Cover Story
To Mourn and to Honor
On a recent dark night, under the half-light of a waxing moon, gusty winds swept through Tucson. At the Splinter Brothers and Sisters Warehouse studios, just east of the railroad tracks, a chain-link fence rattled in the breeze. Every once in a while, a train whistle wailed. The weather had shifted, with October’s balmy Indian…
More Layoffs at the ‘Star’
It was another rough day for the folks who toil at the morning daily. Sources tell the Weekly that another half-dozen or so Arizona Daily Star employees were laid off or otherwise given their walking papers today. We’re hearing that those employees include much of the library staff, online dude Eric Hess and metro team…
Wine Line
The “Wine Line” is going to put your wine worries to rest. It works like this: Send your wine inquiries to wineline@loewshotels.com, or post them on Facebook by visiting the Loews Hotels Facebook page and clicking on the “Wine Line” tab. All that’s left then is to kick back with a bottle of good merlot…
Since Red Star Asked: The Latest From Mars!
NASA/JPL/University of Arizona Pitted Layers Northeast of Hellas Region Red Star is complaining that we didn’t share a postcard from Mars last week. (Actually, we think we did.) Nonetheless, we’ll take any excuse to share these gorgeous snapshots, so this one is for him. More from the UA’s awesome HiRISE here.
City Election Final Canvass Numbers: Coming Soon
We’re sure you’re dying to know about how many voters turned out on the east side and whether Steve Kozachik actually won Ward 6 in last week’s election, but the City Council was not able to approve the official canvass at Monday’s meeting. The county canvass is now in the city’s hands, but the IT…
Daily Show Mocks Shadegg’s Baby Talk
It appears we weren’t the only ones laughing at Arizona Congressman John Shadegg’s absurd use of Baby Maddie as a prop in the health-care debate. The Daily Show With Jon Stewart Mon – Thurs 11p / 10c <td style='padding:2px 1px 0px 5px;' colspan='2'The Men Who Stare at Votes www.thedailyshow.com Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor…
Developer Outbids WAMO for Solar Culture Building
Steven Eye’s Solar Culture Gallery is now in on the endangered list. Dave Devine reports that developer Steve Fenton outbid the Warehouse Arts Management Organization at an auction this morning, buying the Solar Culture warehouse for $101,000. See last week’s Skinny for other information. More to come as news develops.
Congressman John Shadegg’s New Prop
The New York Times brings us this tidbit from this weekend’s health-care debate in the U.S. House of Representatives: Representative John Shadegg, Republican of Arizona, held up the tiniest prop so far, a little girl called Maddie, 7 months old, whom he introduced as the daughter of a staff member. After saying he wished she…
Weekend Warriors, or Birds of a Feather
They lack the body fat to make it through the winter, so they travel in small packs, sometimes three or four abreast, often blocking the shared paths and causing bigger animals to slow to a crawl. After a calorie-burning circuit, they prance about the cafe in special shoes, wrap-around shades and flamboyant spandex. The wind…
Latest Election Results: Uhlich Leads By 195 Votes
The final City of Tucson election results: Democratic Councilwoman Karin Uhlich now leads Republican challenger Ben Bueher-Garcia by 195 votes. Republican Steve Kozachik now leads Democrat Nina Trasoff by 1,728 votes. Prop 400 is now losing by 927 votes. Uhlich has released a statement: I want to congratulate my two opponents, Ben Buehler-Garcia and Mary…
Friday Roundtable: Elex Wrap, Special Session and Ann Brown Says Goodbye To All That
We bid goodbye to Star editorial page editor Ann Brown as she departs the morning daily and the Arizona Illustrated Friday Roundtable.
Friday Roundtable: Police Chief Villaseñor and Fire Chief Kelly
Police Chief Roberto Villaseñor and Fire Chief Patrick Kelly stopped by the Friday Roundtable. We got them to confess to their photo-radar speeding violations! Watch it after the jump.
