A Message from Steve K...01/16/2024

• UA/Board of Regents 

• Plastics

• Sex Trafficking Forum 

• Pima Council on Aging (PCOA) and Memory Care 

• RTA 

• TEP Midtown Reliability Project 

• 5th/6th Street Lighting 

• Electric Landscape Equipment 

• 2024 Health and Fitness Resolutions? 

• Visit Tucson Survey 

• Capstone Project 

Ortega Moving On 

Mike and his wife Pat began work as city manager in Tucson back in 2015. I phrase it that way because all of us in public service rely on the support and understanding at our home front. We do these jobs as teams – they take time, effort, and can be exhausting and frustrating. And they can bring a lot of satisfaction when we achieve good policy results. Mike and his family plan on staying local, staying connected with the community and most importantly regaining some of the family connections that sometimes take a back seat when these positions take us late into the evening or onto weekends.  

One of Mike’s Honey-Do chores is to finish restoring this ‘66 Impala for Pat. He’s about a year behind – she's waiting patiently with keys in hand. 

We’ll see Mike and his family around at his grandkids’ soccer matches, community events and him riding shotgun with Pat in her new Chevy. All of us at the ward 6 office are grateful to Mike for his hard work and dedication to the city, our workers and most importantly to the citizens of Tucson and the entire Pima County region.  

Here’s a report Eric Fink and KVOA ran on Friday evening. Both Paul and I share thoughts on Mike. Mine will serve as a lead into the section on the UA.

https://www.kvoa.com/video/tucson-city-manager-michael-ortega-set-to-step-down-later-this-year/video_8992c216-8317-5065-9e33-8c0f405541c5.html  

Bernard Siquieros 

Above I linked the story about Mike Ortega’s resignation. At the city council we understand that word means he will be leaving. I mentioned ‘integrity’ in my comments to Eric Fink. Mike has it. The jury is out when it comes to who’s lacking it in the midst of the UA/ABOR financial mess. 

On Sunday the Star had two relevant pieces. One was written by executive editor David McCumber. It walks through the credibility questions and includes this thought: “It must be decided if the UA can move forward with Robbins at the helm.” I had an op/ed in the Star last week that concluded the answer to that is that he needs to be dismissed. I’ve got that linked below. Here’s the Sunday piece from the Star editorial staff:

https://tucson.com/opinion/editorial/arizona-daily-star-editorial-u-of-as-fiscal-hall-of-mirrors/article_a4ff4500-b16a-11ee-8cd7-b350b84fda6e.html 

Also on Sunday Tim Steller had a good column that drew the apt comparisons between how the UA mishandled the tragic shooting of Hydrology professor Tom Meixner and how they’ve mishandled the current fiscal crisis. At the core of both incidents was prior knowledge and misrepresenting the eventual response. Tim suggests an outside audit of the finances is needed. If they do that it needs to include a deep dive into who’s making money on the Global Campus mess, the background on the gift to intercollegiate athletics, an audit of how the UA’s COVID money was actually spent, a review of the salary scale at the Robbins inner circle level and terms and conditions of those contracts that appear to make them inviolate. I’m sure most of you saw over the weekend that the Robbins/Heeke team were prepared to give the football coach a 5 year, $5.1M annual contract extension. They were outbid by The University of Washington. But it begs the question as to institutional priorities and the optics of making that kind of an offer while the rest of campus is under hiring and pay freezes. Robbins/Heeke will likely say much of the coach’s salary is paid by donors. The response is simple; money spent in one area is no longer available to be spent in another. Even floating the offer while the rest of campus is under a hiring and pay freeze makes it abundantly clear that there are at least two sets of rules on campus.  

