Plastic Blocks
The plastics pilot project is off and running. Thanks to Reyna Preciado from KGUN for stopping by the ward office and covering the story. Here’s a link to her piece.
Councilman Steve Kozachik is collecting unrecyclable plastic - KGUN 9
Stopping by the ward office is exactly what many of you have been doing throughout the past week. We now have our ‘starter kits’ - bags with 10 collection bags and information on the program. On Tuesday, August 2nd from 9:30 am until noon, we’ll be doing a drive-by Starter Kit distribution at the ward office. Early in COVID we did this with free masks. This one is more enjoyable – free kits to get you started in the plastic reuse program. Just drive over (3202 E. 1st) and we’ll have someone outside handing out the kits. You won’t even have to get out of your car.
You can also sign up to get periodic updates on how the project is working. Use this link to get to the webpage where the sign up is posted.
Webpage is live and can be accessed here.
Once you sign up, you’ll see this message. It also gives you an option to order more kits online. Ours are free at the ward office.
Recently ByFusion was highlighted in national media through CNN.com. Click this link and you can see their operation in action and hear the background on how this whole idea got started. You’ll see that our pilot is a part of cutting-edge stuff that only a handful of jurisdictions are currently doing. We don’t mind leading by example – and we love it that so many of you are on board.
https://www.cnn.com/videos/business/2022/07/26/recycle-plastic-waste-building-block-byfusion-orig.cnn-business
In the video, you see them building various structures with the blocks. I’ve shared this image before – it's the seat bench we built out in San Gabriel neighborhood. The seat is made from Anita Goodrich’s crushed glass (also spawned in the ward 6 garage) and the blocks are the one’s we’re now collecting plastic for. If you want to see the San Gabriel bench it’s in their pocket park located at Irving and Santa Barbara. When you go by, don’t worry about it looking kind of lonely in that location. We are working with Tucson Clean & Beautiful on a landscape design for the area. Planting is scheduled for this fall.
So, there are several ways you can join in with what we’re doing. Just use your own plastic garbage bags from home to start collecting your plastic waste. Or come by the ward 6 office and pick up some bags – any day as a walk in, or Tuesday morning during our drive-thru event, or go online and order bags through the project website.
Here’s the graphic showing what we can use. Many of you have written asking whether certain things can be used.
On Sunday, I did a little dumpster diving in our Plastics Only bin – I was removing Styrofoam someone had thrown in. NO STYROFOAM. It is not plastic and constitutes contamination in this process. It belongs in the trash.
Eviction Prevention Recognition
Last week, Ann and I attended a recognition ceremony for the dozens of workers who helped to push out over $64M in eviction prevention funds. Some of that was rent assistance, and some was for utilities. The lead agency in the program was the Community Investment Corporation (CIC.) We’re grateful to their Executive Director Danny Knee for helping to pull this off.
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CIC didn’t do the work flying solo. There were 11 other partner agencies who took on the huge task of keeping people in their homes throughout COVID. This graphic shows that wider group of agencies.
You don’t need to be told that our housing market is on fire. Rents are increasing such that even without the challenges COVID added, many people are hanging on by a thread when it comes to staying housed. COVID only added to the stress and challenge. It is with that background that CIC and the listed agencies should all be proud of their work. Here are the results of their combined efforts -
All of us here at the Ward 6 office are extremely grateful to all of the workers who had a hand in making this effort a success. It continues to show the heart of our community.
Tucson Wildlife Center
Lisa Bates and her wonderful staff and group of volunteers is in the busy time of year out at the Tucson Wildlife Center (TWC.) It’s baby season, and with monsoons hitting they’ve got a full house of critters being rehabilitated. They take in all sorts of animals, give them the TLC they need and return them to a natural habitat.
Examples? This little rabbit has barely opened his eyes. He’s fed and nurtured in their medical section.
 Right across the room from the tiny rabbit is this group of newborn swallows. They’re being fed until they’re strong enough to start integrating them with other birds – eventually for release back to the wild. The medical staff at TWC has formula that gets the nutrients the birds need in order to thrive.
