Phoenix

The Democratic primary for the newly drawn CD-09 in Arizona will be one of the most interesting races in the nation to watch this year.

Kristen Sinema is an unapologetic liberal who will have a field day with positions that Andrei Cherny took during his run against Republican Doug Ducey during the Arizona State Treasurer’s race in 2010.  Cherny, who is much more liberal than his campaign positions of 2010 would suggest, is likely to spend most of the campaign explaining why he said some of the things he did.

And in politics, as the saying goes: if you are explaining, you’re losing.

Sinema will almost certainly get early support from EMILY’s List and other left wing interest groups because of her national profile during her time in the Arizona Legislature, when she was the only openly bisexual office holder.  She took a lead role in pushing for Obama’s health care bill and has been a happy and effective warrior for all things left of center.

I predict that she will outraise the one-time wunderkind Cherny and that she will beat him soundly in the CD 9 primary.  The real question is why Cherny allowed his ego to propel him to what will be almost certainly be a humiliating loss.  Proof that ambition has real consequences.

The Obama campaign has repeatedly claimed that they view Arizona as an opportunity to “expand the map” for their electoral strategy.

They are smoking crack.

The last time a Democrat Presidential candidate won Arizona was Bill Clinton (with 47% of the vote, to Dole’s 45% of the vote) in 1996 – and that was only because Ross Perot’s 8% showing siphoned off votes that would largely have otherwise gone to Bob Dole.

This New York Times article breathlessly reports how there are many things that point to the possibility of an Obama victory in Arizona: Sen. Russell Pearce being recalled, Daniel Valenzuela being elected to the Phoenix City Council, a Democrat being elected Mayor of Tucson.

Poor Helene Cooper doesn’t realize how absurd her examples look.

Sen. Russell Pearce’s loss in the recall election had nothing to do with Hispanic voters – in fact, Jerry Lewis’s margin of victory demonstrates that Lewis won among Republicans in that race.

Daniel Valenzuela won… wait for it… “an overwhelmingly Latino district.”  It’s like saying that Hispanic support for Democrats is surging because Ed Pastor got re-elected.

And Tucson?  Enough said.

Yes, the Hispanic population has grown by big numbers in the last decade – but it isn’t even at its high point, which was about three years ago.

There is something that is really important to understand when it comes to the Hispanic vote in Arizona.  They just don’t turnout in large enough numbers to sway a statewide race.

To wit: in 2008, Rep. Ed Pastor won in a landslide with 72% of the vote in Congressional District 4.  That 72% consisted of 89,721 votes.

That same year, Democrat candidate Bob Lord only garnered 42% of the vote against Rep. John Shadegg.  That 42% consisted of 115,759 votes.

So you have a losing Democrat in CD3 getting 26,000 more votes than Ed Pastor who wins in a landslide in his majority-Hispanic district.  That is a turnout problem, and it’s not going to be fixed anytime soon – especially by a President who has not delivered the hope and change that he campaigned on in 2008.

However, I hope and pray they spend millions in Arizona in their futile effort.  It means less money will spent in true battleground states.

So, welcome to Arizona!  Maybe your campaign spending will help boost our economy!

Yesterday’s election was proof, once again, that voters can be finicky – and that’s the way it should be.

Here is a rundown:

 Legislative District 18 Recall

The big story was the surprise victory of Republican Jerry Lewis over Republican State Senate President Russell Pearce.  Pearce was placed on recall ballot through the efforts of some left-wing and Democrat- affiliated organizations, but it was conservative Republican Jerry Lewis who took advantage of the opportunity by running a very solid race. Pearce outspent Lewis as much as 3-1, and Pearce also enjoyed support from some independent expenditures and the entirety of the Republican establishment.

It wasn’t enough.  Voters were given a choice between a hard-edged Mormon conservative Republican whose main issue has been immigration (Pearce) and a softer spoken Mormon conservative Republican who has been a champion for school choice (Lewis).  This will likely impact the next legislative session, in that there will be fewer immigration-related issues at the forefront.

Lewis will be a good fit in a conservative State Senate, but Pearce loyalists will likely spend time unnecessarily sniping at him – and he may be a short termer, depending on what happens with redistricting.

City of Phoenix

In the Phoenix, union-backed Greg Stanton prevailed over Wes Gullet.  Thelda Williams prevailed over a challenge from the right.  One of the unspoken stories in that race was the Williams enjoyed strong support from the LDS community (who would typically be more aligned with a more conservative candidate) because of her work in helping the LDS Church preserve the ability to build a temple in the north reaches of Phoenix.  Daniel Valenzuela bested Brenda Sperduti.  After Jim Waring unseated a union boss in August, there is a pretty even split on how much union influence there will be at City Hall.

Who said politics was boring?

The Arizona Republic reports that it costs taxpayers an average of $100,000 per City of Phoenix employee. That’s not to say that some City of Phoenix employees don’t deserve to be paid appropriately for their work, they should. The rub is paying full-time employees for things that could easily be outsourced – like auto repair. How many companies do you know of that employ their own auto mechanics? Yeah, yeah, I’m sure Swift Transportation or Knight Transportation does, but that’s apples and oranges.

There is nothing wrong with sending cars that need to be serviced or repaired to a private auto shop. It would save taxpayers money, and the private company would have incentive to do a good job for a good price because they would want the repeat business.

