Education

Has the environmental lobby their “Waiting For Superman” moment? What the popular documentary did to expose the insanity of public education started a movement around the country.

Has a good idea by a pioneering Congressman from Arizona, Mo Udall, been taken to an extreme that has diminished the intent of saving endangered species?  Is it time for Congress to reign in the run away legal industry that uses tax payer funds to sue taxpayers?

Like many things in America a good idea can turn bad when left unchecked.  One such idea is the work that Arizona Congressman put into the Endangered Species Act to protect animals at the edge of extinction at the hands of evil developers. What he started was marked a monumental for the environmental movement. Sad to say his idea has turned into a billion industry for groups like the Center For Biological Diversity.

Tucson is on the front lines of this fight and has been completely nuetralized and over taken by the environmental groups. We talk about pygmy owls, orchids, snails, jaguars or any series of animals not because we love to see them flourish but because these law suits and the plants and animals that Mo Udall fought so hard to protect are used as pawns to churn huge fees and obstruct growth.

xFrom: Environmental litigation gravy train  – Opinion piece by Karen Budd-Falen, Budd-Falen Law Offices  – September 16, 2009 between 2003 and 2007 a fund paid out to environmental based groups was as follows: 

• In total, $4,716,264,730.00 (that is billion with a “b”) in total payments were paid in taxpayer dollars from the Judgment Fund from 2003 through July 2007 for attorney fees and costs in cases against the federal government. 

Published in The Tucson Weekly:
By harassing the feds to make a profit, the Center for Biological Diversity makes environmentalists look bad

by Ted Williams

Ted Williams is a contributor to Writers on the Range, a service of High Country News. He writes in Massachusetts.

It has taken me decades to be recognized as an environmental extremist. My “attack” on Alaska Republican Rep. Don Young, a National Rifle Association board member, in Sierra Magazine fomented a mass exodus from the Outdoor Writers Association of America. I serve on two foundations that award major grants to groups defending land from developers, and I write a muckraking column for Audubon called “Incite.”

Actually, I’m an extremist only as defined by people who perceive fish and wildlife as basically in the way. For those folks, all environmentalists are extremists. But radical green groups do exist—and you and I are a major source of revenue for them.

The Interior Department must respond within 90 days to petitions to list species under the Endangered Species Act. Otherwise, petitioners like the Center for Biological Diversity (CBD) get to sue and collect attorney fees from the Justice Department.

For 2009, the CBD reported income of $1,173,517 in “legal settlement.” The center also shakes down taxpayers directly from Interior Department funds under the Equal Access to Justice Act, and for missed deadlines when the agency can’t keep up with the broadside of Freedom of Information Act requests. The Center for Biological Diversity has two imitators: WildEarth Guardians and Western Watersheds Project.

Kierán Suckling, who directs and co-founded the Tucson-based CBD, boasts that he engages in psychological warfare by causing stress to already stressed public servants. “They feel like their careers are being mocked and destroyed—and they are,” he told High Country News. “So they become much more willing to play by our rules.”

Those rules include bending the truth like pretzel dough. For example, after the center posted photos on its website depicting what it claimed was Arizona rancher Jim Chilton’s cow-denuded grazing allotment, Chilton sued. When Chilton produced evidence that the photos showed a campsite and a parking lot, a court awarded him $600,000 in damages.

“Ranching should end,” proclaims Suckling. “Good riddance.” But the only problem with ranching is that it’s not always done right. And even when it’s done wrong, it saves land from development.

Amos Eno runs the hugely successful Yarmouth, Maine-based Resources First Foundation, an outfit that, among other things, assists ranchers who want to restore native ecosystems. Earlier, he worked at Interior’s Endangered Species Program, then went on to direct the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation. Eno figures the feds could “recover and delist three dozen species” with the resources they spend responding to the CBD’s litigation.

“The amount of money CBD makes suing is just obscene,” he told me. “They’re one of the reasons the Endangered Species Act has become so dysfunctional.”