How about this group – it shows the variety they deal with out at the Center:
The public brings in injured or abandoned critters and the TWC staff and volunteers take them under their collective wing and nurse them to a condition in which they can be released. Their goal is to release them back into the same habitat they arrived from.
My staff and I appreciate the wonderful work TWC does. This is also the group we have an agreement with to monitor our TFD controlled burns out at the Sweetwater wetlands. So, they’re true partners in support of our wildlife throughout the region.
This is the Tucson Wildlife Center website. https://tucsonwildlife.com/ All non-profits can use both financial and volunteer assistance. If you’re a critter-lover and have either of those to help with, please consider sharing in the work going on out at TWC.
Reid Park Master Plan
Several thousand responses have been incorporated into the ongoing process of reimagining Reid Park. This graphic shows a small portion of what staff has heard from the public.
Our parks people have put together an online site you can go to see who is responding to the Reid Park survey, and a more complete description of what we’re hearing. You can find the summary page at this link:
English Website: bit.ly/reidparkreimagined
Spanish Website: bit.ly/reidparkreimaginedSP
Sierra Boyer from our parks outreach staff is the contact person for getting more information on the outreach process. If you’d like to do a deeper dive into the survey than what you find on the site, contact Sierra at Sierra.Boyer@tucsonaz.gov.
Ready, Set, Rec
Time flies – and thanks to Sierra and her team for continuing the community outreach so we can be ready when the RSR van visits. Here’s the schedule for the month of August. The activities are geared to people of all ages, families or people visiting the van who are flying solo. We hope you have an opportunity to check the RSR van out – it’s outdoor activity with a touch of community built in.
More Parks/Recreation Opportunities
The fall, 2022 indoor leisure class schedule is out for you to browse through. Registration began over the weekend. Lots of these classes fill up pretty quickly, so if you think you’re going to want to get into one of them, registering early is important.
This fall the variety of classes has expanded. There are still the usual pottery and ceramics classes, but this time there are classes in yoga for seniors (Chair Yoga,) new dance fitness classes, team style dance classes, Pom – lots of new chances for people of all ages to get active according to your own ability.
Call Registration Services at 791.4877, or do your registering online through this link: EZEEreg.com. The deadline for registering for session one is Wednesday, Aug. 24.
Summer Safari at the Zoo
There are 2 more weekends left for Summer Safari nights at the zoo. In addition to the zoo activities, the Ready, Set, Rec vans will be there to add to the variety of what you can take part in.
On Saturday evening, August 6th the focus is on primates. The zoo staff will lead some climbing exercises – monkey's call it brachiating – where you’ll test your skills swinging and hanging like our animal world relatives. They’ll also have some rock climbing exercises – each Summer Safari night has a theme. This one’s my favorite.
They’ll close out Summer Safari nights on the 13th of August. The theme that night will be teaching the dynamics of animal social skills. The elephants have some relatively unique examples right now because of the ‘kids’ who are in with the adults. But social interaction is common among all species – and you’ll learn about it on the 13th.
For their swan song evening there will be a special book signing/reading by children’s author Teydon Rae, introducing the upcoming Broadway in Tucson “The Lion King” production, and activities spread throughout the facility.
Get tickets through the zoo website at https://reidparkzoo.org/.
Quick Shout Out to TPD
We literally get calls every day from residents asking about drug use and other low-level crimes that are taking place in public. The all-too-frequent complaint is the ‘the police don’t do anything.’ That’s not accurate.
By way of example – in the past 2+ weeks TPD has made over 50 arrests in the Armory Park area in an effort to get our arms around crime in the downtown region. I’ve had photos in recent newsletters of guys throwing rocks through windows, or setting a fire in a downtown building. Our office and TPD take those issues seriously. Our challenge is that when TPD arrives at the jail for booking, they’re taking up to 4 hours just for that intake – if they accept the person at all. That takes the officer off the street for about ½ of their shift just waiting on the jail process. And when we do get a case in front of a judge, far too often the cases are simply dismissed and/or the person is allowed right back on the street with little or no consequences.
