A Message from Steve K...04/10/2023

Last week the entire region lost a valued and loved community public servant. Barbara Escobar was the head of the county Department of Environmental Quality. She passed away last week at the very young age of 58. Prior to being promoted to Department Head, Barbara worked in the County Wastewater department. County Administrator Jan Lesher was right in calling Barbara’s passing “a great loss for our County.”

We’re in the midst of putting a final budget together for fiscal year ‘24. That runs from July 1st of this year through June 30th of next year. My team and I at the ward 6 office would like your thoughts on how we should prioritize the allocation of our limited dollars. Please take a few minutes and answer this survey tool. There’s one question – how would you divide up an imaginary $100 between our various responsibilities. If you feel there are areas we need to focus on that aren’t listed we’ve given you the chance to specify those. You’ll see that I did not include road repair. That’s not a miss on my part – I intentionally left that off the list because of the roughly $60M annually we’ve already got committed to road repair through Prop 411. And there’s another $15M annually already going towards our complete streets amenities through 411.  

We’ll keep this survey open until May 3rd. Thanks very much for participating.

Here are the rules and benefits from taking part in the survey. 

• The survey and incentive drawing closes on 5.3.2023 at 11:59 pm. 
•  Entry is free and optional. Those who want to enter for an opportunity to participate must provide contact information. 
• Two winners will be randomly selected; each will win a $100 gift card to Tucson Originals. 
• The likelihood of winning is based on the number of respondents who opted to participate in the drawing. 
•  One entry per person. 
• Winners will be notified within 10 business days by a member of the Ward 6 staff. 
• Each winner must provide proof of identification to receive their Tucson Originals gift card. 

Click on link for survey - tinyurl.com/ward6survey.  

Each year high school students from across the state compete for scholarships and recognition in the BGC Youth of the Year event. This year two Tucson ladies were honored. The competition involves each entrant submitting 3 different essays on a variety of topics. They’re also judged based on their academics and their community involvement. There are 40 judges involved so this is a tough process they go through to get this recognition. 

Shown on the left in this photo is Camilla. She won the Military Youth of the Year award. Camilla and her family are living on DM AFB. Camilla is still deciding on where her next academic step will take her. She’ll be receiving scholarship assistance at whichever college or university she selects. 

Shown on the right in the photo is Hakima. She’s from Somalia and she’s now living in Tucson along with her family. Hakima is headed for Howard University next year, and this BGC award comes with scholarship funding that’ll help her get started.  

Last week President Biden said he’s proud of the evacuation from Afghanistan and how it was conducted. He concedes that in any high-risk effort like that there’ll be ways it could be improved upon – but he’s standing by the manner in which we left Kabul. 

On Good Friday I was in the office responding to some emails. One was from the guy I’ve written about in the past who was a helicopter pilot who flew ‘shoulder by shoulder’ with U.S. military fighting Taliban. His sons are both injured and hospitalized in Kazakhstan. Despite the medical emergency, our congressional delegation and embassy/state people can’t seem to find a way to allow him to fly ‘home’ to assist. We have offered to fund every penny of the flight. Here’s the email I received Friday from Nazar: 

Hello dear brother, Mr. Steph Kazuchak, I hope you are well with all your respected family, I thank you all the world for all the help and support you have given me, I wanted to inform you, with great distress from Tucson to California I am leaving, my heart is with you, I am very sorry for my children in Kazakhstan, I have to leave Tucson, I will always be in touch with you. 

Best regards 

Nazar cannot afford to pay his bills in Tucson. I suspect that will be true in California as well. He’s one of the Afghan evacuees who is lost in our broken immigration/asylum system, speaks little English and cannot fathom why the same government that brought him here is refusing to help him leave to help his family. He’s a prisoner on the streets who is desperate, running out of money and provisions, and I know he’s also running out of hope. 

Then there’s this lady – she's still in Afghanistan trying to get out before she’s murdered by Taliban.  