Included in the Steller piece was a comment by the chair of the UA faculty senate. She is quoted as saying the core of the current problem is a “culture of privilege, immunity and failed system of accountability.” Privilege is demonstrated in the Robbins/Duval personnel caste system in which some are retained at high 6 figure salaries and faculty/staff/TA’s/students are held responsible for fixing the financial mess. That’s a caste system in which the latter group is treated as Shudras – manual laborers at the bottom of the system. Those retained have probably signed Non-Disclosure Agreements, so don’t expect a ton of light coming from within his inner circle. Immunity and the failed system of accountability is demonstrated by the inaction in holding the right people accountable for either of the messes. This will take more than the comments by faculty leadership – that's just words. It all smacks of a system in which those at the top are ‘too big to fail’ while those in the classrooms are tasked with carrying the load of remedying the problem. Here’s a link to Tim’s column from the Sunday Star:

https://tucson.com/news/local/subscriber/columnist-tim-steller-university-arizona-accountability-crises/article_e40610c8-b0b4-11ee-a6bd-77f2eded354f.html#tracking-source=home-the-latest  

One bit of maybe positive news. This is a quote from the op/ed I wrote for the Tucson Sentinel:  

And the current public relations mess happening over the dismantling of the historic Soleri Chapel makes the public relations component to this whole mess even more of a factor for ABOR and Arnold to keep in mind. While Robbins' spokesperson says they're "documenting" what's in the chapel, in layman's terms it simply means they're taking pictures of what they're taking apart so people can go to archives and see what used to be there.   

Late last week the UA announced that it’s ‘pausing’ the Soleri project. The reason is the significant amount of public input they’ve gotten to actually preserve what’s there and not just ‘document’ it photographically.  

And here’s an op/ed I wrote that the Star was kind enough to print last week – my point tags with what I said about Ortega – integrity matters. 

https://tucson.com/opinion/column/local-opinion-after-u-of-a-crisis-deception-robbins-must-go/article_58ce98f4-aff6-11ee-be70-2743b56560be.html  

If there was any doubt about what Robbins meant by ‘resignation’ it was made abundantly clear when he followed up his statement with an email to UA faculty and staff. Here’s an excerpt: 

I want to thank Lisa for her exceptional professionalism and dedication during many years of service to the University. She has been part of the leadership team that shepherded our institution through the pandemic while also enabling important mission-centric advancements through our strategic plan, and I wish her well. 

Here’s a link to the full email: https://president.arizona.edu/news/leadership-update  

In my op/ed I raised the question as to whether or not ABOR was complicit in the apparent misdirection contained in Robbins’ statement to the Board. The day after it was made public that the ‘resignation’ was really a reassignment (evidently Robbins was actually wishing her well in her new office across the hall?) ABOR chair Duval issued this statement. It’s a word salad but I bolded the one part in which he cites the Moody’s statement about the UA bond rating – it's the same quote I used in my op/ed, but in mine I went onto note that Moody’s based the rating on the full set of ‘facts’ they were provided, not just the one’s Duval cites. The one salient piece missing from Duval’s list is of course the resignation. 

Greetings,  

Our public universities are complex and extraordinary institutions and resources for our state. With continual increases in enrollment, cutting-edge research, and endowments reaching unprecedented heights, we strive to fulfill our commitment to Arizona, ensuring that all residents reap the advantages of our public universities. Now, more than ever, additional financial monitoring is important to safeguard their long-term fiscal health. This holds true not only for the University of Arizona, where we are actively addressing current fiscal challenges, but also for Arizona State University and Northern Arizona University.  

Recently, the Arizona Board of Regents implemented new measures to fortify existing financial management requirements and monitoring for the state’s public universities. Enhanced financial oversight protocols include centralizing budgets and information technology management, implementing controls to prevent overspending, mandating board approval for cash reserve expenditures and ensuring additional transparency in budget communications. A novel peer review process featuring teams comprised of university and board staff, has been established to evaluate each university's financial planning and analysis, culminating in a written report to the board. (Find the ABOR University Financial Oversight Enhancements and Expectations report here.)  

In addition, ABOR Executive Director John Arnold assumed the role of interim chief financial officer at UArizona. Leveraging his vast budget expertise gained from previous roles as Arizona’s state budget director and the board’s chief financial officer,  Arnold will be instrumental in supporting UArizona President Robert Robbins to implement a turnaround plan for the university. Already, Moody’s Investors Service deemed the board’s “rapid and disciplined response” as credit positive, indicating a vote of confidence that we are on the right track. Read more here.  

This challenge didn’t emerge overnight, and its resolution will similarly require time. Nonetheless, by taking these measures, we contribute to UArizona’s longstanding resilience and the enduring fiscal well-being of all three universities.  

