Let’s put a face to COVID – a friend of mine, in his 40s, father of 3 young people, died in Tucson from COVID last week.
Russ lasted just 9 days after having contracted the virus. Many of you knew him from his work on City and UA projects – the TCC, Hillenbrand Softball Field, McKale renovations, to name a few. Most importantly, we invited him into our homes because we trusted his integrity and valued his friendship. The numbers become more real when the loss becomes personal.
Nobody wants to be segregated into small groups on Thanksgiving. But you need to. This is a checklist from the current CDC site advising people about getting together for Thanksgiving:
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The City is planning an in-person budget retreat for the week before Christmas. I’ve advised them that I won’t be in attendance. My Chief of Staff has had 2 transplants. All of us have family. I’ve got a precious 99-year-old mother-in-law living here that we plan on visiting at Christmas. We’ve all been told by health authorities to avoid groups, stay outdoors when in a group, and stick to your ‘pod’ of people. We’ve been doing it since March. Now there’s a special need for an in-person budget retreat? There’s nothing we can do in person for that meeting that we can’t do – and haven’t been doing – virtually. The COVID numbers you’ll see below are horrible. There is no reason to expect that will change for the better a couple of weeks after the Thanksgiving holiday when many people are likely to ignore the health professionals’ advice.
Please walk the talk and do what is necessary to keep our City, County, and our families and loved ones safe as we enter this holiday season.
Vermont Governor Rick Scott took this difficult step last week:
I’ll have plenty of COVID numbers below. Behind each of them is a person who is leaving behind a family, friends, and co-workers. Let’s jointly try to keep that in mind as we think about the very real sacrifices we’re making to beat this virus.
Blue Light Recognition
This week’s blue light recognition is for the City's public safety workers. That includes 911, police, and fire. This graphic shows the distribution of COVID infections through the various City departments. Not surprisingly, they’re clustered in those 3 operating units. Police and fire are out in the public, working in direct contact with residents in oftentimes compromising conditions. And until the recently started renovation of the 911 center, our dispatch workers were in close quarters, working extensive shifts for consecutive days. All of that placed those particular employees in vulnerable positions, and the COVID numbers bear that out.
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We at the Ward 6 office are grateful to all of our City employees for their dedication to support the needs of our community. In this context, we’re grateful to our public safety team for continuing their work in that support during these difficult and dangerous COVID days. Thanks for all that you do.
Be Kind: I Am You 360
Here’s one thing that TPD is doing out in the community. That’s Desiree Cook. She founded I Am You 360. It’s a local non-profit that serves the needs of homeless youth and local foster kids. In Tucson, combined, we have about 10,000 young people in those categories. Desiree and her staff are committed to touching their lives. It’s this week’s Be Kind item.
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There’s a Facebook Watch show called Returning the Favor. They go around the Country and look for people in communities who are doing amazing things – like Desiree. The show finds needs they can fill that will help the people they’re targeting to better carry out their work.
I Am You 360 provides hygiene and other sanitary and COVID-related health supplies to the youth they’re working with. TPD is directly involved with delivering the products to the youth. Having TPD involved is an intentional part of the work that results in building relationships between the police and the kids. And the products they get? That’s a piece of humanizing them by providing the most basic needs that many of us take for granted. Some of the work Desiree and her team does involves delivering the products to the kids. The Favor the show did in support?
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TPD did a lights and sirens delivery of a brand new delivery van with the I Am You 360 logo painted – donated to the work through the show. Thanks to TPD for their work. Thanks to Returning the Favor for their generosity. And especially, thanks to Desiree for the great work she’s doing for the youth in this region.
Here’s a link to the 20-minute show. Watch it all. It will bring a tear to your eyes.
Watch the full episode on Facebook Watch.
Amy Ulm-Scott
Over the weekend, our dear friend, wife of radio guy John C. Scott, passed away. Amy Ulm was a part of that radio team, and most importantly, the life partner for John. A recent Star article had this quote:
"I've done radio since I was 15 years old. I'm comfortable with it. It's something I have always done. It's not hard for me," he said. And it's a family affair. His son, Mark Ulm, is his producer, and his wife, Amy Ulm, sells ads for his show.
Losing a person who was a part of you is inconceivable. We at the Ward 6 office wish peace and perfect memories for John and the family.
