Cover Story
2014: A Last Look Back!
Oh, 2014: The year the Democrats got smacked. Sony got hacked. Pima County Supervisor Ally Miller cracked. A saguaro went on the attack. And, if you’re anything like us, you didn’t end up with jack. While other, more reputable publications will recap the big stories of 2014, we’re once again remembering the little ones: The…
Independent Distillery to Begin Making Liquor Downtown This Spring
The local distilling world is about to get a bit bigger this spring when Independent Distillery fires up their fermenter and mash tun and still and starts cranking out locally made liquor downtown. Located off of Arizona Avenue between Congress Street and Broadway Boulevard next to the future Johnny Gibson Downtown Market, the distillery plans to…
Look Who Thinks We Should Spend $6.2 Trillion More On Education
Spend an extra $6.2 trillion on education over the next 20 years, get a return of $225 trillion on the investment. That’s what Randall Lane, who edits Forbes, suggests in the magazine’s December 15 issue (Hat tip to commenter Michael S. Ellegood for pointing me to the article). That’s Forbes, the business magazine. Lane discusses…
Supt. Diane Douglas Willing to Work with TUSD to Fix Culturally Relevant Curriculum Dilemma; H.T. Sanchez is Very Optimistic
The notice of noncompliance John Huppenthal sent out to TUSD on his last day as Arizona’s superintendent of schools Jan. 2, saying some of the district’s culturally relevant classes violated state law, is still on the table. But school district Superintendent H.T. Sanchez says Superintendent of Public Instruction Diane Douglas is willing to collaborate to…
Arizona Environmental and Wildlife Officials Continue to Push for an Update on the Recovery Plan for Endangered Mexican Gray Wolves
Arizona Game and Fish Tuesday served a notice of intent to the Department of Interior Secretary and the director of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. They hope to push for an updated recovery plan for Mexican gray wolves. From the Arizona Game and Fish release: “This Notice of Intent is an effort to ensure…
Time Is Running Out To Get Rid of Your Christmas Tree
If the spirit of the season is so strong in your household that you haven’t yet gotten rid of your Christmas tree, time is running out to dump it for free at one of the city’s TreeCycle spots. If you don’t drop it off by Sunday, Jan. 11, you’re stuck with it for another year.…
District Tavern to Close, Though It Isn’t Clear What Will Take the Longstanding Bar’s Place
Local music lovers and barflys alike will be sad to hear that, as of Saturday, Jan. 31, the District Tavern will be closed for business—at least as its known now. The District’s owner Noel Chester says the battle to keep her bar open in its current location actually began three and a half years ago…
After Many Years, Tucson Police Officers Roll Back Into TUSD Schools Today
The School Resource Officer program is alive again—after now six years—at some of Tucson Unified and Amphitheater school districts’ middle and high school campuses. Officers started rolling back into eight facilities today. The resurrection of the program concerned a lot of people, sparking protests over how SROs would deal with enforcement of Arizona’s immigration law…
UPDATE: TUSD Superintendent Sanchez Meeting with AZ Schools Chief Douglas Soon
After to speaking to several TUSD sources, they said Superintendent H.T. Sanchez and Superintendent of Public Instruction Diane Douglas are meeting today, Wednesday, and Douglas will release a statement after their meeting. That could be later today or very, very soon. I had a nice conversation with Tucson Unified School District Superintendent H.T. Sanchez earlier…
Mexican President Peña Nieto at White House Today to Talk About All But the 43 Missing Ayotzinapa Students
Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto is at the White House today to talk to President Obama about immigration, trade and what the two countries could do with this Cuba situation. I guess the main focus of the meeting, according to an article by The Washington Post, is Obama is looking to recruit Mexico, and other Latin…
I Know It’s True. I Read It In The Rolling Stone
Huppenthal’s parting shot at TUSD’s Culturally Relevant Curriculum made Rolling Stone, not because of its attack on the ethnic studies courses, but because Hupp mentioned a Rage Against The Machine song and KRS-One’s discussion of the nature of hip-hop. None of that is news to Tucsonans — it’s been all over the media — but this…