We need all parts of the law enforcement/judicial system to work if we’re going to successfully address crime. Not everybody belongs in jail – everyone understands that. But I hear the frustration from TPD regularly – ‘we catch them and they’re back in the area before I’m done with my paperwork on the case.’ Thanks to our officers for hanging in there and continuing to work towards a safer community. We hope there’s progress in getting the other legs of the enforcement system to do their part.
Over the weekend TPD arrested a suspect in the Salpointe High School arson fire. The guy was observed allegedly attempting to stab a dog with some pruning shears. A resident is responsible for assisting police in the arrest. They have DNA evidence tying him to the Salpointe scene. We hope this isn’t another catch and release situation and that the whole system works in support of TPD’s efforts.
Refugees / Judge Ahmad and His Family
I’m grateful to Zayna Syed from the Arizona Republic for spending quite a bit of time following judge Ahmad’s story, and for her coverage. The Star reprinted it – in case you missed it, here’s the original piece:
https://www.azcentral.com/story/news/local/arizona/2022/07/28/afghan-judge-who-fled-taliban-tucson-reunited-family/10160002002/
The sad reality is that the conditions in Afghanistan continue to deteriorate. Last week, Amnesty International issued a few different reports on the situation. The very brief message is that under Taliban rule, women and girls are suffering all sorts of abuses. Nilofar and Kawsar – the judges family – are grateful and fortunate to have escaped what so many are being subjected to.
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One of the Amnesty International stories was titled “Afghanistan: Death in slow motion: Women and girls under Taliban rule.” It was offered on July 27th. The report outlines how in the approximately 1 year since the U.S. withdrew from Afghanistan, Taliban have taken control and have systematically imposed policies that eliminate the rights of women and girls in that country. They’ve eliminated the right of girls to attend school beyond grade 7, they’ve decimated any systems of protection for women fleeing domestic violence, they’ve detained, abused and tortured girls for violations of Taliban’s own discriminatory rules, and through starvation and atrocities the number of children, early and forced marriages is surging. Women who protest publicly have been arrested, forcibly disappeared, and/or tortured. That’s what our quick exit has left behind. You can use this link to read the full Amnesty International report: https://www.amnesty.org/en/documents/asa11/5685/2022/en/
I continue to receive emails and other contacts from people living in Afghanistan who are desparate to get out. One example came through last week from a former employee of the USAID program in Afghanistan. She’s now living in Maryland. She is in direct touch with many of her former colleagues who remain in Afghanistan. Her message to me last week was “As I understand the threats are becoming graver, deaths and violence are increasing, threat of forced marriage of girls is increasing, and the rate of suicide of young girls facing forced marriage is increasing. So, the situation is becoming graver and harsher each moment as we speak.”
Another example is this email I received from one of those former USAID colleagues. As I’ve done in the past, I’ll share it verbatim. He’s an Afghan still in Kabul trying to escape.
I thank you for your help and contact with us. I want to inform you that taliban's intelligence has started searching of torgeted people for killjng and punishing. They captured one of my uncle named Mohammed Shah and my cousin named Lalak in Kandahar last mount and still missing.
I want to inform you that after MSS/USAID I worked in Afghan government in mony high civil & millitary posts where I was very active against taliban and I was very famous on media .
So the danger is increasing more for me.
I wrote back and asked where he was in the process of getting a Special Immigrant Visa (SIV.) Short of paying a human smuggler, it’s about the only way out of the place. His answer is that there’s no process to engage – here' his response to me:
Dear Steve Kozachik,
Thank you for your email reply. I want to inform you that Taliban have closed passport issue process for Afghans. Some Afghan families went to Pakistan, Iran and turkey with smuglers on very dangrous ways where many of then lost there livies on the way.