Would you rather be in Nazar’s situation – stuck here trying to get back home to help his family, or in this woman’s situation – stuck there trying to get out to save her life? It’s who we hear from weekly here in the ward 6 office. And for those who have made it out your donations are necessary and appreciated. 

Thanks to all of you who came by last week in support of Gregory School student Macy Head’s Bar Mitzvah project. He was in the office over the weekend packaging up the donations that will be distributed to local homeless people. We were happy to be a part of his work. 

With the end of Title 42 coming, the local Casa Alitas Shelter is certainly going to be overrun with new guests. That means we need the new underclothes, socks, light jackets, lotions, sunscreen, shampoo, etc – the stuff you’ve been graciously helping with since we started doing this down at the Greyhound Depot 8 years ago. The needs continue to grow. We’re grateful for your generosity and your willingness to stick with it.  

Throughout the entire time we’ve been working with you in this collection effort not a single significant policy change has been made in D.C. that has changed the trajectory of the immigration/asylum problem. We appreciate the assistance you give to people you’ll never see or know, but who you can rest assured are grateful for the help. 

A couple of weeks ago there was another school shooting – this one in Nashville, Tennessee. There were 3 kids, each 9 years old and 3 adults, each about 60 years old killed in the shooting. Frustration mounts with each of these new incidents. There will be more. And that frustration will continue to grow. 

In Nashville, 3 members of their state legislature expressed their frustration by joining some youth who were up in the gallery calling (literally) for strong gun control measures. This is a picture of one of the legislators who was leading chants with a megaphone while holding up a gun control sign. The lady to his right is one of the other legislators who was involved with leading the protest. 

Last Thursday, instead of voting to make it more difficult to buy a gun, the Tennessee state legislature voted to expel two of the three members who took part in the protest. The lady you see in the photo was spared from expulsion by a single vote. Two young black guys were ousted by the Tennessee legislature. You can draw your own conclusions. 

Reality check; yes, they disrupted the proceedings on the house floor. Members of the Tennessee legislature compared it to the January 6th incursion into the capitol. That’s beyond thoughtful. The house rule they violated in Nashville was speaking out of turn – that's decorum, not smashing doors and windows and trampling capitol police. Compare these images: 

 Nashville: 

Sunday, April 16th is National Health Care Decisions Day. The purpose is to help raise awareness about the importance of advanced directives. The Arizona End-of-Life Care Partnership will be hosting events all month as educational forums in which people can learn their options for advanced care planning. The End of Life Care Partnership comes under the umbrella of United Way agencies. Some of the forums will be in person, and some are virtual. Please use this link to find an event that you can take part in. And take some loved ones along – all of us need these documents in place, regardless of our age. 

Events | Advanced Care Planning and Resources - Arizona End of Life Care Partnership (azendoflifecare.org) 

Two of the panelists will be Rocky Baier, co-founder of Tucson’s Repair Café. I regularly write about their events. And Ali Soland is a member of Youth for Blue Skies. Ali will speak about the Ironwood Tree Experience program. Sustainable Tucson is working on including more panelists. 

The event is virtual – use this link to sign in on Tuesday, April 11th at 6pm: https://sustainabletucson.org/  

Our entire public safety team is hosting a public open house on the afternoon of Sunday, April 23rd. The event will run from 1pm until 4pm out at the public safety training center. That’s located at 10001 S. Wilmot. It’s a drive, but if you haven’t seen the training facility, you’ll find it worth the commute. 

The presenters will include 911, police and fire. The purpose of the event is to familiarize the public with what each agency is responsible for. It’s being billed as a recruiting event so anybody who is considering a career in any of the public safety fields is highly encouraged to stop by and ask any questions you’ve got. 

We get questions about our staffing levels in each agency. This event is a chance for any of you who are, or who know people interested in a public safety career to be a part of our filling open slots. 

In an effort to get the public’s impression of the transit system, the city is conducting a COA. It’s a route-by-route analysis of the services being provided in our transit network throughout the entire region. Included are Sun Tran, Sunlink, Sun Shuttle and Sun Express.  