The second rub is that we have City of Phoenix employees making more money than comparable jobs in the private sector. That doesn’t seem to make sense.

City Councilman Sal DiCiccio has been one of the few voices trying to educate people about what is going on, and he’s taking on some powerful interest groups, including the employee unions. It’s refreshing to see someone on the council who has the courage to take on the establishment and actually stand up for the average taxpayer.

Here is an interesting excerpt from the Republic story:

“Public-sector employees should not get paid more than their boss, the taxpayer,” DiCiccio said. “It’s skewed so far it’s almost embarrassing.”

The councilman has upset Mayor Phil Gordon, some council members and labor groups by proposing to outsource certain “non-strategic” city jobs to the private sector. For example, Phoenix spends $31 million a year to have city mechanics repair vehicles, he said; only $10 million is outsourced. He would like to see more work sent to private mechanics.

Luis Schmidt, a spokesman for the union that represents mechanics, said outsourcing those jobs could put police officers, firefighters and other employees who drive city vehicles at greater risk. Schmidt argues that city mechanics are better trained and more accountable than their private-sector counterparts.

So DiCiccio has upset the Mayor, other council members and the unions. And the mechanics union spokesman says police and firefighters would face greater risk if their vehicles were repaired by mechanics in the private sector. Seriously? That has to be one of the most absurd arguments I’ve ever heard.

We need more Sal DiCiccio’s standing up for the taxpayers. As a resident of Phoenix, I offer my personal thanks to the Councilman.

Bill Gates is now a Phoenix city councilman.  By a 5-3 vote, he was appointed to the vacancy created with Maria Baier’s appointment to be Arizona’s State Land Commissioner.

Gates is a solid pick.  He has been active in the community and is a smart, thoughtful attorney who will bring a strong work ethic and common sense approach to city government.  There is no question that he will have an immediate impact on the council.

I’ve had the chance to work with Bill on a variety of issues and known him for many years. This couldn’t happen to a nicer guy. Congrats Bill.

You see a story like this one, about Wal-Mart opening targeting a specifically Hispanic clientele, and the first thing that comes to mind is “Why didn’t they do that before?”

At least, that was my reaction.  Bashas’ has done it for years under the Food City banner and there have been a number of different chains that have catered to Hispanics.  Given Wal-Mart’s market share, you’d think they would have done this long ago.

So, it opens today – and my guess is that it is going to blow expectations out of the water.  Wal-Mart is a great store – it’s got everything.  I know there are a bunch of Wal-Mart bashers out there – whether you are a union supporter or a shopping snob – but at the end of the day they are good at what they do – sell a lot of stuff at affordable prices.

That will be the same with the new store at 89^th Ave and Thomas… and it should be.

Viva la Wal-Mart!

(I don’t know if that is correct Spanish grammar – my high school Spanish teacher, Mr. Allen, would be horrified if he knew how little I actually learned and retained.)

As if you needed more reason not to ride the light rail in Phoenix, this should keep you off for good. 

Around 8 a.m., a train was stopped for cleaning after a man smudged feces in the interior of the train. Police were told the man on the train was flicking and playing with feces.

The light rail operator was notified and quickly took the train out of service.

“It is a biohazard, and we have protocol for how we handle a situation like this,” says Hillary Foose. Those protocols include disinfecting the train.

Are we really surprised?  Riders have to hold it until the end of the line and they’re not required to wear pants, so of course this kind of crap was going to happen.

We are in the midst of a recession, our state and city budgets are being squeezed like nothing we’ve seen in generations, and yet the City of Phoenix wants to spend more than nine million dollars to buy raw desert.  Does this sound like a priority when we are constantly hearing about city employee layoffs, fewer police officers and fewer fire fighters?

This is the kind of thing that makes taxpayers cringe.  In this economy, that land is not going anywhere – particularly because it’s already designated as open space under the state’s Growing Smarter initiative.

I think the City needs to rethink the timing of this expenditure – or they need to be more honest about the real needs the city faces. Either we don’t have enough funding for law enforcement, or we do.  Just tell us the truth.

Hugo Chavez has done something Phoenix Mayor Phil Gordon wasn’t able to get done – he’s convinced the people to rescind term limits so we can be president for life.  The vote to kill term limits won with 56 percent of the vote with a turnout of about 67 percent.  That means a minority of voters in Venezuela have now potentially saddled all of Venezuela with a communist dictator for years to come.  Proof that not participating in the political process can have real consequences.

Waiting at the light at 19^th Ave and Camelback in Phoenix on Wednesday evening, I watched a northbound 3-car train go past with 18 passengers.  I then watched a southbound 3-car train go by with exactly 4 passengers.

Then I read the lede to today’s Arizona Republic story: Just as ridership is growing to record levels on the Valley’s public transit, authorities are edging closer to enacting big fare hikes.

Let me get this straight.  Ridership is at record levels, and there were 4 people on a train at 6:45 p.m. on a weeknight?  It only took one person to gain 50% in ridership?  I guess that makes it pretty easy to attain “record levels.” And now we’re worried that we’re going to reduce ridership because fares will go up?

Less than 30 days ago, light rail officials were reporting that they were “on track to meet or beat its ridership projections for the year.”  This was after exactly one week of operating with paying riders.

It’s not like there weren’t a lot of people telling us this wasn’t going to work.   We’ll just have to continue to pay for it for years and years to come.