AZ Star ran a story on this year’s Gem Show being off due to economic challenges nationally and internationally.  Decent story read it – HERE.  A couple local hotels were asked about bookings this year compared to last and the consensus is we are down 25%. No doubt challenges this year are beyond our immediate control. The main thing we can do from an economic development point of view is DIVERSIFY our tourism and industrial base.

Once again the online comments are where the real stories develop. Here’s a great set of comments that are worth a second look;

Tucson’s government has never cared to develop an economy based on industry. I remember when the City Council ran Firestone out of town. So, we go through this every time there is a downturn in the economy.

Companies don’t want to come here – there isn’t a skilled workforce. Those same companies can’t get their managers to move here because the schools are mediocre – at best.

But, you can’t tell the City Council, Board of Supervisors, City Manager anything. They don’t care – they have their own vision of what they want to accomplish and never mind the city.

Instead, we hear that the Tourism Board is busy advertising in Mexico. Wonderful, they can spend some of their drug money at our hotels and restaurants.

We’ve never had a leader to organize the citizens to put a stop to the mismanagement of the city.

A response to the above comment;

15 years ago my employer announced they were moving our jobs to Albuquerque because they were getting tax incentives to do so. We knew it would be only a matter of time before they moved other jobs to other cities for the same reasons.

Stupid us, we figured that the Tucson Ecomonic council might want to know and DO SOMETHING like offer the same tax incentives to keep those well paying jobs here. So we called them up and filled them in. The reply: “Well it’s their company, they can do whatever they want” and hung up on us.

So after 15 years I’ve only managed to make 50% of the wages I used to make thanks to the low paying jobs the Tucson Economic Council has brought in. And sure enough my old employer moved almost all other jobs out of Tucson. They only have a small workforce here now.

Another short and to the point comment;

Less tax revenue from tourism=higher property taxes for residents. Fewer jobs means more people on welfare. Fewer people=lower real estate values.