arizonans want their tax dollars spent? Would they rather go to a history museum than to a state park? Would they rather have access to a history museum than to a rest stop while traveling?
Posted by Dick at 6:26 PM