UA Job
Many of you continue to write about the UA and the ‘elimination’ of my job. I thank you for your concerns and very kind comments. It’s very nice to see that the community is watching what’s happening on and around campus. It affects lives.
Many people feel there may have been some connection between the very public positions I’ve taken on mandatory testing and the action the UA took. Because of that, I’ll give a short update on what Robbins/Carmona had to say last Monday during their briefing. It continues to put the lie to the contention their representative made to Mayor and Council when he said making testing mandatory is ‘unconstitutional’.
During the briefing, Carmona called the current COVID situation in Pima County “catastrophic.” I agree, and the data I share today certainly validates that. Given that, it was more than troubling to hear both he and President Robbins say multiple times that their concern is for what happens on campus, in the classrooms. My advocacy for testing students living off-campus is out of a concern for how their presence out in the wider community feeds into that growing ‘catastrophe’. Remember Pima County’s Dr. Cullen called the UA impact on the rest of the City a ‘tidal wave’.
Robbins said they cannot legally require testing for students who don’t come onto campus. But if they come onto campus, “in the classroom, we can require testing.” Both KGUN and KVOA asked what had changed - ‘what changed so where you didn’t have legal authority, now you do?’ The response was an unconvincing dance. Per Robbins, the previous claim that it was unconstitutional ‘was an assumption’. Funny, that’s not how it was presented when they came to the Council meeting. When asked to clarify why students living in off-campus housing who come onto campus even to go to the bookstore or student union wouldn’t need testing to protect the wider community, Robbins deflected to talking about what a good job they do of cleaning those facilities. Then he reiterated, “where we’ve been focused the most is in the classroom to protect our faculty and staff.”
Finally, this brief exchange - (KVOA) “Do you stand by the claim from Dudas (the guy who came to the Council meeting) that mandatory testing is unconstitutional?” Robbins - “I’m not sure about the constitutionality because there will be exemptions to look at on a case by case basis.” But won’t those same exemptions apply to students who are entering the classroom? Clearly, the UA now understands, and always did understand, that there was no constitutional issue with mandatory testing. Schools all over the country are doing it. The issue is working through the logistics and a concern over cost. I believe those are solvable if people want to roll up their sleeves and address them.
So the plan is for students, whether they live on or off-campus, to have mandatory testing if they’re taking in-person classes in January. Details evidently to follow.
Each of them is aware of the problem. I pulled this graphic from the show:
During the week of 11/8, all but 2 Arizona counties had a % positivity above 10%, which meets the substantial risk category for % positivity issued by the State. This week, the trend is going up. In addition, every County in the State has a case rate that exceeds 100 per 100,000 people. That’s also in the substantial risk category. If those numbers continue to escalate, the campus may have to shut down as they did in March.
I did a little back-checking. On October 21st, our 7 day rolling average for new COVID cases in Pima County was 70. Last week it was 432.
This is the list of large off-campus parties that took place recently. Clearly, there’s no reason to be comfortable with the UA’s testing plan.
Glass Recycling
Very soon, you’ll see one of these dumpsters out in the back of the Ward 6 office. When you do, you’ll know to put the glass you’re bringing to be crushed inside of that bin instead of stacking it behind the garage.
The staff has put together a well thought out plan for removing glass from the curbside blue barrels and expanding the crushing operation I’ve been doing in the Ward 6 garage for the past year. We’ve demonstrated there’s a valid secondary market for the crushed glass (sand,) and now the City is putting the pieces together to do this on a more commercial scale.
The next couple of months will serve as the ramping up educational period. I’ve suggested to our Environmental Services folks that a part of that can be them bringing the larger dumpster to the office so those of you who are already participating in the program become our initial pipeline for having materials ready to crush when the new, larger crusher arrives out at the landfill. And from a selfish standpoint, it gets me out of the crushing business.
This isn’t going to be a big moneymaker for the City. We’re losing money on recycling glass right now, so if we end up breaking even from a financial standpoint, that’d be worth the change. What we will be accomplishing lines up with the Climate Resiliency Plan the Mayor is championing – Reduce, Reuse, Recycle. We’ve used the crushed glass to lay the concrete that you walk on when coming to the Ward 6 office. We’ve used it for filling ruts in alleys, back in the olden days when it rained. I’ve had the Living Streets Alliance folks here filling over 100 sandbags that they’ll be using for the street events they host. And you may have used some of the old beer bottles to fill sandbags out by Hi Corbett for your own monsoon prep. Those are just a few of the uses we’ll be putting the glass/sand to. All of it reduces the costs we’d have otherwise had to incur buying sand from a quarry. And taking the glass out of the blue bins will reduce the wear and tear on the equipment they have out at the Material Recycle Facility. And as more of you get involved with the program, less and less glass will end up in the landfill. It’s a win all around.