See “The Greatest Movie Ever Made” for Free at The Loft Tonight
Here’s your chance to see a cinematic classic for free! The Loft’s Essential Cinema program continues with L’Avventura at 7 p.m. tonight. You can find the details here. Here’s the Loft’s description of the film: One of modern cinema’s trailblazing works, and often cited as one of the greatest films ever made, L’Avventura is a…
Federal Judge Tells Joe Arpaio to Stop Workplace Raids; ACLU of Arizona Happy
Federal Judge David Campbell today said workplace raids ordered by Maricopa Sheriff Joe Arpaio and Maricopa County Attorney Bill Montgomery are probably unconstitutional and should stop immediately, until a final decision is reached on the issue. This preliminary injunction in the suit Puente v. Arpaio prohibits Arpaio and Montgomery from enforcing two Arizona laws that…
Arizona’s Most Iconic Restaurant Is a Tucson Institution
The list-making mecca Thrillist released a list of the most iconic restaurants and each state and Arizona’s title went to El Charro. Though the article says that the list makers searched for more that just which restaurant was oldest, factoring in “tons of research, awkward cold calls, and several cross country trips,” you kind of…
Ducey Is Sworn In as Governor, but Write-In Candidate Claims He Was Robbed of Rightful Victory Through Fraud
Republican Doug Ducey may have been sworn in as governor earlier today, but write-in gubernatorial candidate J.J. Johnson says he’s the real winner of the race. Shane Dale of the Casa Grande Dispatch reports: He received the most votes of any write-in candidate in this year’s Arizona governor’s race, and the fifth-most votes among all…
Fewer Catalina Mountain Lions Being Killed by Hunters Since Bighorn Sheep Reintroduction, AZ Game & Fish Says
In 2013, Arizona Game and Fish began its on-going program to reintroduce bighorn sheep to the Santa Catalina Mountains. At the time, 31 of them were relocated to the area from Yuma. More than half of that herd were killed by mountain lions a few months later – causing the department to eliminate three of…
Get Lunch Downtown Tomorrow at the Food Truck Rally
Clear your lunch schedule tomorrow and prepare pencil this in. The food trucks are headed downtown on Jan. 6 to broaden your lunch options for the day. Whether you’re craving German fare, pizza, hot dogs, or even Caribbean eats, there definitely something better cooking at the Tucson Food Truck Rally outside the main library than…
A Final Political Kumbaya Moment (Before The Nastiness Begins)
Savor this moment. Maybe clip a few of these quotes and hang them on your wall for future reference. Our new Governor Ducey and Superintendent of Public Instruction Douglas have shown us their nonpartisan, sensitive sides in their final comments before taking office. Here are a few lovely moments Diane Douglas gave us in an…
Ducey Inaugurated as Governor, But AZ’s Finances Are a Hot Mess
While the spectacle of Gov. Doug Ducey’s inauguration day in Phoenix is undoubtedly glorious, the days ahead might not be so pretty. The Arizona Legislature has a long list of topics that lawmakers are likely to tackle when they get back to work next week. You can expect Republicans to make another run at expanding…
Mars Got Some Snowy Frost, Too
NASA/JPL/University of Arizona Tucson wasn’t the only place that had a nice, white frosting in recent days. The UA’s HiRISE camera, aboard the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, snapped this gorgeous photo of the frost melting in a Martian gully a few weeks ago. HiRISE researchers note: “At this time of year only south-facing slopes retain the…
Tonight at the Loft: Mondo Monday Madness with “The Hideous Sun Demon”
Looking for a cheap night out? It doesn’t get much better than a $3 ticket for the Loft Cinema’s showing of The Hideous Sun Demon at 8 p.m. tonight: Good old radiation helps transform a straitlaced scientist into a hideous reptile freak whenever he’s exposed to the sun in this classically cruddy hunk of ‘50s…
Speaking Of Mexican American Studies, A New Court Case Begins January 12
No-longer-superintendent John Huppenthal’s parting shot across TUSD’s bow has been much in the news lately, including a few posts here at the Range. Hupp, not content with successfully dismantling the TUSD’s Mexican American Studies program, has been itching to do the same to the district’s current Culturally Relevant Curriculum, a similar (but not identical) program…
Arne Duncan: “The division between young people and the police is huge.”
