Welcome to District 5's Home on the web!
I want to keep visitors to this website up-to-date on what the board is doing on behalf of county residents in general and my District Five constituents in particular. Those who survey all the features of this website will get a good idea of who I am and where I stand. Hopefully, it will inspire you to get in touch with me to let me know where you stand, and where and when you believe I am on track or astray.
Dealing With Foreclosure/Don't Borrow Trouble Pima County
7.02.2008
Pima County was a sponsor of "Save Your Home From Foreclosure," a free forum and workshops in March that was a great success. Partcipants received general information and private, confidential consultation. The event was associated with the onging Don't Borrow Trouble Pima County campaign to deal with the crisis in home foreclosures.
If you want to buy a home, to refinance a home mortgage, to take out a home-equity loan, to prevent an impending foreclosure, or to consolidate debt, you can make use of Don’t Borrow Trouble Pima County campaign resources.
The campaign includes brochures, radio and television announcements, workshops, an informative website: http://www.dontborrowtroubleaz.com, and a telephone “hotline,” (520) 792-3087, that reaches trained professionals who can answer many questions for free and can refer callers to appropriate experts who can answer other questions.
Pima County and several local organizations have joined Freddie Mac in this campaign to inform people about how to avoid predatory mortgage loans, which have caused a widespread national outbreak of loan foreclosures and of lending company failures.
If lenders make claims that sound too good to be true, their claims probably are not true. “Pre-approved” home loans offered over the telephone or in the mail are an invitation to trouble. Borrowers must demand to have any offers in writing and should talk to several lenders before making a commitment, or signing any papers. Borrowers should ask about “prepayment penalties” and “additional fees.” They should not sign documents with any incorrect dates or blank fields.
Scam lenders use an array of gambits to trick borrowers into agreeing to a bad deal that can cost them dearly, and too often even costs them their home.
Borrowing against a mortgage or on an increase in a home’s value can result in a much longer-term loan at a higher interest rate, so the borrower ends up paying much more over time. Since the borrower’s home is collateral, borrowers can lose their homes if they fail to make payments. The number of people losing homes to foreclosure has gone up 200 percent since 1980.
Freddie Mac is a government-backed but stockholder-owned company that Congress created in 1970 to support homeownership and affordable rental housing. In addition to Pima County there are 23 other local supporters of Freddie Mac’s Don’t Borrow Trouble Pima County campaign.
Regional College Access Center Now Open in Tucson 7.15.2008
If you’re a high school student, or an adult seeking career enhancement, you now have a place with the resources advice to help you think about and pan for your educational or professional advancement – the Regional College Access Center in its downtown office, and on the internet.
The lack of guidance and easily accessible post-secondary education resources is a problem for all, but it strikes hardest at those whose parents, relatives and associates do not have college or formal post-secondary training experience – mostly low-income and ethnic-minority people. The Metropolitan Education Commission, with Richard’s help, now provides advice and information about the wide variety of educational and apprenticeship programs available in this area, online and out of a downtown office where Spanish is spoken.
While the position of high school counselor was created to address this issue there never have been enough of them, and when cuts must be made most school officials will choose to cut counselors before they dismiss teachers or critical support staff. Recent figures show that public high schools in Arizona have an average of one counselor per 450 students. Many charter schools and private schools have few counselors, or none; an estimated 3,000 to 5,000 children in Pima County are educated at home. The Regional College Access Center also provides assistance to adults interested in returning to school, or in getting training needed to advance in their careers.
In a modern world in which more than half of all jobs require education beyond the high school-diploma level, people were in dire need of an entity that would pull together information about the vast array of post-secondary education offerings available in Pima County, and encourage them to take advantage of these opportunities.
The Metropolitan Education Commission began trying fulfill this mission nearly three years ago and its effort reached fruition this year when the Regional College Access Center opened its doors at 10 E. Broadway, Suite 10, and launched its website, www.metedu.org.
June Webb-Vignery, executive director of the commission, says the services that students and adults need to move on educationally are in place in Pima County – with the University of Arizona, Pima Community College, labor unions, and private entities. These include test preparation assistance, college and training-program application assistance, site visits, summer programs and more.
What the new center provides is consolidated information – students and adults can conduct and initial screening of various educational and training offerings without seeking hard-to-find resources and going from site to site. It also offers coordination and direction, especially at the office, where bilingual English-Spanish employee Arlene Benavidez is located.
The concept of providing such a one-stop site for students and adults to explore options for advancement beyond a high school diploma is not new. The National College Access Network reports that 44 states have at least one such entity and many have two or more. Webb-Vignery said the city of Phoenix and local advocates in the Arizona capital are working to open a center up there.
Home Health Care Privatization Plan Curtailed After Hearings 7.02.2008
A series of public hearings in early 2008 that Chairman Elias sought convinced Pima Health System to curtail its plan to privatize the provision of home care services to elderly people and others who have severely limited mobility. The proposal would have taken about 600 attendant-care workers off the county payroll and scattered care recipients among nearly 20 private contractors. The plan was partially carried out, but halted after negative comments at the hearings.