Watch for Public Service Announcements, inserts in your mail, and notices in the media as we roll out this new program. It’s just one piece of the larger climate work this Mayor and City Council are and will continue to do.
You’ll have plenty of time to adjust, but beginning February 21st, these are the materials that’ll still be allowed in the blue barrels. Glass will go to one of the dumpsters that’ll be scattered around the City.
- Plastic bottles, jugs, and containers
- Paper
- Cardboard
- Aluminum/tin cans
This would not have happened had Val Little from West University not planted the seed with me over a year ago. Val, let’s get together when this winds down, and you get to crush the last bottle at Ward 6.
RTA Next
Last week I wrote a pretty extensive summary of my thoughts on the RTA road priority list we were being asked to put together. The short message is that if the RTA is going to have a chance of passing with City of Tucson voters, they’ll need to make some fundamental changes to how it’s being structured. Naming a list of roads and letting the RTA pick and choose which ones make it to the ballot isn’t one of those changes.
As it stands, each jurisdiction is being asked to provide a list of road projects that’s equal in value to what other jurisdictions are being allowed. Our tax base in support of the RTA is vastly different. Therefore the value of what comes to the City of Tucson out of the RTA needs to reflect that. Similarly, voting on the RTA is done one-city/one-vote, irrespective of what our financial or tax base value to the whole committee is. That’s a governance issue that other Regional Transit Authorities have figured out. This chart shows some options we’ll need to be discussing if RTA Next makes any sense.
RTA Next will need to include a set aside for road repair. There has been no mention of other categories of work such as off-hour transit funding, pedestrian safety elements, smart signalization technology, investment in alternate fuel vehicles, and more.
On Tuesday, we told staff that we weren’t ready to offer a roadway list but that we are ready to discuss these other parts of what an RTA Next voter ‘ask’ might look like. I’ll, of course, write about this as the conversation evolves. Our message last week was an important one for the City Council to send.
Tucson Gem and Mineral Shows
A few weeks ago, I included a piece announcing that the Tucson Gem and Mineral Show had canceled their 2021 event at the TCC. There’s still one major show that stages in the convention center that’s in the decision-making process. That’s the American Gem Trade Association (AGTA). I spoke to their director last week, and he tells me they’re looking very closely at the COVID situation and will make a final decision soon. Another of the big shows did exactly that last week. The GJX show has also been canceled.
GJX is the huge tent that sits on Granada, across from the TCC. Even though it’s a private show, the dollars they drive into our local economy are significant. Yet, despite the financial importance it plays for the City, as I shared with Star reporter Gabi Rico I believe they’re doing the right and responsible thing. It’s effective on the first of December. These shows have to let their suppliers know well in advance so they can book international flights and arrange the transport of extremely expensive gems. There is no way I or anybody could promise these operators that we might not have to call them in January and tell them their show needs to be postponed. We have an existing agreement with the State, so they can at anytime give us 14 days' notice that they’ll be standing up an Alternate Care Site within the TCC. Nobody can predict when or if that call will come.
Pima County Health has given all of the shows the current guidelines (masking, distancing, size of the group in the venue at a given time, etc.) with the caveat that they can change as COVID conditions change. So just as I did with TGMS, I’m extending this note of regret to GJX but adding that I think their decision is in the best interest of the community, from a public health perspective.
The Gem Show is really between 45 and 50 individual shows. Two of the big ones have canceled. Expect to hear more in the very near term. Each of them is important to the entire region. And each needs to be done safely, if at all. According to Visit Tucson, about 30 of the smaller ones are still planning on moving forward and are working in concert with our Pima County Health partners each step of the way.
Sonoran Corridor Environmental Study
A few years back, when Patrick McNamara worked for the Star, he did some extensive work laying out the economic development opportunities that exist out at what’s referred to as the Sonoran Corridor. That’s the extension connecting I-10 and I-19 out south of the airport. In one story I remember working with him on, he indicated that economic development experts agree that this is the ripest area in the entire State for significant clean industrial development that would provide game-changing jobs for the region. I believe it’s our gem in the rough, and we need to be taking appropriate steps to see how we can responsibly develop the area.