Warehouse Auction Update
We mentioned in The Skinny this week that the state-owned warehouse that’s home to Solar Culture is set to go to auction on Tuesday: More than two decades ago, artist Steven Eye first opened the doors to an abandoned downtown produce warehouse on Toole Avenue that he had rented for the princely sum of $300…
Discounts for Veterans
Veterans Day is Wednesday, Nov. 11. Here’s a sampling of discounts offered to veterans at some local and national establishments. Hats off to these organizations, and to all current and former members of the military, thank you for your service. Every day:-Sport Clips offers veterans and active-duty service men and women a 20 percent discount.…
Walkup Gets Towel-Snapped By GOP
The Weekly’s token libertarian, Jonathan Hoffman, delivers this dispatch from the GOP celebration on election night: Mayor Bob Walkup showed up long enough to give a few interviews and leave. Though a Republican, Mayor Walkup is not very popular with members of the party. He did nothing for the Republican city council candidates, and when…
The Arizona Daily Star Is Now Friends With Scott Stiteler
The morning daily proclaims in a hard-hitting editorial, “Facebook Group is shortsighted, destructive”: We’re distressed and baffled by a destructive Facebook group that is opposing the planned 7,000-square-foot restaurant and bar at the southwest corner of Fifth Avenue and East Congress Street, across from the Rialto Theatre block. Former state lawmaker Tom Prezelski’s response on…
Colbert Celebrates AZ Prison-Privatization Plan
I was catching up with Colbert and noticed that he had high praise for the Arizona Legislature’s plan to privatize the prison system. “Let’s replace the long arm of the law with the invisible hand of the market!” The Colbert Report Mon – Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c <td style='padding:2px 1px 0px 5px;' colspan='2'The Word -…
‘Star’ Buyout Rumors (updated): Layoffs on the Way?
Rumors are starting to bubble up regarding the list of people who agreed to take the Arizona Daily Star’s buyout offer—and the biggest name on that list so far is Opinion page editor Ann Brown. Those taking the buyout will celebrate their last day of employment at the Star tomorrow, Nov. 6 John Schuster and…
Prop 207 Victory For Goodman? Not So Fast…
The Goldwater Institute has spoken on its lawsuit on behalf of developer Michael Goodman vs. the city of Tucson, calling Pima County Superior Court Judge Paul Tang’s ruling a victory for Prop 207, the Private Property Rights Protection Act passed in 2006: “Arizona voters overwhelmingly embraced greater protection of private property rights,” said Clint Bolick,…
Election Autopsy With Jim Nintzel and John C. Scott
Arizona Illustrated host Bill Buckmaster invited me and radio ringmaster John C. Scott down to the studio to read the tea leaves from the city election. Watch it after the jump.
Latest Election Results: Buehler-Garcia Down By 246 Votes
The latest City of Tucson election results: Democratic Councilwoman Karin Uhlich now leads Republican challenger Ben Bueher-Garcia by 246 votes. That race remains tight, but Uhlich picked up a handful in the latest round. Republican Steve Kozachik now leads Democrat Nina Trasoff by 1,675 votes. Prop 400 is now losing by 783 votes. Pima County…
HiRISE Spots Phoenix!
NASA/JPL/University of Arizona Here’s one I missed in all the election excitement: The HiRISE camera aboard Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter has spotted the Phoenix Mars Lander on the frosty northern plains of Mars. Lori Stiles of University Communications tells us: The HiRISE camera aboard NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter captured one image of the Phoenix lander on…
Latest Election Results: Black Swan Triumphant!
The latest City of Tucson election results: Republican Steve Kozachik now leads Democrat Nina Trasoff by 1,722 votes. The Black Swan looks unbeatable! Democratic Councilwoman Karin Uhlich now leads Republican challenger Ben Bueher-Garcia by 240 votes. That race keeps getting closer and closer. Prop 400 is now losing by 784 votes.