There is a survey that you can find at this link: https://www.tucsoncoa.com/.Go to the “Share your thoughts” tab and take a few minutes to give our transportation folks your thoughts. If the system is going to be improved, input from the users or potential users is important. The deadline for taking part is Sunday, April 16th.  

On a related note, it’s widely known that we’re talking about whether or not to continue free fares on our transit system. I think the votes are already there to approve that at some point.  It’s also widely known that the UA, Pima College, TUSD and major employers all benefit from ridership. The loss of farebox revenue under our free fare system is roughly $9M to the city. Those dollars need to come from someplace. We are in conversations with each of the groups I’ve listed above to get them to step up and help fund a portion of the lost revenue. That’s only fair. They benefit – they can help support. That’s not unprecedented in other jurisdictions. At the last M&C meeting I proposed that we also consider an approach that keeps fares free, but also helps our budget in ways other than directly funding transit.  

We already fund our homeless work program. It’s a program we run that puts some of our unhoused population to work during the day – helping them earn some wages, gain dignity in the process and connect with city resources. 

A part of the funding for that comes from faux parking meters we have scattered throughout the downtown area and along 4th Ave. My proposal is to place a faux farebox on each transit vehicle – bus, streetcar, sun van... - and allow people to voluntarily support the homeless work program by putting money into whatever ‘meter’ we end up installing. The more we gather the more people we can include in the work program. And we can reduce some of the impact on the general fund.  

I'm hopeful the schools and employers will do their part in funding transit. I’m also hopeful we can come together with a creative way to help the budget while giving people an opportunity to voluntarily make a positive impact on the citywide homeless challenge we are all facing together. 

Those pictures show plastic collection bins that are in place in the Loft Cinemas’ entry areas. We’re grateful to Peg Johnson and the Loft team for getting so deeply involved with the program. Become a Loft member – and toss your plastic waste into one of these bins on your way out of the theater. 

I had a very promising meeting with the owner of 2 Ace Hardware stores last week. He loves the plastic collection program we’re running and will be taking samples of the block to his next owners meeting. He’ll be making a pitch that we do a pilot event at one of his stores to test community interest in getting ahold of some blocks for their own small residential-scale projects. I know the community is interested. Just as was the case with our own pilot though, we’ll need to demonstrate it to the wider set of Ace owners – which is understandable and is something my team is totally willing to take on. We’re not done with the service agreement with ByFusion quite yet so taking these small steps fits with our broader goal of rolling out a region-wide program. 

Last week both of the other 2 drop off locations filled their bins for the first time. At the ward 6 office we’re having ours emptied 6 times per week. That could probably be a 7x activity but our E.S. staffers deserve at least one day of downtime. Last week’s total collected at all 3 locations was 3.86 tons. That brings the program up to 72.88 tons collected since last August. As noted above, we continue to get more partners every week. All of us at ward 6 and the ByFusion team in L.A. continue to be grateful for your support of what we’re trying to put together. Without your involvement it wouldn’t have happened.  

Reminder – the ward 6 office is no longer the only drop off location. Here are your options: 

There are an estimated 50 million medical devices every day that are sterilized by using Ethylene Oxide. That includes PPE, syringes, tracheotomy tubes – all things medical. Nobody questions the need to be sure they’re sterilized before put to use. The question is how that process is done. 

In 2016 the EPA completed their own review of EO. They concluded that it is 60x (sixty times) more toxic than they had previously estimated. The agency did a community risk assessment and now estimate that elevated cancer risks that exist in communities with chemical plants could drop by as much as 96% if their new proposed rules go into effect. Their own study demonstrated that EO is the ‘biggest driver of the remaining risk.” 

Good for the EPA for finally addressing the use of this chemical. And good for Becton Dickinson for hearing us and changing their plans and stepping away from using EO at the planned Tucson facility. 