When the county administration made its plan public in November, it came as a surprise not only to the Board of Supervisors, but also to the workers and, most importantly, to the dependent people they serve. Citing a shortage of attendant care workers locally, the administration said the 600 workers would be able to obtain employment with private businesses in this field locally..
But workers and the dependent people they serve said at the hearings that they worry the change might affect them negatively and they had many questions about how it can be carried out so as to avoid unhappiness, suffering and debilitating complications. Many people in the field are concerned that this move might exacerbate the existing shortage of home-care workers.
People receiving care and their affected attendant care workers are concerned most about about how to maintain continuity of care. The workers and those they care for often are relatives and even if not, they usually have developed a deep mutual relationship in which the workers know precisely the needs of those for whom they are caring. No two people are alike and no two care recipients need to receive care in the same manner.
Despite the overall shortage of attendant care workers locally, there is as yet no assurance the local private companies have the capacity, wherewithal or interest in hiring every one of the displaced county employees, let alone assuring each care recipient continuity in his or her care. Not every worker is likely to find a good fit -- many companies will rightfully be selective in who they hire and many county workers might wind up with a new employer with whom they do not get along. The county does not pay these workers high wages and many receive few or no benefits, but their new employers -- if they fine one -- have no obligation to match the pay and benefits package they have with the county.
Robert Hooker, Champion of Justice 7.15.2008
Pima County lost one of its most valuable assets when Public Defender Robert Hooker was killed in a tragic traffic accident.
Hooker combined a calm demeanor with firm convictions to shape and upgrade the county Public Defender’s Office in his more than two years at its helm. He was resolute in his belief that those without money or savvy deserved legal representation as capable as that of the wealthy and sophisticated.
A former Superior Court judge and longtime defense attorney in private practice, Hooker took on the Public Defender job in January 2005 determined to put his belief into practice. Under his leadership the office, which represents indigents charged with serious crimes, significantly increased its courtroom presence – especially when it came to first-degree murder cases. This saved taxpayers money because fewer major cases had to be sent to expensive private attorneys.
Tall and impeccably well-dressed, Hooker, 65, attracted seasoned attorneys to the Public Defender’s Office with the help of longtime friend and former legal partner Robert Hirsh, a top criminal defense attorney who once specialized in insanity defenses. Hirsh has taken over as Public Defender.
Hooker was as well known for his broad knowledge of law as he was for strong convictions and his passion for the Bill of Rights. He resigned as a Superior Court judge in 1983 after the Arizona Legislature passed a law limiting judicial discretion in sentencing and setting draconian minimum sentences that since have vastly increased the state’s prison population.
He was a native of north-central California and graduated from Chico State University, where he played basketball, before coming to Tucson and the University of Arizona to earn his law degree and settle into his career.
After work one evening in early April, the vehicle Hooker was driving was struck head-on just north of downtown when a drag-racing teenager lost control of his vehicle. The Public Defender was killed instantly.
Hooker is survived by his wife of 43 years, Sharon; their son Lance; a sister, Marsha Crowe; and two grandchildren.
Reinvestment Enhances 16 District Five Neighborhoods 7.15.2008
The Neighborhood Reinvestment Program of the 2004 Pima County Bond Package has been good to District Five neighborhoods, thanks to the noteworthy efforts of Richard and his staff member Andrea Altamirano, and his representatives in the program Camiliano Juarez and Lori Aldecoa.
As the funds are largely exhausted, 16 District Five neighborhoods have shared a total of more than $6 million for improvements to their streetscapes, streets, parks and playgrounds.
Those receiving the $500,000 maximum were A Mountain Neighborhood, for sidewalk installations; Feldmans Neighborhood for sidewalks; Rincon Heights Neighborhood for pedestrian safety improvements, traffic mitigation and landscaping; and Menlo Park Neighborhood, which used its money for park improvements and traffic mitigation.
Barrio Hollywood was awarded $497,000 for public safety enhancements; West University Neighborhood received $476,190 for park improvements and a new water feature for children in a park; and Northwest Neighborhood used $457,850 pedestrian safety and traffic mitigation amenities and for landscaping improvements.
El Cortez is getting five playground shade structures; Midvale Park is having street lights installed; Rose is getting a new pedestrian bridge over a major wash; Barrio Anita is having a cover installed over a basketball court; and Jefferson Park is getting sidewalks.
Avondale is having streets lit; Midtown is having sidewalks built; Palo Verde is getting street lights; and Highland Vista is getting landscaping and water-harvesting features.
The next county bond package is expected to go to voters in November 2009.
Supervisors Oppose Interstate 10 Bypass Highway Proposal
7.02.2008
The Board of Supervisors voted unanimously to approve a resolution that opposes construction of a new controlled-access highway associated with Interstate 10 that would bypass the urban areas of Tucson and Phoenix. Chairman Elias was the primary sponsor of the resolution. Routes under study would exit I-10 near Willcox or Benson and knife through the San Pedro River Valley behind the Rincon and Santa Catalina Mountains, or exit I-10 just east of Tucson to cut south of the city and then up the Avra Valley behind the Tucson Mountains. Any such bypass route eventually would reconnect to I-10 west of the Phoenix urban area.