Fortunatly Taliban have a deal with Qater government and have alllowed " Qater Airways " air line to evacuate Afghan famillies from Kabul airport which they get the list of passenger from US government the " State Deportment " that inclodes almost SIV programme people.
I see and get infomation from our freind that ever week Qater Airways evacuate 700 SIV case holders Afghans from Afghanistan to Qater. Even there were Afghans who's case had not aproved yet but the US Deportment of State gave there list in Qater flights and they were evacuated this month.
I sent the required informations and answered all questions to my case werker 70 days ago but I have not got the answer yet.
I hope you contacting the US Deportment of State if the US State Deportment sent my familly's list to Qater authority to evacuate us in Qater Airways flight from Kabul. It well save our livies from the wildest terrorist group of Taliban.
Thank you so much,
The problem is that nobody in State knows anything about ongoing evacuations to Qatar. Either it’s happening and State doesn’t want to confirm that with me, or my email friend is being lied to. Given the circumstances, I’m leaning into him being lied to. This is a guy who worked with a local non-governmental organization such that he is eligible for SIV status. I’ve forwarded over a dozen documents on this guy’s case to our state employees and to the IRC director. IRC will try to get the case to the right person. State does not even acknowledge receipt of the information.
This is from my contact in Maryland. She tells of how she met the guy who’s emailing with me.
I went to his project site undercover in a burqa. they shifted my location each night before sleeping so that people wouldn’t know my location and bomb me. i picked up a landmine red rock on side of the road. he is in a hard core area. what support could there be for him?
The guy has 13 family members who are moving nightly from location to location just trying to avoid contact with Taliban. When I sent out a request for advice on this only the state International Rescue Committee director responded. Nobody from State even acknowledged receipt of the documents.
So, it’s great to have Ahmad and his family together in Tucson. In the 8 months it has taken to secure her release and safety, Taliban has secured its hold on Afghanistan and untold numbers of people have been murdered. And our bureaucracy is stuck ‘following protocols’ while this goes on every day.
E-Scooter Parking Enforcement
One of the primary reasons I did not support the e-scooter program when it was implemented is random parking creating clutter and hazards throughout neighborhoods around 4th Avenue and downtown. We continue getting calls and emails from people sending us pictures of scooters left laying on sidewalks, obstructing ADA access ramps or just lying in the street. Our Park Tucson folks are close to putting a hopeful solution into place.
Soon you’ll see roughly 75 designated parking areas – marked with stickers that’ll look something like this. They will be scattered through the four major areas of the entertainment district; Main Gate, 4th Avenue, downtown and the west side. The hope is that people riding the scooters will use these spaces when they’re finished with their rides.
This map shows generally where you’ll find the parking areas. Park Tucson has a vendor now under contract and they’ll begin applying the stickers next week. Because Ironhorse neighborhood has been taking the brunt of the irresponsible ‘parking’, we’ll begin identifying parking spots there.
So, what about enforcement? Park Tucson is working with another vendor to establish a real-time fine process. Populous is a company that manages scooter programs in other cities. They’re working with our PT staff putting into place a process by which you’ll be able to send in a picture of a violation and Populous will be able to generate an immediate citation. The amount of the fine will be based on how far from a designated or appropriate parking area the scooter is ‘parked.’ And to be clear, parking will still be allowed in what are currently appropriate parking areas; in Right of Way, standing upright, not blocking sidewalks, etc.
We at the Ward 6 office are grateful to Donovan Durband for his hard work on getting the details of this parking program off the ground. We’ll see how it works. Hope springs eternal, right? And if you choose to ride a scooter, the rules of the road are the same; stay off the sidewalk, one person per scooter, wear a helmet, and follow all rules of the road.
One Water 2100 Town Hall
One Water 2100 is our long-range planning for the regions water future. Tucson Water is hosting a series of outreach meetings to gather your input in this master planning process. The next one is coming on Tuesday, August 16th at the TCC. This will be indoors so please mask up during the event.