As esteemed business and community leaders in Arizona, I deeply appreciate your sustained support of public higher education and our exceptional universities. I welcome any questions or feedback you have and look forward to the year ahead as we persist in advancing education for all. 

Sincerely, 

Fred DuVal 

Chair 

Arizona Board of Regents 

In the last column you can see the NSF notes 31% of the funds for research came from within the UA’s own coffers. Ranking 20 out of 30 isn’t bad, but having to dip into your own reserves to get there is one reason faculty and staff on campus are questioning the financial management and investment priorities of this administration. Is that really an ‘unprecedented’ success or is that more wordsmithing by the UA and ABOR?  When you drain funds from the institution it leaves less for on-campus priorities that faculty and staff have been asking for – like paying teaching assistants a salary sufficient to keep them off food stamps. And evidently the ABOR chair agrees with the direction Robbins’ team has been headed.  

In the Sentinel piece I also mentioned the Robbins comment about merging on-campus/athletics department fund raising efforts and UA Foundation development work. A very little research would inform him that the idea isn’t novel. It blew up in the face of the then UA administration when in the ‘90’s it was discussed until it was clear that people would be giving up their state pension clock. And later when it was discussed significant donors at the Stevie Eller Dance studio shot it down. The real issue – as Robbins himself has conceded - is simply outspending your revenues.  

There remains the question of accountability. Not only for the decisions made that got the UA to its current mess, but also within the current system, who is accountable to whom for those decisions. One example is that within the athletics department when the FBI was investigating multiple charges the fact that the NCAA compliance officer within that department is a direct report to the athletics director put the compliance guy in a clearly conflicted position.  ESPN called last week to talk about this whole situation. When their story comes out, I’ll be sure to share the link with you. 

We know Robbins is accountable – at the very least – to ABOR. Who is ABOR accountable to? They’re political appointees. But everybody should be accountable to the public. If you’d like to share your thoughts with the Board of Regents, you can do so by using this link: 

https://www.azregents.edu/contact-us  

Based on the tenor of the Duval letter I’ve cited above there’s no promise your concerns will be taken seriously. But they need to hear from the public, faculty, staff, students and donors. What they do with the input is their call. 

Last week the community brought in nearly 7 tons of plastic for the ByFusion plastics program. That’s the most we’ve collected in a week since starting the pilot back in August of ‘22. We at the ward 6 office thank you for the great support the program continues to generate. Each week I get inquiries from businesses about becoming a drop off site. We want their participation but until ByFusion is up and running locally we’re not going to be able to expand the drop locations. When they’re here there will be a variety of options put into place – we've got all we can handle with the success of the present program. 

The whole issue of plastics is catching on. People are more and more understanding what an environmental mess we’ve created. Coming on January 26th the Tucson Botanical Gardens will host the opening of an exhibit called Washed Ashore. It will be a series of art sculptures replicating various sea critters, all made from plastic debris that was collected from beaches along the Pacific Northwest. Washed Ashore: Art to Save the Sea is a non-profit that has gathered over 35 tons of plastic from beaches and turned them into over 85 art pieces. Botanical Gardens will have several of them on display starting on the 26th.  

This is an exhibit that has been shown in the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History in D.C. Congratulations to TBG for hosting. The exhibit will be up through June 30th. To learn more about the exhibit and get tickets please reach out to the Gardens at https://tucsonbotanical.org/ or call them at 520.326.9686. You’ll see a couple of raised planter beds made from our blocks at the end of the Washed Ashore exhibit. 

Also this reminder of the local group who’s out collecting glass curbside and getting it into our recycle program. I’ve shared about Tucson Curb Cycle in previous newsletters, but given the possible confusion around our glass recycle program I’m offering this reminder. 

In ‘21 we stopped taking glass in our blue bins. The 20 collection sites we have scattered around the city are helping to keep glass out of the landfill, but it’s not yet what we were gathering and sending to Republic Services through the blue bins. To help increase the recycle amount Tucson Curb Cycle offers a subscription curbside program. Their goal – make it as easy for people as possible to keep their glass out of the waste stream. 