A senior Obama official had this to say: “CBD has probably sued Interior more than all other groups combined. They’ve divested that agency of any control over Endangered Species Act priorities and caused a huge drain on resources. In April, for instance, CBD petitioned to list 404 species, knowing full well that biologists can’t make the required findings in 90 days.”

Former Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt and his Fish and Wildlife Service director, Jamie Clark, together saved the Endangered Species Act from a hostile Congress. One way they did this was with brilliant habitat-conservation plans that rewarded landowners for harboring endangered species.

A few plans were flawed, but the center scarcely saw one that it didn’t hate.

Clark offered this: “Back then, the suits came mostly from CBD. Now I think CBD and WildEarth Guardians are trying to see who can sue most. … Citizens need to be able to petition for species in trouble, but this has become an industry.”

Acquiring the public’s attention seems to motivate environmental extremists almost as much as acquiring the public’s money. Recently, the CBD petitioned the EPA to ban lead ammunition and fishing weights. There are lots of inexpensive, non-toxic alternatives, and lead projectiles for hunting and lead sinkers small enough to be ingested by birds do need to be banned.

But the Center for Biological Diversity sought a ban on everything—no exception for the military, target-shooting or deep-sea sinkers that ostriches couldn’t swallow. It seems inconceivable that the center didn’t know its petition was going nowhere. But for a year, its name has been all over the news, and now the center is suing the EPA.

The Center for Biological Diversity gives every environmentalist a bad name.

A great editorial from a sociology professor Tom Reifer, from UC San Diego – HERE

A few of the alarming stats:

- California’s mass incarceration boom, the nation’s largest, saw prisoners increase from 25,000 in 1980 to some 143,000 today. It was supported by the prison guards union, the most powerful lobby in the state, and set the pace for prison expansion in the nation as a whole. With only 5 percent of the world’s population, the United States now has 25 percent of the world’s prisoners, some 2.4 million persons. California built 21 new prisons from 1985-2005, or one a year. And in 2009, the United States saw its incarceration rate increase for the 37th year in a row.

- California has racked up a dubious achievement. Our state is home to the most expensive prison system in the world, costing roughly $50,000 annually per prisoner. We now spend more of the general fund on prisons – almost 11 percent – than on higher education, which only gets 7.5 percent.

- Black residents of California are now more likely to go to prison than college, a trend expressed in hip-hop artist Tupac Shakur’s lyrics: “You can’t conceal the fact, the penitentiary’s packed and it’s filled with blacks.” National statistics in this regard are compelling. Incarceration rates for high school dropouts aged 18 to 24 were 31 times higher than their college-educated counterparts, and for young black men, 60 times more likely.

Posted: Friday, May 27, 2011 9:00 am | Updated: 10:11 am, Thu May 26, 2011.

By Joe Higgins and Chris DeSimone, Inside Tucson Business | 0 comments

We all know about the frustration over the lack of direction by Tucson and Pima County governments as infrastructure crumbles. But this column isn’t about what’s not working.

Instead it’s about what happens when business owners and others finally realize “it’s time to MOVE.”

These are people who are no longer concerned whether Tucson Unified School District will ever offer a competitive world-class education. They don’t care about such things as the city’s anti-big box ordinace. They’re realizing Tucson’s and Pima County’s better days are behind them.

It’s time to MOVE – as in going for the Marana – Oro Valley Experience.

According to new Census demographics data, the wealth of this region is in Marana and Oro Valley. The average annual household income of Marana is $67,001 and Oro Valley is $71,628. Tucson’s average is $37,635.

If you owned a car dealership or appliance store, where would you set up shop?

Oro Valley and Marana are where Raytheon Missile Systems engineers, Tucson police officers and successful small business owners live and raise their families.

Oro Valley and Marana have high-achieving schools, parks and safe neighborhoods that attract companies like Roche and Sanofi Aventis.

Retirees like the shopping, planned housing communities and activities.

Marana has miles of cotton fields to build vibrant urban environments of the future. Oro Valley has the Santa Catalina Mountains, outdoor activities and resorts.