One Water is the entirely accurate notion that all sources of water need to be considered when planning our water future. We don’t know what’s going to happen with our allocations from the Colorado River – but we do know they won’t be as reliable as they have been up until now. That means a solid focus on our groundwater, reclaimed water, stormwater – all sources have to be integrated into an overall approach to water security.
The event will be held in the Copper Room at the TCC. Please use parking area B when you arrive (near Granada and Cushing Street.) The event will run from 4pm until 6pm. Register in advance using this link:
https://TucsonOneWaterCommunityTownHall.eventbrite.com
You need to register prior to the end of the work day on Friday, August 12th.
If you’d like to study up on One Water ahead of the meeting you can use this link as a resource.
TucsonOneWater.com
If you follow this newsletter, you know that for me water security is the #1 issue we face as a region. I hope you can carve out time to review the One Water material, and if possible, take part in the planning event on the 16th.
Thank You to Mister Car Wash and Southwest Gas Foundation
On a water-related note, trees need water. Tucson needs trees. Last week our friends at Mister Car Wash donated $100,000 towards the million-tree initiative, and Southwest Gas Foundation came in with another $50,000. That’s going to plant a lot of trees in areas of the city that have low canopy coverage right now. Mister Car Wash was one of the first to preserve an historic building over on 5th Street. They’re using it as their corporate headquarters. They showed their community connection then, and have added to that with this donation. And Southwest Gas has a foundation that regularly finds areas of need in the community to which they contribute. We appreciate both of these generous donations.
Our friends at Sustainable Tucson have data on city-wide tree canopy coverage. Blenman Elm is midtown. They’re not particularly overgrown with trees, but they have 18% shade canopy, whereas Las Ranchitos neighborhood on South Country Club and the Benson Highway is only 5% covered. The dollars committed by Mister Car Wash and SWG are earmarked for low-income/low-canopy neighborhoods.
You can learn more about the entire climate action work being done throughout Tucson at this link:
https://climateaction.tucsonaz.gov/
Brush and Bulky
Twice each year the city Environmental Services team comes through neighborhoods and does our Brush and Bulky program. You can go online at https://www.tucsonaz.gov/es/brush-and-bulky to find the date for your next visit.
The program allows up to 10 cubic yards of your stuff to be placed where your neighborhood trash is collected. You are not to place it in the street, and you are not to place it out more than 2 weeks before the scheduled B&B for your area.
A washing machine is about 1 cubic yard. Think of 10 of them lined up in the Right of Way – out of the street – and 3’ from any potential obstacle that would make it difficult for the B&B team to pick it up. This mess is sitting in the street, and it was placed out over a month before B&B for this area. The homeowner will be cited by our Code Enforcement staff. Brush and Bulky is one of our most popular programs, and it does not give people the right to create this sort of mess in their neighborhood a month ahead of time.
 Here’s a list of the kinds of things you can set out for B&B:
Anything exceeding the size limits will be left behind. And please do not place construction waste, electronics, glass/mirrors, gas or air cylinders or rocks and dirt out for B&B. The crew will not take that as a part of the program.
You can also call E.S. for a special pick up if you have to off-load material outside of your regular B&B schedule. Call them at 791.3171 to schedule that pick up. If you follow the normal B&B size restriction the cost for the special pick up is $55. We at the Ward 6 office are grateful to all of the Environmental Services workers who provide these services to the community.
COVID
Fewer than ½ of all Americans have received a COVID booster. And less than 1/3 of eligible adults have made the effort to get their 2nd booster. That includes people who are immunocompromised, or who are over 50 years of age. With those numbers it’s not surprising that COVID continues to spread. Hospital rooms are filling, ICU use is increasing and fatalities continue to go up. In the U.S. we’re averaging over 400 deaths per day due to COVID. Based on the media coverage this gets, who’d know?
The CDC defines ‘fully vaccinated’ as having received the first 2 doses of COVID vaccine. It does not count boosters. Even with that you can see roughly 2/3 of Americans have gotten 2 shots, and fewer than that have in Arizona. These graphs compare the nationwide totals to those for Arizona. As has been true of the past couple of months, it’s all going in the wrong direction.