This program is open to residents, bars, restaurants – if you’ve got glass, you want recycled then you should consider this program as an alternative to the city collection sites. We of course still want your glass, but if convenience is the issue then you might consider Tucson Curb Cycle. 

If you’d like to get more information on how to sign up with this group, please go to their website: 

https://www.tucsoncurbcycle.com/  or call them at 520.222.7001. 

This is a reminder to mark your calendar for next Monday, January 22nd at 5:30 to come and join us at the ward 6 community room. We will have a 90 minute presentation, including Q&A on the topic of sex trafficking. The panel will consist of representatives of the victim community, Tucson Police, one of the referral agencies and Dominique Roe-Sepowitz. She’s the lady who’s primarily responsible for data collection and tracking the successes/failures of the various jurisdictions in Arizona. My team and I have worked with Dominique for going on a decade. The problem of trafficking only continues to grow. 

I write about sex trafficking from time to time because our office has been deeply involved in trying to combat the problem for a decade. Come on the 22nd and learn how your kids are vulnerable and some of the things you can do in order to help protect them.  

Below I’m going to share some information PCOA sent out related to staying fit – exercise. I know, the “E” word. It applies to all age groups so I’m holding it separate from this section. Here I want to share what PCOA has available for free memory screenings. Not only screenings, but information and follow up resources. 

If you or a loved one is displaying possible memory issues you should know about the free screenings being offered at PCOA. Dementia Capable of Southern Arizona has walk-in hours at the PCOA Katie Dusenberry Center located right across from Reid Park at 600 S. Country Club. Help at that location is available on Monday’s from 9am until 11am. In addition, the E. Broadway PCOA location has walk-in service on Thursdays from 2pm until 4pm.  If you’d like more information on what’s available, please give them a call at 520.790.7262. 

Last week we had an update on the on-going discussion related to whether or not the city will participate in RTA Next, and if so what we’ll want to see on the ballot. I was pretty clear. Before I’ll support extending the current ½ cent sales tax I will want to see a minimum of $200M for road repair for roadways the RTA has funded, completion of the Grant Road corridor, and a commitment by the RTA to cover cost escalation in projects over the next 20 years. Relying on sales tax revenue to cover inflation is what got us to where we are. There’s no sense in repeating that mistake. 

The current estimate is that a renewal of the ½ cent tax will yield just over $2.3B over the next 20 years. Similar to the current RTA there are 4 elements that make up the program. This table shows what’s right now being proposed by city staff. For example, we’d receive 26.5% of the roadway investment, but would get 88% of the safety and active modes (bikes, pedestrians.) One reason we’d get the lion’s share of the safety/active mode element is that we’re proposing to shift some of our roadway work into that second category. It leaves very little for the rest of the region so I’m guessing there’ll be a healthy conversation about that allocation. 

While the city proposal gets us close to what our population and tax base percentage is (55.6%) there’s still nothing to suggest Grant Road is funded, inflation will be funded or RTA roadwork will be maintained.  

This will be back on our January 23rd agenda for us to give final thoughts to our RTA team before the next RTA board meeting. We’ll also have an executive session to talk about a possible ballot measure for us to run this fall. What would be on that ‘ask’ of the voters is what we’ll be talking about. 

TEP Midtown Reliability Project 

Quick update on the TEP process. They’ve whittled down the possible streets they’re considering for the new transmission line project. They’re shown on this map: 

The brown lines represent roads TEP is still considering for running their poles/lines. While they’ve eliminated the purely residential streets in most areas, some collector streets are possibilities. TEP will have another public open house to share their thoughts with the public. That’s coming on Thursday, February 8th from 6pm until 8pm. It’ll be held at the Double Tree over by Reid Park – 445. S. Alvernon. 

You can learn more about the project at this link: www.tep.com/midtown.  

The project webpage is also available in Spanish at https://www.tep.com/proyecto-de-confiabilidad-del-centro-de-la-ciudad/ 

You’ll note that Campbell/Kino is still under consideration. That’s because the appeal of TEP’s challenge to our gateway/scenic corridor ordinance is still pending in Superior Court. When the court decides it will more fully inform TEP’s decision as to what they propose as a preferred route to the Corporation Commission. They hope to have this under construction by the end of next year with completion scheduled for 2027.  