From an economic development perspective, the most recent successes in our region are in these jurisdictions with Sargent Controls expanding in Marana and Roche’s Ventana Medical Systems adding 500 jobs in Oro Valley, which is home to operations by both the world’s No. 3 and No. 6 biotech firms, along with the University of Arizona’s Bio5 Institute.

The time is ripe for these municipalities to seize contorol of their own destinies in tourism marketing.

In 1987, the City of Scottsdale branched away from the “Valley Of The Sun” to create its own convention and visitors bureau telling the world it’s a high-end destination that embraces its western roots but at the same time offers world-class luxury.

According to audit data, Scottsdale spends 51 percent of its bed tax money promoting itself to tourists. (Tempe and Albuquerque spend similar percentages.) By comparison, the Metropolitan Tucson Convention and Visitors Bureau spends 22 percent.

At its peak before the recession, the Tucson region saw 4 million visitors; Scottsdale saw 8 million in the same year.

Between the tragic events of Jan. 8, our sheriff telling national media this is a “mecca for hatred and bigotry,” and one of our congressmen calling for an economic boycott, Tucson’s already weak tourism brand may be nearly impossible to resurrect.

But Marana can distance itself as it continues to play host to the World Golf Championships – Accenture Match Play and its world-wide audience. Marana also has a Ritz-Carlton resort and a regional airport that can land a Boeing 737.

In the marketplace, business leaders know that competition keeps them from losing focus and becoming stagnant.

Marana and Oro Valley already are showing they can attract economic development. They also could become a world-class brand in tourism.

If you’re tired of the roadblocks and excuses put forth by leaders in Tucson and Pima County and are losing faith that things may never change, look north.

We know there are those who say the positives should extend all the way south to the city limits at River Road, and extend east to Vail and south to Sahuarita.

The fact is Marana and Oro Valley are already well on their way. At this point, Tucson’s elected officials may never be able to catch up.

For the rest of us it’s time to MOVE.

Contact Joe Higgins and Chris DeSimone at wakeuptucson@gmail.com. They host “Wake Up Tucson,” 6-8 a.m. weekdays on The Voice KVOI 1030-AM. Their blog is at www.TucsonChoices.com.Posted: Friday, May 27, 2011 9:00 am | Updated: 10:11 am, Thu May 26, 2011.

By Joe Higgins and Chris DeSimone, Inside Tucson Business | 0 comments

We all know about the frustration over the lack of direction by Tucson and Pima County governments as infrastructure crumbles. But this column isn’t about what’s not working.

Instead it’s about what happens when business owners and others finally realize “it’s time to MOVE.”

These are people who are no longer concerned whether Tucson Unified School District will ever offer a competitive world-class education. They don’t care about such things as the city’s anti-big box ordinance. They’re realizing Tucson’s and Pima County’s better days are behind them.

It’s time to MOVE – as in going for the Marana – Oro Valley Experience.

According to new Census demographics data, the wealth of this region is in Marana and Oro Valley. The average annual household income of Marana is $67,001 and Oro Valley is $71,628. Tucson’s average is $37,635.

If you owned a car dealership or appliance store, where would you set up shop?

Oro Valley and Marana are where Raytheon Missile Systems engineers, Tucson police officers and successful small business owners live and raise their families.

Oro Valley and Marana have high-achieving schools, parks and safe neighborhoods that attract companies like Roche and Sanofi Aventis.

Retirees like the shopping, planned housing communities and activities.

Marana has miles of cotton fields to build vibrant urban environments of the future. Oro Valley has the Santa Catalina Mountains, outdoor activities and resorts.

From an economic development perspective, the most recent successes in our region are in these jurisdictions with Sargent Controls expanding in Marana and Roche’s Ventana Medical Systems adding 500 jobs in Oro Valley, which is home to operations by both the world’s No. 3 and No. 6 biotech firms, along with C-Path and the University of Arizona’s Bio5 Institute.

The time is ripe for these municipalities to seize control of their own destinies in tourism marketing.

In 1987, the City of Scottsdale branched away from the “Valley Of The Sun” to create its own convention and visitors bureau telling the world it’s a high-end destination that embraces its western roots but at the same time offers world-class luxury.