Topic: TEP Franchise Agreement 

Meeting ID: 813 3362 3339

Passcode: W@rd6 

The current agreement expires in 2026. The vote on May 16th will be to answer the question whether we should extend it for another 25 years. The agreement that’s on the ballot includes a slight increase in rate that will be largely earmarked for undergrounding utilities, with a smaller portion going to other climate initiatives. The impetus for holding the election this May was so TEP can begin to put together some funds to pay for undergrounding on our scenic and gateway corridors. 

I can’t take a pro or con position on the FA in the newsletter. Come on the 11th and bring your questions. You’ll start to see early ballots in the mail around April 18th.  

Boards, Committees and Commissions 

I know several of the TRRGers and others have been watching the study session item I’ve got coming for BCC’s and quorums. It was scheduled for last Tuesday but we had to bump it because we were running so behind. It’s coming – not forgotten. 

For those not familiar with the item, I’ve asked that we consider changing how we consider whether or not a BCC has a quorum at a given meeting. Right now, the rule is a majority of the number of members who ‘could be’ appointed. For a variety of reasons many of the BCC’s don’t have their full complement of members. I’m asking that we change the rule so a majority of those who have been appointed is all that’s needed to form a quorum. 

A few examples – Environmental Services Advisory Committee can have 13 members. There are only 8 appointed. That means if they have 2 absences at a given meeting, they cannot meet their quorum of 7. It’s worse for the Pedestrian Advisory Committee. They can have 13 but only have 6 appointed. That means they’re prevented from meeting even if all 6 of the appointees are ready and willing. Many other BCC’s are in similar positions. 

We have two BCC’s that are quasi-judicial. The Planning Commission and the Board of Adjustments both have their own rules for both quorum requirements and the number of votes it takes for an item to pass. The Civil Service Commission also has unique rules. None of those will be covered by the change if M&C do adopt the change I’m asking for. I expect the item to be on an upcoming April agenda. 

For over a year the M&C have been asking a series of questions – some about procedural issues in the RTA and some related to budgets and funding for RTA projects. Until recently it has felt as though Tucson was the only one of the 9 member jurisdictions that had these questions. It got to the point where we said we’d opt out of participating in an RTA Next if we didn’t get some relief. We got enough to at least keep us at the table. More is needed. 

Last week both the City Manager and the County Administrator jointly penned a letter to the RTA Director. The letter spelled out many of the questions we’ve been asking. It was great to see Jan Lesher’s name on the letter. Tucson and Pima County are the big players on the RTA. With both of our collective voices now asking these same questions, in a formal and written manner the Director can no longer ignore them. 

They’ve also asked to see a breakdown of the total amount of funding in the transit category needed to maintain the currently RTA-funded transit services through the horizon of RTA Next and how much would be available for new service improvements. The RTA funds weekend, evening and non-city routes. A full picture of what’s being planned for the transit category is a regionally important bit of information. And the Ortega/Lesher letter asked for specific information on regional pavement maintenance needs and costs. Ahead of our vote earlier in the year to stay at the table members of the RTA indicated they’d be willing to dedicate money from RTA Next to maintain roads built using RTA money. We all need to see what the obligations are in order to gauge whether or not what goes onto the ballot makes sense. 

Right now, I’m a skeptic about whether RTA Next can do any better funding all of what they’re talking about than the current RTA has done. And what’s being discussed for the Next ballot measure includes more obligations – pavement preservation and about $230M in deferred projects. So, I’ll be watching closely at the responses the Director comes back with. The city has options other than signing onto another 20 years with the RTA.  

Congratulations to parks director Lara Hamwey and her team for successfully adding roughly 80 lifeguards above what we had on staff last year at this time. They’ve gone from 88 to 169, which means more pools will be open during the summer.  

The goal is to reach 250 lifeguards so we can open the maximum number of public pools. In order to make the goal parks is hosting a recruitment party. It’ll be held on Friday, April 14th from 5pm until 8pm at the bandshell in Reid Park. There will be raffle prizes, family-friendly games, food and a bunch more. If you are interested or know a young person who’d like to be trained as a lifeguard and get some summer employment, please stop by this event.