When the voters passed Prop 407 one of the roadways that was on the ballot for outside-the-curb upgrades was the 5th/6th street corridor. The project falls under the “pedestrian and walkability” category. Prop 407 work is not the repaving part of the work that’s starting on this section of road – it's the off-road part. 

On the ballot the project had this description: 

It’s a roughly $5M effort going along the 2 miles from Campbell to Alvernon. Since the public outreach has begun to more clearly define the scope of work residents from the area have made varying suggestions related to the lighting component. Some want no lighting. Some want it bright for pedestrians walking on the new sidewalks. Some want only historic fixtures – the input has been all over the map. 

On Monday, January 29th at 5:30pm the citizen Bond Oversight Committee will hold a public meeting to discuss this project. They will receive input from the transportation department and talk through how to honor the spirit of the ballot language while maneuvering to a spot that seems to meet the desires of the public, inconsistent as those are. That’s one of the challenges of crafting public policy. 

For those attending please know that staff cannot propose designs that run afoul of the ballot language, and they will not be proposing creating a dark walking corridor along that collector street. Neither would be a design the BOC could approve. The meeting will be held both in person and by zoom. The in person portion will be in the Mesquite Room at the P&R building located at 900 S. Randolph Way. It’s a fairly small room so if you don’t want to risk perhaps being in close quarters with others you can use this link to sign in by zoom:  

https://www.tucsonaz.gov/Departments/Clerks/Boards-Committees-Commissions/Boards-Commissions?run=currentagenda&board=128 

This may not be the only item the BOC will be discussing on the 29th. The agenda will be posted on the clerk’s website at least 24 hours ahead of the meeting. 

Electric Landscape Equipment 

During our last M&C meeting we received an update on the progress being made implementing parts of our climate action plan. One of those is the gradual transition in city landscape maintenance moving from gas-powered equipment over to electric. It’s a work in progress. I suggested extending the requirement to include our landscape vendors. We’ll see how the policy develops. 

When citizens have asked me about the city simply banning gas-powered leaf blowers or other landscape equipment, I generally point to the likelihood of that being guaranteed to generate preemption legislation by the state. But they can’t preempt us from adopting our own internal policy, which is what we’re doing. 

What they also cannot do is preempt the county from offering vouchers to people who turn in their gas-powered equipment. The vouchers are for the purchase of electric or hand-powered tools. 

Right now, you can turn in your gas-powered landscape equipment through the county Cut Down Pollution program and receive vouchers for up to $400 to spend on manual or electric tools.  

It’s a pretty simple process. You fill out an application, the county folks take a few days to review the application and once it’s approved you’ve got 3 weeks to take your equipment to one of their drop-off locations. There are 6 of them scattered around the county. Once the equipment (drained of gasoline please) is accepted they’ll have you submit a form to the Pima County Department of Environmental Quality who in turn will issue you vouchers you can use at any area Home Depot. 

Lawn and garden equipment that’s included in the program include lawn mowers, chain saws, leaf blowers, hedge trimmers, string trimmers and more. The value of the vouchers varies depending on what you turn in. For example, you’ll get a $50 voucher towards the purchase of an electric lawn mower.

And of course, manual equipment such as hula-ho weeders, brooms, rakes and hedge clippers are a part of what the vouchers will cover. I’ve poached the application process from the county site – here you go. This is for both residential and commercial users. 

Apply Online 

2024 Health and Fitness Resolutions? 

Did you make a New Year’s resolution to get into better shape? Regardless of your age, there are some easy and pretty much free activities you can do each day that will touch on 4 important areas of fitness. These came from the Pima Council on Aging (PCOA) site, but they apply to people of all ages. 

There are 4 types of exercise that can improve your health and your physical well-being. Those are building endurance, strength, balance and flexibility. And each can be practiced easily every day. It does not require joining a fitness club and getting all new workout clothes. 

Endurance – how about simply setting aside time to go for a walk through your neighborhood? Or out on the Loop? Mow your lawn. Take the stairs instead of the elevator. Dance. Bike. Shoot some baskets. These are all good aerobic exercises that raise your heartrate, help your circulatory system and can prevent or delay several diseases.  