According to audit data, Scottsdale spends 51 percent of its bed tax money promoting itself to tourists. (Tempe and Albuquerque spend similar percentages.) By comparison, the Metropolitan Tucson Convention and Visitors Bureau spends 22 percent.

At its peak before the recession, the Tucson region saw 4 million visitors; Scottsdale saw 8 million in the same year.

Between the tragic events of Jan. 8, our sheriff telling national media this is a “mecca for hatred and bigotry,” and one of our congressmen calling for an economic boycott, Tucson’s already weak tourism brand may be nearly impossible to resurrect.

But Marana can distance itself as it continues to play host to the World Golf Championships – Accenture Match Play and its world-wide audience. Marana also has a Ritz-Carlton resort and a regional airport that can land a Boeing 737.

In the marketplace, business leaders know that competition keeps them from losing focus and becoming stagnant.

Marana and Oro Valley already are showing they can attract economic development. They also could become a world-class brand in tourism.

If you’re tired of the roadblocks and excuses put forth by leaders in Tucson and Pima County and are losing faith that things may never change, look north.

We know there are those who say the positives should extend all the way south to the city limits at River Road, and extend east to Vail and south to Sahuarita.

The fact is Marana and Oro Valley are already well on their way. At this point, Tucson’s elected officials may never be able to catch up.

For the rest of us it’s time to MOVE.

Contact Joe Higgins and Chris DeSimone at wakeuptucson@gmail.com. They host “Wake Up Tucson,” 6-8 a.m. weekdays on The Voice KVOI 1030-AM. Their blog is at www.TucsonChoices.com.

Joe Snell.  Bob Walkup.  Larry Hecker.  Shirley Scott.  Greg Shelko.  Nina Trasoff.  Karin Uhlich. Dan Eckstom. Jonathan Walker.  Michael Guymon.  Rodney Glassman.  Chuck Huckelberry.  Rich Singer.  Jeff Digregorio.  Bob Gugino.  Raul Grijalva. Anne-Marie Russell.  Jack Camper.  Andrew Greenhill.  Jonathan Rothschild.  Regina Romero.  Carolyn Campbell.  Rick Vaughan.  Tom Moulton.  Lisa Lovallo.  Sharon Bronsen.  Robert Shelton. Richard Elias. Jonathan Paton.  Judy Burns. Ann Day.  Rick Meyer.  Ron Shoopman.  John Pedicone.  Richard Fimbres.  Marie Nemerguth.  Ryan  George.  David Welsh.  Metropolitan Convention and Visitors Bureau. TREO.  Michael Keith.  Jennifer Eckstom.  Adelita Grijalva.  Mike Hein.  Jaret Barr.

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YouTube Direkt   Arizona Republic – Doug Maceachern: Churchill was in the ethnic studies department at UC Boulder and made some interesting comments about the 9/11 attacks.  From Wikipedia:

In January 2005, Churchill’s work attracted publicity because of the widespread circulation of a 2001 essay, “On the Justice of Roosting Chickens“. In the essay, he claimed that the September 11, 2001 attacks were a natural and unavoidable consequence of what he views as unlawful US policy, and he referred to the “technocratic corps” working in the World Trade Center as “little Eichmanns“.^[1]

Still think this was a student led uprising? I believe you can see Grijalva,  Isabella Garcia in the audience too.

Posted: Friday, May 6, 2011 9:00 am | Updated: 9:50 am, Thu May 5, 2011.

By Joe Higgins and Chris DeSimone, Inside Tucson Business | 0 comments

Has Tucson’s Democratic machine overplayed it’s hand? Are moderate Democrats and the growing number of independents ready to make some changes in this year’s Tucson City Council races or next year’s Pima County Board of Supervisors races?

Will the business community show up with their dollars and their support? Have we hit the tipping point?

Here are the facts:

1. Rio Nuevo gets new board to wrest control away from the Tucson City Council.

State Attorney General and FBI investigations have been launched find out what happened to $230 million of taxpayers money spent on downtown redevelopment with little to show.

