Before it’s too late. Part One.
It might be different if Tucson’s broader political, social, and economic vibe, i.e. had even half-a-perspective more in alignment with the state in general. One prevailing, or even having a chance to prevail, but this is clearly not the case. Ditto anything creative, innovative, or economically vibrant.
Tucson is an increasingly aberrant, dysfunctional, ossified urbanity; the State of Arizona coerced into becoming its unwilling codependent. Its weak leadership has now spawned a conspiratorial urban pathology that actively seeks expansion to the rest of Arizona, infecting its nutty, aberrant world views on everyone, (remember the recent bullet-dodged, Prop 140? hatched in the “Dirty T” by their goofy elites). Next up: “Tucson-TSC”, i.e. Trump Sanctuary City, as their (recently re-elected) PimaCo Sheriff Nanos openly refuses to enforce any federal border restrictions.
But Arizona taxpayers still fund a large part of all this. How crazy is that?
So, how might this new, ‘UnFunding’ be accomplished? Simple: Let ‘em live with the Consequences
- Let ‘em live with the consequences of a 1.1 million Metro that’s ~40% UN-incorporated, has “At-Large” elections guaranteeing Dimshevik Party municipal dominance, an increasingly rampant criminality, and a fentanyl subculture worthy of ‘Breaking Bad’. One policed by an incompetent County Sheriff, who supposedly patrols intown from subdivisions, to a 9200 sq. mile desert territory stretching almost 200 miles, and where a Soros’ sock-puppet is County Attorney. And let’s not forget the political Godfather here, Raul Grijalva, who in his congressional career attained major committee chairmanship status, but was rarely held accountable by Tucson’s impotent civic leadership to “bring home the bacon.”
- Let ‘em live with the consequences of an antigrowth mentality that won’t allow outside investment. Where $9-figure, highly confidential, prospective industrial recruitments, potentially employing thousands, mysteriously get threatening, official legal letters from Tucson’s large Left-wing orgs about being sued and obstructed with wacky environmental claims. And they’ve bankrupted past utilities, and then threaten current electric company investors (Fortis) with a forced muni buy-out from a City government who couldn’t run a C-store.
- Let ‘em live with the consequences of a disastrous, ineffective transportation matrix; one fought over constantly with their RTA’s (Regional Transportation Authority) funding battles; a 1.1 million Metro (~460+ sq. miles) with ZERO crosstown freeways, awful-butt-ugly-potholed city residential streets, no landscaping on the few major arterials, and squandering nearly a $ billion in precious transport funds and ancillary private interruptions, on a short-line, now largely unridden, downtown streetcar. And they deliberately prevent any major outer lying bypasses to their murderous, congested I-10 …because “they could stimulate shovel-ready industrial sites.” [God forbid, our poor locals & university grads get good family-wage jobs]
- Let ‘em live with the consequences of their fantasy ‘Green Desert’ world. Where wealthy weirdo elites have flocked in from the West Coast and the US Northeast “Paper Belt” (DC-to-Boston), etc. All with zero respect for the border culture, but arrogantly willing to spend big bucks to inflict their nutty political sophistication & self-loathing guilt on the hapless locals. Come for your mountainside trophy house and stay for those world famous ‘dive restaurants’ (the great UN told us so), in between our fentanyl & gangbanger street culture. And a bonus: hundreds of ‘see-and-be-seen’ useless charities to star in. But let’s not forget our lost symphony & opera venues (to Phoenix), and AAA-baseball (to El Paso), with all the other things (Mt. Lemmon tram, commuter air to the Baja, crosstown freeways, etc) we simply cannot do.
- Let ‘em live with the consequences of forcing the population to drink reconstituted sewage water, from a very complex electro-mechanical system these feckless Lefty wingnuts will manage. Oh, such-a-deal! Trust us! Maybe it’s a scheme for New Age guru (among the city’s thousands), Andrew Weil, to monetize your gut bacteria? And don’t forget “planting a million trees.” Without water. In the desert. Tucson’s weak leadership would never think of getting its bloated land grant university (the local state-jobs gravy train) to study & effect how using new SMR (small modular reactors) and graphene desalination tech, would give all Arizona & Sonora uber-cheap, unlimited clean water.
- Let ‘em live with the consequences of that main state-jobs gravy train, the University of Arizona, gaslighting the gullible yokels on a myriad of shallow govt-job-creating, collegiate Kabuki plays. While UA invests its serious money elsewhere in giant tech-ag parks in Pinal County, and an expanding multi-billion $$$ biomedical tech complex in Phoenix. Who’s going to tell those left behind? As the state’s Dimshevik Party actively plots to remake its fiefdom, i.e. the state’s flagship University … will it be the local propaganda rag who tells? Whose moniker has been known for decades as the RedStar newspaper? Fat chance of that.
The list could easily go on, but you get the idea.
Seriously Arizona, you gotta stop spending ANY marginal tax money on this place; you’re throwing it down a rat hole until they effect some seminal changes, and with their confirmed weak leadership, I don’t see that happening anytime soon.
Part 2 coming: Bypassing Tucson; How Arizona can Zero-Out the “Dirty T” and Force Its Reform
Sellers is a Southpark, Roosevelt-Republican (TR) living in incorporated Oro Valley; his background is federal technology commercialization, and administers the private group, Tucson E-P-T News, on Facebook