The resolution advises the Arizona Department of Transportation and Gov. Janet Napolitano against further study of, or construction of such a bypass highway. The Transportation Department is considering the bypass proposal, which Tranportation Board member Si Schorr of Tucson suggested a year ago.
The resolution says contruction of a new controlled-access highway anywhere in either corridor would:
-- Further jeopardize the 55 local animal species of concern that the county's landmark Sonoran Desert Conservation Plan seeks to conserve.
-- Encourage increased car and truck travel in the region as the county's recently adopted Sustainability Program seeks to reduce it.
-- Encourage new suburban development in sensitive areas the county's land-use plans seek to preserve in their natural state.
-- Degrade the biologically rich, diverse and important San Pedro Riparian National Conservation Area or Tucson Mountain Park, Saguaro National Park, Ironwood National Monument, and the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation's Central Arizona Project Mitigation Area.
-- Cost taxpayers many billions of dollars to buy new rights-of-way, and concrete and asphalt, and to pay contractors to build the huge roadways.
-- Divert motorists away from existing I-10 corridor businesses that are dependent upon the commerce that I-10 motorists generate.
-- Exacerbate existing local air pollution problems caused primarily by car and truck travel.
The resolution further notes that I-10 traffic congestion could be reduced with much less cost and environmental degradation if freight and passenger train capacity is expanded and improved upon, and other work is undertaken in the existing I-10 and rail corridors.
The County Moves to Protect Tumamoc Hill
11.16.2007
The Board of Supervisors on Nov. 6 approved a plan that should allow Pima County to purchase 320 acres of state school trust land on iconic Tumamoc Hill's western slope so it can be preserved for future generations.
The board asked the Arizona Land Department to put the land up for public auction. Pima County will bid on it, expecting to be the highest bidder if not the only bidder.
Although the land has city of Tucson zoning for residential development, the slumping housing market and other critical factors are expected to keep development bidders wary, or away.
The land includes a closed landfill the University of Arizona once used, and it is known to be contaminating local ground water. A successful bidder should have to assume liability for cleaning up the landfill, at an estimated cost of $9 million.
There are remains of ancient Hohokam stone terraces on the land that date to 300 B.C. and dozens of Tohono O'odham burial plots dating to the early historical period when the Spanish took control of this area. Preserving artifacts and mitigating the damages to these treasures of development would cost between $3 million and $5 million.
Finally, two parallel underground petroleum-delivery pipelines traverse this parcel and would pose another disincentive to its residential development.
Since the mid-1990s, the county has tried several appraoches to buying this Tumamoc Hill parcel to preserve it. All have failed.
Tumamoc Hill is too valuable to Tucson and Pima County for its beauty, its symbolism, its housing of the renowned Carnegie Desert Laboratory -- which has done continuous research on Sonoran Desert flora at that site for more than a century, its remains of ancient and historic Native American presence and its recreational features to be developed. It must be preserved. It will be preserved.
Former District Five Employee Heads South Tucson Library 12.17.2007
Former Special Staff Assistant Sol Gomez has not let any grass grow under his feet since leaving the District Five office in 2003. He has earned a master’s degree in library science, married, had a daughter, and risen rapidly through the Pima County Library District ranks to become manager or the Sam Lena Library in South Tucson.
Sol, who grew up in the Sierra Vista area in Cochise County, left District Five to pursue a master’s degree at the University of Arizona, taking advantage of its Knowledge River program. Knowledge River is designed to help Latinos make their way into library careers. The program is threatened with federal budget cuts, but Sol is such a believer in it that he is one of its co-coordinators of student support for the 2007-2008 school year and is helping in the effort to find new funding for it.
In a year and a half, Sol had his master’s degree in hand and by that time was married to Adelita Grijalva. A month after obtaining his degree, Sol was hired by the library system – then run by the city of Tucson with half its money coming from Pima County – as a temporary/intermittent librarian at the Valencia Branch. After six months primarily doing reference work at Valencia, he was transferred to the Quincy Douglas Branch to be the children’s section librarian.
Sol worked at Quincy Douglas for six months before being named manager of the little Santa Rosa Branch, which at the time was just a computer laboratory but was in the process of adding a modest book collection. Sol oversaw that transition, soaking up more library knowledge along the way.
After eight months at Santa Rosa, Sol was named manager of the Sam Lena Branch, where he operates a 9,000 square-foot facility with meeting rooms with two full-time employees and six part-timers. Sam Lena offers several community programs, including computer classes, story time for youngsters, baby time for reading to babies and early literacy offerings.
During Sol’s tenure with the library system, it has switched to making all the books within it available system-wide. If you find that a book you want is at a branch other than the one you are at, it will be brought to your branch for you. And recently, it has gone to Sunday hours at most branches, including at Sam Lena. Sunday hours were made possible with additional funding now that the library system is fully funded and operated by the Pima County Library District.
Sol, who has his hands full with a darling year-old daughter, Adelina, finds his library career rewarding and satisfying. His former co-workers on the District Five staff are pleased with his happiness and proud of his success. We're not surprised, we've always known this bright, talented and personable young man is a winner.