[Note: I wrote this awhile before New Years and it got lost in the end-of-the-year shuffle, so it may sound a bit dated. But I’ve been reading a whole lot about the problems with mass incarceration, mandatory sentencing and the school-to-prison pipeline and plan to write more about the topics this year. So consider this…
TUSD Responds to Arizona Education Department Saying District’s ‘Culturally Relevant’ Classes Violate State Law
As reported earlier, Tucson Unified School District was found in violation of A.R.S. §15-112 – a law that’s meant to prevent schools from “promoting resentment towards a particular race among other, overthrowing the United States government, and advocating ethnic solidarity over treatment of people as individuals.” Outgoing Gov. Jan Brewer signed the law in 2010. Two years…
TUSD Found in Violation of State Law
John Huppenthal, who is serving his final days as Superintendent of Public Instruction, notified Tucson Unified School District that it is in violation of A.R.S. §15-112. The law in question prevents schools from promoting resentment towards a particular race among other, overthrowing the United States government, and advocating ethnic solidarity over treatment of people as individuals. If the TUSD…
Sneak Peek: “Zona Politics” Year in Review, Part 2
Zona Politics Eps.12 from Zona Politics with Jim Nintzel on Vimeo. On this week’s Zona Politics with Jim Nintzel: Former state lawmaker Jonathan Paton and attorney Jeff Rogers finish our conversation about the big political stories of 2014 and and look ahead to what we can expect in 2015. We talk about the influence of…
Who Wants Tickets for a UA Basketball Game?
We’ve got a pair of tickets to the UA Men’s basketball game on Jan. 17 against the Utah Utes, and we want you to take ’em. All you have to do is email me at chelo@tucsonlocalmedia.com with the subject line “GO WILDCATS” sometime before the end of the day on Monday, Jan. 5th. I’ll pick…
Pima Animal Care Center Hosts Free Adoption Event This Weekend
In an effort to find permanent housing for approximately 200 pets this weekend, Pima Animal Care Center is offering free adoptions this weekend. According to the Pima Animal Care Center website, adoption fees can be anywhere from $30 to $100, so saving your new pet this weekend could save you some money too. The event…
Support this Very Cool, Body Positive Photo Book
There’s a lot of new that I’m excited about in 2015. There’s the Breaking Bad spin off (please be good) and that Hawaiian brunch place opening downtown sometime next month… and now there’s CURVES by Victoria Janashvili. Here at the Weekly, we’re all about body love. We love it when people feel good about who they are,…
Department of Education tells Harvard to Protect Students from Sexual Assault
In the last year, there’s been a lot of news about campus rape. Colleges generally didn’t know what to do with themselves as students protested leniency with attackers and accused rapists defended their honor. This week, the U.S. Department of Education is saying they had better figure it out. Because of increased attention and organizations…
Start 2015 off with Some Yoga at These Spots Around Tucson
I’d like to extend all of my respect out for the folks who will wake up tomorrow, ready to greet the new year with more than just the last half of a cold burrito and a headache. For those do-gooders and teetotalers, you can start 2015 off with intentions set and a good stretch by heading…
Transgender Teen’s Suicide: Parents, There Are Resources Out There That Can Help You Support Your Child
If you’ve used the Internet in the past few days, you probably already saw Leelah Alcorn’s story. The 17-year-old from Ohio committed suicide by jumping in front of a tractor trailer on Sunday morning. A note set to publish on her Tumblr a few hours after her death detailed the why. In her note, she referred…
AZ Supreme Court Green Lights Lawsuit Against Brewer’s Medicaid Expansion
Less than a week before Gov. Jan Brewer officially stops being governor, she gets a blow from the Arizona Supreme Court. Her expansion of Medicaid may get kicked. Her move to sign that bill was actually a good one, though. From The Associated Press today. The Arizona Supreme Court is allowing a lawsuit challenging Gov.…
Cannabis and cancer