This map shows the area and what’s being looked at. If the connection is built, the development it would catalyze will capitalize on the existing air cargo, rail cargo from Port of Tucson, over the road cargo with the interstates, international commerce with Mexico, and build on the industrial capacity from Raytheon and the County-led aerospace facilities. If we can do it right, it’d bring high paying jobs in ways that aren’t ripping craters in the Santa Ritas for relatively short term gain.
The Arizona Department of Transportation (ADOT) is hosting a couple of environmental impact public hearings, each of which you can listen in on or bring questions for their panel. The first meeting is in-person and will be held out at the Tucson Airport Doubletree. It’ll be on Tuesday, December 1st from 5 pm until 8 pm. Their presentations will loop and repeat, so whenever you show up, there’ll be one playing. You must make a reservation for this meeting, and can do that by signing up through this link: https://tinyurl.com/SonCor. They’re signing people up for 30-minute time slots.
Then, on Thursday the 3rd, also from 5 pm until 8 pm, they’re hosting a virtual meeting. You can join that online atbit.ly/SCEIS2020, entering 146 242 8979 as the access code and SCEIS2020 as the password. Or you can call in at 408.418.9388 and entering that same meeting access number.
The draft corridor study is available at the ADOT website; www.azdot.gov/sonorancorridor. It’s a slow-moving project, but one that could be a major boost to the entire region for years to come.
Crusin’ and Campfires
A while back, I shared this COVID, cooped up/traveling with kids/camping idea with you. It’s a site that you can sign up and get ideas, activities, and goodies you can use either in your backyard or while doing a road trip with young kids. COVID isn’t going anywhere, so I thought I’d give a quick update on that site since we’re right on top of the holidays. The ideas are fun, and the need continues.
If you sign up on the site, they send you activity ideas. And they have gift boxes full of camping-related, kid-oriented items. Here are a few examples:
1. The Limited Edition Holiday Box — Pine-scented fire starters, wooden campfire earrings, 2 unique reusable juice pouches (exclusive to Cruisin' + Campfires), paint-your-own wooden ornaments, a hilarious squirrel cookie cutter for holiday baking together (and remembering the squirrels at all the campgrounds), and a fizzing snowman activity that'll keep your kids engaged while you sit back by the fire.
2. The Cruisin' Activity Box — comes filled with car activities to make your drives to the campground (or your in-laws) more enjoyable.
3. The Seasonal Camping Box — comes filled with seasonally-appropriate activities to do with the kids at the campsite (or anywhere outdoors)
As schools turn back to all virtual, these may be activities teachers of younger grades can use. Or families heading out for holiday long weekends. It’s not your ‘mall experience’, so I wanted to share it with you. To sign up, you can tag Crusin’ + Campfires on Instagram or Facebook or email to crusinandcampfires@gmail.com. It’s way too early for me to be thinking about holiday gifts, but some of you might be the early bird type.
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COVID Trends in Arizona
To frame the context for this section, here’s a NY Times graphic that shows where we’ve been in Arizona since March.
The Governor last week announced that he’s not going to entertain any more partial closures or any tighter restrictions on in-person capacity in retail. Closing the door on that might be premature. Certainly, the trend lines would indicate some wisdom in at least keeping all options on the table.
On a very local level, in the past 2 weeks testing for City employees and their families has shown a 16% increase in COVID positives. That’s 24 new cases. Other than the public safety contacts, it appears the City employee issues are being caused by activities away from the work environment. Again – please be careful in how you’re interacting with others. For your sake, and for theirs.
The graphic I have above shows the trend lines for Arizona since March. This is the County by County map from when all of this began in March:
Those COVID infection numbers led the Governor to issue a shelter in place Executive Order. Now he’s suggesting leaving things alone is fine. With that, compare the March map with today:
I started this newsletter with a personal reflection on the loss of a friend. Hidden in all of those numbers on the map are similar stories for thousands of families scattered throughout Arizona. Last week our Statewide and Pima County COVID deaths continued the sad increase.
Each of these numbers is a person whose loss is breaking hearts. By the time you read this, we’ll likely have broken 300,000 COVID infections in Arizona.