Early Ballots: The Numbers
Pima County Recorder F. Ann Rodriguez has done her usual efficient job of plowing through the piles of early ballots dropped off at the last minute by irresponsible voters who take forever to make up their minds. (We’re sympathetic to the perspective that you ought to hang onto the ballots just in case something breaks…
MiniDorm Update: Goodman Beats Tucson In Pima County Superior Court
UA-area developer Michael Goodman has prevailed in Pima County Superior Court in a legal fight with the city of Tucson over whether he could demolish existing houses and build mini-dorms. Details to follow. Here’s more on Goodman’s fight with the city and the neighborhoods.
City Election ’09 Overtime Edition: Your Ballot-Counting Update
Here’s the latest out of Pima County Elections: An estimated 5,000 to 7,000 remaining ballots will be run through the machines beginning around 1 p.m. It’s expected to take two or three hours and we should get some new results online sometime after 3 or 4 p.m. Stay tuned!
Attention, All Pickup Artists: No Peacocking
Omar Tonsi Eldakar The water strider on the right, identified by the blue-red-white dot sequence, is a highly aggressive male who is trying to break up a mating pair. The male water strider with the white-yellow-blue dots is on top of a female who had green dots on her head. UA scientist Omar Tonsi Eldakar…
Brewer’s In!
Gov. Jan Brewer makes it official: She’s going for a full term in 2010.
Paton Vs. Giffords?
In this morning’s Star, Rhonda explores the anti-incumbency mood that helped Republican Steve Kozachik to his apparent victory over incumbent Democrat Nina Trasoff and has helped Republican Ben Buehler-Garcia stay in the race against Democrat Karin Uhlich as the lingering votes are tallied in the next couple of days. We touched on that theme in…
Top Ten in Books
Antigone Books best-sellers for the week
Media Watch
The end for some ‘Star’ employees; Black Chamber launches ‘Vanguard’; Fox 11 Diggs weekend weather; Lizarde lastest addition at KVOA; Arizona Public Media pledge drive delivers strong numbers
Status Quo—Mostly
Tucson voters overwhelmingly rejected a proposition that would have forced the city to drastically expand the police and fire departments—but the race between Nina Trasoff and Steve Kozachik remained too close to call as of our press deadline. With early ballots (mailed by the deadline) and all but one of the precincts counted, more than…
Noshing Around
The Hog Pit The Hog Pit Smokehouse Bar and Grill has opened in the old Taco Bron location at 6910 E. Tanque Verde Road. We stopped in and found friendly employees and a mouth-watering smokiness permeating the building. Big portions and a menu of smokehouse favorites had people smiling; a biker theme seems to pull…
The Future
Every so often, an unplanned theme seems to miraculously emerge from an issue of the Tucson Weekly. It’s happened this week. The theme: The future of Southern Arizona. In Opinion, Tom Danehy weighs in with some thoughts on the future of city government and the arts, while Irene Messina makes the case that Tucson needs…
Delicious and Diverse
Tucson’s Greek community is thriving despite the down economy. There have been several recent additions to the Greek-restaurant scene, including a newer chain restaurant with a couple of locations. Having Cypriot in-laws, I get exposed to a lot of delicious homemade Greek food, so I am a tough critic. One of the most recent additions…
Police Dispatch
ON A ROLL EAST BENSON HIGHWAY OCT. 10, 2:41 A.M. A drunk man rolled around in the road for no apparent reason, according to a Pima County Sheriff’s Department report. Responding to a “man down” call, a deputy made contact with a witness on East Benson Highway, where a male subject had reportedly been rolling…
Patagonia Pluckers
It bears a sharp resemblance to a beached carp, although that lumbering fish doesn’t officially exist in the 265 rippling acres of Patagonia Lake. With a little toe-nudging, however, my lethargic find turns out to be a yellowing, water-logged oven mitt. Oven mitts aren’t listed as a game species here, either. But such garbage does…
24 Hours Later …