Cannabis Therapeutic treatments are emerging and gaining acceptance across the globe, but with no FDA approval or large scale double blind studies done in the USA to fall back on where does one go for reliable information about these treatments? There is respected science about these issues coming from Israel, England and other parts of…
Support the Tucson Folk Festival
Every May the past 30 years the Tucson Folk Festival reminds us it’s OK to slow down a bit, as well as of the importance of picking out a good lawn chair to enjoy the music from. So to keep the festival going, the Tucson Kitchen Musicians Association with KXCI Radio returns with the Headliners…
Nine Questions
Andrés Cano Andrés Cano, a native Tucsonan, is an aide and community liaison to Pima County Supervisor Richard Elías. To kick off 2015, Andrés will be receiving the Henry “Hank” Oyama Community Leadership Award from Amistades, Inc., at their annual Segundo de Febrero commemoration. Andrés, 22, is an emerging and active community advocate with ties…
Keep Tucson Legal Clinic Needs Volunteers
It’s a new year, which comes with great opportunities for you to do some good in our city. Keep Tucson Together is looking for volunteers to help handle increased traffic in its DACA applicants legal clinic. They are also looking for sponsors for a proposed outreach session to provide more info, guidance and forms to…
Soundbites
I have to start this off with a confession: I’m writing this on Christmas Eve and I’m scratching my head, wondering why there’s next to no shows listed for the first week of January. Sure, it’s a case of the post-holidays hangover in full effect; most people don’t feel like doing anything at the dawn…
Much Needed Post-New Year’s Art and Music Breaks
The first show at Contreras Gallery and Jewelry should be particularly sweet and lovely. Tucson artist Mary Theresa Dietz’s new show, “The Dream,” opens Saturday, Jan. 3 at the 110 E. 6th St. gallery, from 6 to 9 p.m. For more info, visit www.contrerashousefineart.com. Take in some art, but get back to dancing. Catch Mik…
Editor’s Note
Today is the first day of 2015 and I don’t want to rattle off a list of resolutions. We all know what we each need to do to make our lives better. For the city and county, that’s a resolutions list that could go on forever—how we could take better care of our citizenry, run…
New Year, New Art
Jan Olsson is best known for edgy Paris cityscapes. In jazzy expressionist works, human figures float in angular spaces, and coffee cups hover over round café tables. Her new show at Davis Dominguez does a 180. Instead of Paris, where Olsson now lives, she paints the Tucson desert and other remembered childscapes. Instead of arty,…
Police Dispatch
He Drinks Alone Foothills Area Nov. 24, 10:20 a.m. Intense loneliness apparently compelled a man to cause a ruckus at a sports bar—yelling at, flipping off and waving a pretend gun at people whom he felt had snubbed him, a Pima County Sheriff’s Department report stated. Sheriff’s deputies responded to a north-side Famous Sam’s, where…
Best of in Cinema
1. “Birdman” Worth the hype and then some, “Birdman,” for my money, is a couple laps ahead of everything else this year. Much attention has been paid to the film’s uninterrupted long takes, and it’s a great distraction from what’s really going on here. “Birdman” brings us an actor (Michael Keaton) fighting to get out…
Road Unblock
It’s been more than two years since President Barack Obama pissed off Gov. Jan Brewer when he relieved hundreds of thousands of undocumented young immigrants around the country from deportation, and gave them work permits and Social Security cards. Brewer responded by issuing her own executive action: None of them were to get driver’s licenses…
The Skinny
All Quiet on the Campaign Front What if they had an election and nobody ran? As we enter 2015, it looks like it could be a rough year for political junkies. The odd years bring us Tucson City Council elections. This year, Mayor Jonathan Rothschild is wrapping up his first term and looking for a…
Media Watch
Cathy Green concludes 40-year media sales career Cathy Green is a believer in the five-year plan, and while it wasn’t always precisely implemented during her four-decade electronic media sales run in Tucson, it certainly set the stage for a multitude of employers along the way. Her sales career includes stints with KOLD TV and numerous…
Ask a Mexican!