Strength – I do not enjoy lifting weights. Any activity you do is going to have to be one that you will keep up for the long haul, so choose somethings you like. I use resistance bands a couple of times each day. You can do it while watching the news. Other options include just squeezing a tennis ball, carrying your groceries, doing some wall push ups, or lifting your body weight without assistance when getting up from chairs. Building tone and strength can help preventing falls and injuries. And it ties in with the next fitness area. 

And to celebrate your new-found fitness you can take the Visit Tucson community survey and qualify for one of the four $100 restaurant gift cards they’re giving away to some lucky participants. The survey is intended to help our tourism partners understand how Visit Tucson can improve the regional quality of life, help with growing our tourism economy and provide residents and visitors with the kinds of activities you’re after. 

The survey is intended for Pima County residents who are 18 years of age or older. It’s available in both English and in Spanish. It only takes a few minutes to complete – so do some shoulder rolls after each question. The survey will close on January 21st.  Here’s the link. Good luck in the gift card drawing:  

 https://survey.cmix.com/295A8866/810072EE/en-US 

It’s nice to be able to close out the newsletter – and this topic – by sharing the successful agreement on this project. There are several moving parts and it took from pre-COVID to get it across the finish line. Credit to all who were involved – the WUNA board, Capstone management, WUNA and Feldman’s neighbors, city staff, our housing department and attorneys from both sides.  

Pre-COVID the proposal was to demolish some historic bungalows lined up along Euclid and replace them with multi-story student housing. Sounds simple enough, except that the bungalows are contributing structures in the West University historic zone, Euclid is an agreed-on buffer between the student towers and the neighborhood, and the heights Capstone was after were greater than what’s allowed on that site. Otherwise, no problem. 

There were three parts to what we approved last week. One was a development agreement with Capstone. That agreement contained commitments by Capstone to build 30 units of workforce housing in the location of the bungalows, a robust security plan, an agreement to make payments to the city housing department for their oversight of eligibility on the workforce housing and some basic site design elements for the project.  

Next came what was called a demolition agreement. It’s really an agreement to physically move 5 of the existing bungalows from their current site over into a new location within WUNA. That preserves their contributing historic status, provides housing that’s sorely needed, and with them moved it opens up the location for the workforce housing units to be built. There is a separate agreement between Capstone and Joel Ireland – property owner at the new location – to rehabilitate and manage the units. Two units will remain on the Euclid buffer and will be rehabilitated and used by Capstone. One of the existing structures was too far gone to survive a move and rehab. From the standpoint of historic preservation and the need for affordable housing, this was a win for everyone. 

Finally, we agreed on the text change in the existing zoning. This allows the greater heights that Capstone has been after. It also sets the site development back behind the workforce housing, and steps the massing down from the Speedway/Euclid corner so it’s not just a wall of building at that location. Here’s a rough rendering of what that view will look like when the project is done near the end of ‘25. 

That massing design is important because diagonally across the Speedway/Euclid intersection is another parcel that the city is negotiating a purchase agreement on. It has some of the same elements the Capstone site has; surrounded in the rear by an historic neighborhood, has contributing historic single-family homes on the site, has had student housing proposed (and rejected) in the past, and is a valuable site for development. Once the city owns it, we will be able to put some development conditions in place, put out bids and get something built that may follow a path similar to our Capstone process. So, what we did with Capstone will set the tone for what we do on the NW corner of that intersection. 

Capstone also entered into a Community Benefits Agreement with the neighborhood. That will include a significant investment into sidewalks and ADA ramps within West University. That investment will build on work the city is already doing as a part of Prop 407. 

There was a lot of work invested by a lot of people on this project. I’m grateful to all who were involved. That effort will pay off with a good project that has housing, preservation, affordability and neighborhood investment all built into the package. 

Thanks to Sarah Lapidus from the Arizona Republic for covering the project. Here’s a link to her story: 

https://www.azcentral.com/story/news/local/arizona/2024/01/14/development-to-bring-student-and-workforce-housing-to-tucson/72195454007/