What’s Happening at Colleges Around the Country
As a backdrop to this section, this graph shows where the Country is headed with respect to COVID:
A week ago, the State of Michigan ordered all colleges to stop in-person instruction until after Thanksgiving. Some had already done that. According to a story in the Detroit Free Press, many applauded the order.
The impact on Division 1 football continues – Clemson vs. Florida State, Utah State vs. Wyoming, Houston vs. SMU, Navy vs. USF, Texas vs. Kansas, Colorado State vs. UNLV, Central Arkansas vs. Arkansas – all canceled. In the Pac12, the Washington State vs. Stanford game was canceled last weekend. And the Governor of Oregon told both Portland and Portland State to shut down both men’s and women’s basketball operations until further notice.
Albion College in Michigan gave students less than 48 hours’ notice to leave the campus. Cases of COVID in Michigan have exploded recently. The number of positive cases on their campus forced the school’s essential staff into quarantine. Many students are justifiably upset because the school stopped offering COVID tests, so now they have to rely on community-based testing to learn their status.
Duke took a different approach. They adopted a strategy of mass mandatory testing. They used mandatory pooled testing, contact tracing, and a mask mandate. All students were tested at least once per week. The most recent data they released showed fewer than 1% of their students tested positive.
I pulled this from the Tufts University student guide. It speaks for itself:
Something like that would have been a good compromise had the UA ever bothered to reach out and talk to me about the mandatory testing Resolution they successfully lobbied the Mayor and Council to vote down. Through their efforts, the UA as an institution successfully lobbied to affect public policy. Prior to my job being eliminated on campus, I was the only public official who was attempting to get them to do something like what they ended up doing anyway - constitutional issues notwithstanding, evidently.
Local Tucson: Tucson Clean & Beautiful
Last week I shared some Tucson Clean & Beautiful tree planting projects, both from out in front of the Ward 6 office and over in West University. That work continues all over the City.
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This is a photo from a TC&B/Broadway-Broadmoor neighborhood project that ended up having 30 new trees planted. As is typical, the TC&B staff showed up and worked with the Broadmoor neighbors to get the new landscape planted. This neighborhood is located right at the edge of the Arroyo Chico wash. That’s a great habitat for critters of all kinds, including numerous bird species that’ll enjoy their new options.
Thanks to Richard Roati for sharing the photo and to all of you who took part in the work. Each of these projects has a positive impact on climate and on our quality of life in Tucson.
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Harvard Global Health
In the past couple of weeks, I’ve been sharing how Arizona is tracking in the Harvard risk analysis.
Two weeks ago, this was what Arizona looked like.
Last week the virus had spread a bit further:
And now -
That means everyplace in Arizona is a hot spot. The Red Risk Level in the Harvard analysis calls for “Stay at Home Orders Necessary” as the way to mitigate the spread. That is a really difficult message to send during Thanksgiving week, but it’s the data. And as I’ve said many times, the virus sets the rules.
This trend makes the notion of an in-person Mayor and City Council budget retreat even more of an ill-considered decision. And one that runs contrary to the very things we’re asking of you. The Pima County health folks and the UA College of Public Health are predicting right about the time M&C want to do their in-person retreat, hospitals in the City will be at capacity. I’ll be joining the City department heads and doing that meeting virtually.
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We at the Ward 6 office wish you a safe and happy Thanksgiving. Maybe just stay in your small bubble, and Facetime loved ones - just for this year so we can get all of this behind us?
I share these links each week so you can do your own research.
Pima County Health Department portal: https://www.arcgis.com/apps/opsdashboard/index.html#/426baca70718453a9f63a4f85e545d8b
The national CDC site: https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/cases-updates/index.html
For the NY Times data sets, use this link:
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/04/23/upshot/five-ways-to-monitor-coronavirus-outbreak-us.html
You can find the Harvard data on this site: Harvard Global Health Institute Key Metrics
The State Department of Health site is at this link: www.azdhs.gov.
Track the advice on public schools through this link: https://www.azed.gov/communications/2020/03/10/guidance-to-schools-on-covid-19/ You can find all the dashboard information at the “School Reopening Public Health Benchmarks” spot.
Here’s the UA daily update link. www.covid.arizona.edu. When it opens, click ‘See Latest Updates,’ and it’ll take you to a screen with the updated data.
Sincerely,
Steve Kozachik Council Member, Ward 6 ward6@tucsonaz.gov
City of Tucson Resources
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