Hooray! Hooray! It’s Play-in-a-Day! The enthusiasm voiced by those who are familiar with this crash course in creativity is downright infectious. First launched seven years ago by the Old Pueblo Playwrights, this year’s Play-in-a-Day competition happens this Friday and Saturday. Here’s the drill: Friday night, six teams of two playwrights each are sent off to…
The Skinny
CLOUDS OVER SOLAR CULTURE? More than two decades ago, artist Steven Eye first opened the doors to an abandoned downtown produce warehouse on Toole Avenue that he had rented for the princely sum of $300 a month from the Arizona Department of Transportation. That warehouse, which had been acquired by the state and was slated…
Accolades and Shortcomings
Tony Kushner’s Angels in America is a very important play. It is not, however, a very good play. Angels in America follows the lives of two couples as their paths intersect with the AIDS crisis in New York City in the mid-’80s. When Prior Walter confesses to his partner, Louis Ironson, that he has been…
On the Field
If you were a huge fan of British soccer in the 1970s, then The Damned United is exactly the Brian Clough biopic you’ve been waiting for. It’s got all the Brian Clough goodness you need, including Clough’s awesome meltdown with Derby County, the ensuing debacle at Leeds United, and the heartwarming relationship between Clough and…
A Very Tucson Celebration
Music, says Joey Burns of Calexico, is “part of remembering the dead in daily life.” Every time he picks up his old black-and-white accordion, he remembers his grandfather. “My mom’s dad was a doctor, a German-American who played accordion,” Burns says. “He gave me the accordion before he passed. I play it on all our…
Live
Peaches, Men
Michael’s Sad End
It’s no secret that Michael Jackson owed a lot of money when he died—and lots of people wanted to get paid. Chief among those were the folks putting together Jackson’s London-based concert series, a 50-date engagement dubbed “This Is It!” It was supposed to be a big payday for creditors, as well as Jackson’s triumphant…
Selling Adventure
Ever since he joined Green on Red 25 years ago, I’ve wanted to ask singer-songwriter and guitarist Chuck Prophet if he was born with that last name. He set the record straight in an interview last week. “Would I make that up?” he said, in mock offense. A longtime favorite in the Old Pueblo, Prophet…
Icon in Jeopardy
Buffelgrass is forcing us to think the unthinkable: A Sonoran Desert in which the saguaro cactus is no longer the master of the landscape. Is this really possible? Could Arizona’s cherished icon vanish from a substantial portion of its range? Actually, yes. The problem is fire. The Nature Conservancy biologist Dale Turner says the density…
Guest Opinion
They want you to give up and leave,” someone shouted recently at a Tucson Arizona Department of Economic Security office. Those hopeful of receiving benefits and the chair-swiveling number-callers both seemed justifiably indignant. The language was R-rated, and the mood was bleak. The Arizona Department of Economic Security’s Web site includes text that reads, “Every…
Ask a Mexican!
Dear Mexican: Why do beaners or gabachos deliberately try to ignore white people and act like they’re not there? Or when you’re walking by, why do the lady beaners laugh so hard with a repulsive fake laugh that makes you want to just punch them? Not only I have noticed this; a lot of other…
The Internet, Now on Paper!
As some of you have noticed, there is more to the Tucson Weekly than just the dead-tree version that you hold in your hands (or that you read using the hand-less method of laying it on a table). Our online presence extends from our Web site to a Flickr page (which displays photo galleries you…
Mailbag
Claim: The Damage Done by Illegal Immigrants Should Be a Censored Story I think you left out the biggest story not covered by the mainstream media in 2008 and 2009 (“Censored! Oct. 22). The damage done by illegal immigration is almost a taboo subject within the mainstream media. They filter the truth and facts through…
Soundbites
ALL SOULS PREPARES FOR ITS CLOSE-UP If you haven’t seen the mural painted on the east wall of the Rialto Theatre, you might think that Sunday’s show there is just another Calexico concert (not that there’s anything wrong with that). It is not. Sunday is, of course, the day that this year’s annual All Souls…
Now Showing at Home