2. Buses and light rail priorities.

The city council panics over 10-cent low-income bus fare while at the same time prepares to build a $196 million streetcar system that will cost millions per year to run and will need dense development in old neighborhoods to sustain any ridership. To build a much-needed student housing project in the hole that was an old YMCA at Fourth Avenue and Sixth Street, the developer pays $15,000 and monthly payments of $2,500 for 15 years to the surrounding neighborhood in order to get the council’s approval. How much longer will developers pay to play to invest with uncertainty or skip by Tucson?

3. The City Council refers a half cent sales tax to voters only to be defeated by 20 percent margin.

Voters have lost confidence in city government and the Mayor and Council. Did the council get the message that it’s time to tighten belts and reprioritize? Tucson moved $13 million in federal money for pothole repairs to build a bridge over the Santa Cruz River to qualify for other federal money for the four-mile streetcar. Priorities?

4. University of Arizona versus University Medical Center.

The UA makes a public power play to bring UMC back under its control. The hospital was spun off in 1984 to keep if from folding. Today, UMC generates $90 million per year to support future nurses, doctors and pharmacists. Follow the money. And yet just two weeks ago, Inside Tucson Business’ 2011 List of Largest Employers showed the UA surpassing Raytheon Missile Systems for No 1. This despite state budget cuts, tuition increases and a hiring freeze.

5. Where are the jobs?

A 300-acre solar farm in an old cotton field near Marana gets caught in the political buzzsaw of neighbors and paybacks for old political scores. Supposedly, Tucson is a top 25 Solar City in the United States yet we continue to delay and politicize an investment in green technology? County Supervisor Sharon Bronson and her colleagues are delaying the project by Fotowatio Renewable Ventures, the Spanish firm that is one of the world’s leading solar power operators, may look to go elsewhere. We already know about the supervisors trying to block the Rosemont Copper mine. And now a solar farm?

6. U.S. Rep. Raúl Grijalva.

The five-term congressman’s call for a boycott of Arizona over passage of SB 1070 almost cost him re-election from previously unknown Ruth McClung. Are voters tired of the rhetoric?

7. Back-room deals.

The city council votes on a land deal to sell downtown redevelopment property in Rio Nuevo to the Gadsden Company for $250,000, which resells the property to a low-income housing project for $1.43 million, according to the Arizona Daily Star’s Rob O’Dell (March 22). Councilwoman Shirley Scott joined the majority after she received a letter from Gadsden’s attorney, Larry Hecker, detailing the $1.5 million Gadsden said it put into the project. “I think that speaks well for this group,” Scott said, adding Gadsden is not asking for any special treatment. And, it just so happens, Hecker is Scott’s campaign chair for re-election. He was also campaign chair for City Councilwoman Nina Trasoff’s unsuccessful 2009 campaign and Bronson’s 2008 campaign. When will Tucsonans say enough is enough?

8. Marana wastewater fight.

Pima County’s heavy-handed clout using its wastewater management system as awakened Marana and now the town’s voters may be ready to change find a supervisor in 2012 that is more in turned with their goal of becoming a world-class municipality.

9. Pima County property taxes keep going up.

The Pima County Assessor’s office actually increased the values of most of the commercial property in the county, despite three years of the most depressed real estate market in generations. Now, the supervisors are looking at raising the county’s property tax rate by 17 cents per $100 of assessed valuation. Pima County government had 8,396 full-time equivalent employees in 2008 and has 8,132 today. Take out a loss of 450 positions through a contract shift at Pima Health Systems and the number of Pima County employees actually grew.

10. Democratic party primary endorsements.

Typically, political parties don’t weigh picking favorites until after their electorates choose candidates in the primary election. But Pima County’s Democratic Party already has picked its slate for the Tucson City Council and the primary isn’t until Aug. 30. The endorsements brought a sharp letter of rebuke from six Democratic state representatives, including Tucsonans Sally Ann Gonzales, Matt Heinz, Bruce Wheeler and Macario Saldate.