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The CDC advice continues to be to mask-up – and not just when you’re indoors. The BA.5 variant is so contagious that the recommendation is to wear a good quality mask whenever you’re in a public place. It was reported to me that last week an in-home health care provider was making her rounds in the homes of vulnerable clients and was not wearing a mask. At least one of the clients was down with COVID two days after her visit. The worker spent the week out sick herself. Do you remember people dying in nursing homes early in COVID as a result of the virus being brought in from the outside? That’s what happened here – over 2 years into the pandemic. That level of irresponsibility is breath taking.
Early in the pandemic you might remember trying to find good quality N95 masks was difficult. Now there are so many styles of masks being sold that you need to be careful that what you’re buying is NIOSH approved. The National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health is a division of the CDC. You can easily go online to see what they’re saying about masking up. Use this link for their recommendations: https://www.cdc.gov/niosh/npptl/topics/respirators/disp_part/n95list1.html
It’s also prudent to keep a supply of rapid tests at home. I know we’ve used ours several times. It’s the only way to be sure you’re not infected and out and about possibly infecting others. When COVID began we were all so careful about contact tracing and isolating if we were in contact with others who had tested positive. Now many are letting their guard down – and the virus is spreading. You can use this link to get your free tests You’re allowed to order up to 16 free tests. They come 8 at a time.
This link is from our partners at Pima County health. It gives easy to follow instructions on how to give a self test: https://webcms.pima.gov/cms/One.aspx?portalId=169&pageId=787398
Pima County health is also giving away self-test kits. Here are this week’s locations:
Our Pima County case counts increased significantly last week. And while those for the state overall remained high last week, the number of fatalities jumped to 70 lost friends and loved ones. In Pima County we’re at the highest case level since well before this new surge began in May. Here’s the chart I’ve been keeping – updated to include last week’s numbers.
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Week of
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Pima County
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Arizona
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April 24th
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260 new cases
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2,350 new cases
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May 1st
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510 new cases
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3,911 new cases
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May 8th
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776 new cases
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5,404 new cases
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May 15th
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1,090 new cases
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7,204 new cases
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May 22nd
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1,692 new cases
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11,498 new cases
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May 29th
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1,985 new cases
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13,042 new cases
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June 5th
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2,200 new cases
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14,677 new cases
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June 12th
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2,451 new cases
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16,334 new cases
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June 19th
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2,559 new cases
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15,373 new cases
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June 26th
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2,263 new cases
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16,514 new cases
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July 3rd
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2,210 new cases
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20,198 new cases
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July 10th
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1,880 new cases
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15,280 new cases
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July 17th
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2,251 new cases
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18,135 new cases
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July 24th
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2,764 new cases
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17,249 new cases
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Here’s our state map dating back to the start of this in 2020. Think for a second where you were and how your life has changed since I first showed this map. I remember that we had 42 cases in Pima County and that it was going to be like ‘a bad flu season.’
Here are this week’s Pima County Health vaccine centers.
The Harvard Global Health Care risk level map shows continuing spreading of the virus in all parts of the country during the past week. The map is likely showing the effects of millions of us having resumed normal activities, ignoring masking and other CDC guidelines while the most easily transmissible variant we’ve dealt with is making its rounds.
Arizona is once again completely in the high risk for transmission category. And in Pima County our case counts escalated again, pushing us further into that risk level. Last week we were at 30 new daily cases per 100,000 and 321 on a 7-day average. Both of those jumped significantly last week. It has been a long time since we saw our daily new case level exceed 400 – we're getting close.
The NY Times posted some recommendations on how to avoid getting the new BA.5 Omicron variant. They’re not difficult to comply with – and doing so might save someone sometime in the hospital.
Sincerely,
Steve Kozachik
Council Member, Ward 6
ward6@tucsonaz.gov
City of Tucson Resources
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