Dear Mexican: How did the patron saint of Mexico get a name derived from Arabic? El Moro Judio Dear Jewish Moor: You’re referring to the Virgin of Guadalupe, the brown-skinned apparition of the Virgin Mary who tradition says appeared before the Aztec peasant Juan Diego in December 1531 just outside modern-day Mexico City. As you…
Danehy
Please let me make this clear: These are my favorites from the past year. It’s not a “Best of” compilation. If it were and I went along with all of the “experts,” I’d have to lavish praise on a movie called “Boyhood” (which I have no desire to see) and a new album by Lana…
Guest Opinion
While volunteers break their backs digging out buffelgrass in Southern Arizona, the U.S. Department of Agriculture is promoting a cold-resistant strain that will spread it even further. While Saguaro National Park sprays herbicides on buffelgrass with helicopters, Texas calls Pennisetum ciliare its “wonder grass.” Buffelgrass is deliberately grown as cattle feed on millions of acres.…
A Delicate Balance
The team at Neo Malaysian Kitchen and Sushi have been around Tucson in various iterations and at different venues for nearly 30 years. Many of you may remember Seri Malaka, the restaurant that introduced Malaysian fare to the Old Pueblo. And then there was Om, a modern fusion place in the Foothills. Now there is…
The worst… Oh, the Suffering
1. The Identical This strange Elvis/Bible Thumping movie hybrid is, and always will be, one of the worst movies that will ever be made. It’s of legendary badness, like “The Room” and Roberto Benigni’s “Pinocchio.” You have to be really bad to top the next film on this list in badness. 2. Blended Wow. Just…wow.…
Noshing Around
THE YEAR IN FOOD So, 2015 is amongst us. In the spirit of the new year, I thought I would take a page out of the VH1, E!, etc., playbook and do a good ol’ “The Year That Was, Top Ten” list. Yes, it is very cliché, and completely subjective to my opinion, (limited) memory,…
Cinema Showdown
LAUGH FOR A CHANGE Usually politically-themed documentaries aren’t exactly funny—maybe funny in that so sad you have to laugh sort of way, but not intentionally funny. Well, the Yes Men, an activist duo known for impersonating corporate and political mouthpieces and disseminating misinformation, are actually funny on purpose in their documentary “The Yes Men Are…
This Week in Craft Beer
Another year of mighty growth has come and gone for the craft beer industry, paving a path toward an even brighter future as breweries that opened during the first phase of the craft beer renaissance find their footing and expand their operations to new markets. There is no end to this story, but changes to…
Local Love
January After announcing the year-end closure of Toxic Ranch Records from its location of nearly 20 years, on Sixth Street at Fourth Avenue, in October, 2013 due to rising rent fees, owner Bill Sassenberger sees a groundswell of support for the store, which finds a new home—albeit short-lived; Toxic Ranch as a brick-and-mortar entity is…
Nine on the Line
Adam Yeager is a Tucson native and executive chef of Zinburger Wine & Burger Bar (River location). He started early here in town, making that other daily publication in the first grade as a “Little Chef.” He attended Cook Street School of Fine Cooking in Colorado, and ultimately decided just to jump into the flourishing…