11. All mail elections.

Under the guise of trying to “save money,” the Tucson council changed the rules of the election game just as its Democratic incumbents face tough re-election campaigns. An investigation is underway over irregularly marked mail-in ballots in South Tucson and now mail ballots have gone missing in this month’s Sahuarita council elections. The “save money” argument is a smokescreen.

12. Tourism in the toilet.

As reported in Inside Tucson Business, passenger traffic at Tucson International Airport for March, normally the busiest month of the year, is at 16-year lows. Tucson didn’t have Major League Baseball Spring Training this year for the first time since 1947. Now the economy is beginning to feel the negative impact of mismanagement of the tourist assets that have been taken for granted. Last month Travel+Leisure called Tucson one of their top 25 “most under-rated cities in the world” – not just the United States, the world. That’s not a good thing for the Metropolitan Tucson Convention and Visitors Bureau whose job it is to get the word out.

13. Arizona is projected to add jobs, but not Tucson.

State economic development officials are projecting Arizona will add more than 17,300 jobs in the next year but the Tucson region won’t see any of them. To accentuate the point, tourism is expected to grow by 3.1 percent statewide but will drop 0.2 percent in the Tucson region.

14. More low-wage jobs.

When Intel announced earlier this year it was spending $5 billion to expand and build in Chandler, it included a projection of 1,000 high-paid new jobs. Within days of that announcement Tucson, landed its expansion that will be bring us another 400 call center jobs. This on top of the announcement that Tucson-based Raytheon Missile division decided to build its newest plant in Huntsville, Ala., not here.

15. Mexican-American Studies.

A student demonstration prevented the Tucson Unified School District governing board meeting from taking place April 26 because the board was due to vote on moving the program to an elective instead of allowing it as a substitute for the core subject of American History.

Moving Mexican-American Studies to an elective would put it in line with African American Studies, Native American Studies and Pan Asian Studies as well as art, music and some foreign languages among other important options students can choose. Mexican-American Studies serves 5 percent of the district’s approximately 53,000 students, yet it has taken an inordinate amount of the attention.

Meanwhile, there are issues with procurement irregularities, school closures and students’ low achievement scores on standardized tests.

Tucson is not a shiny liberal city on the hill. The so-called political progressives like to look up to cities like San Francisco or Portland, Ore. They admire the environmental commitment of Boulder, Colo., and dream of being the Berkeley, Calif., of the desert.

But Tucson’s city core crumbles while suburbs flourish. This region’s vision and planning is taking place in Marana, Oro Valley and Sahuarita.

Lately, people including Comedy Central’s “The Daily Show” have had some fun over Democratic leaders’ idea of Southern Arizona becoming a 51st state. It’s just a diversionary tactic from Democrats trying to gloss over the facts we’ve presented here.

Tucson may be the butt of jokes but those who are struggling to run businesses and earn a living here aren’t laughing. It’s time for a change starting with this year’s city elections.

Contact Joe Higgins and Chris DeSimone at wakeuptucson@gmail.com. They host “Wake Up Tucson,” 6-8 a.m. weekdays on The Voice KVOI 1030-AM. Their blog is at www.TucsonChoices.com.

Despite budget cuts, attempts to take over UMC and hikes in tuition  the University of Arizona has just overtaken Raytheon as our regions largest employer. Raytheon has been at the top spot for years but got nudged out this year by the University.  I guess this fits with Tucson’s largest industry (at 21% of our workforce) continues to be the government sector.

Last year Raytheon reported 12,140 employees and the UofA posted 10,363. This year the numbers are 11,604 for the UofA and 11,500 for Raytheon according to Inside Tucson Business.

Pima County went from 8,300 in 2008 to 8,132 this year, a 3%  drop. Tucson went through a 27% drop.  Pima County lost 450 positions with a contract shift from Pima County Health. So in reality the County actually added positions.  Anyone seeing a trend here?

City of Tucson and TUSD went down.

I guess the evil legislators cutting the UofA funding could be concidered Arizona’s own stimulus plan. Raising tuition, grabbing UMC’s pot of money is needed to feed the big payroll.   Nice job Shelton.

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