Anvil: The Story of Anvil; Up (Blu-Ray); Monty Python: Almost the Truth (Blu-Ray); Chéri
Alec Ounsworth: Mo Beauty (Anti-)
This pairing of a nasally voiced indie rocker from the Northeast with a collection of New Orleans musicians has yielded a strange hybrid, like alienation finding a solid footing. Clap Your Hands Say Yeah singer, songwriter and guitarist Alec Ounsworth journeyed to the Crescent City with producer Steve Berlin, who assembled an all-star band of…
Top Ten in Movies
Casa Video’s top rentals for the week
Mark Knopfler: Get Lucky (Reprise)
Each release from ex-Dire Straits mastermind Mark Knopfler secures his rep as a classic songwriter—at the expense of his ranking as a guitarist. Knopfler’s sixth solo effort, Get Lucky, is his best in terms of his material, yet it’s his weakest fret-board effort. It’s a tradeoff that many will accept given the cinematic language in…
T Q&A
Bob Benzinger
Monsters of Folk: Monsters of Folk (Shangri-La)
In moments of cynicism, blasphemous notions pop into my head. One example: There should be a one-month hiatus on all new bands. However, should such a fascistic ban occur, projects like Monsters of Folk might not be born, and the world would be a much darker place. The artists behind Monsters of Folk are by…
Nine Questions
Bridgitte Thum
Danehy
By the time you read this, the Tucson city elections will be over, and we’ll all know whether Steve Kozachik pulled the upset over Nina Trasoff, if Ben Buehler-Garcia came close enough to put a scare into Karin Uhlich, and if Shaun McClusky pulled even 30 percent against Steve Leal’s anointed successor, Richard Fimbres. Then…
City Week
<h3Tucson in the Movies CoyoteMoon Films launch with Time and Again and Se Habla Español 7 p.m., Saturday, Nov. 7 Crossroads 6 Grand Cinemas 4811 E. Grant Road 327-7067; www.coyotemoonfilms.com It’s always exciting to see your town on the big screen. You recognize that building; you’ve driven along that street; you’ve shopped in that store.…
Messina
Review some of the Old Pueblo’s rankings in various surveys, and the picture isn’t pretty. In February of this year, Tucson was no. 18 in BusinessWeek’s “America’s Unhappiest Cities.” This summer, we ranked no. 12 in the Old Spice “Sweatiest Cities” survey. And in October, the folks at The Daily Beast rated Tucson a mediocre…
Mesquite Mania!
Sometimes you just get a hankering for good pancakes. You can head out to a 24-hour joint or a favorite breakfast place, or you can whip up your own using one of those shake-and-pour mixes from the grocery store. You can also harvest and mill your own ingredients to make wholesome and organic pancakes. It’s…
Sober New Time
I want you to call me ‘Lufwa,'” the girl says to her beautiful best friend. The name is the word “awful” spelled backward, and the girl has already told the reader that she aspires to be awful. Her beautiful friend complies: She calls her “Lufwa,” which sounds like “La Fois,” and the girls fall out,…
Top Ten in Music
Toxic Ranch Records top sales for the week
Tucson Ward 3 Shocker: DeCamp Wins!
Well, in KidsVoting, anyway. We’ve got the results in on KidsVoting in the Tucson City Election. In Ward 3, Green Party candidate Mary DeCamp captured 35.56 percent of the vote among the 855 school children who cast a ballot in the race. We said back in our endorsement package that Mary was way ahead of…
Election 2009: What’s Left To Count
We spoke with Pima County Elections Director Brad Nelson, who tells us that there are probably still about 15,000 ballots left to count from yesterday’s election. But how many of those are city ballots is anyone’s guess at this point. According to the latest report: In Ward 6, Republican Steve Kozachik holds a 1,332-vote lead…
Election Update: Kozachik Widens Lead; Buehler-Garcia Narrows Gap
The Pima County Elections Department has posted some updated election results. Now with that one pesky missing precinct reporting, here’s how the close races are shaping up: — Karin Uhlich’s lead over Ben Buehler-Garcia is now just 444 votes. — Steve Kozachik’s lead over Nina Trasoff is up to 1,332 votes. — Prop 400 is…
Andrew Zimmern’s Bizarre World at El Charro
The Travel Channel is coming to Tucson to tape an episode of Andrew Zimmern’s Bizarre World at El Charro’s downtown location at 311 N. Court Ave. The taping will take place at 11 a.m., Thursday, Nov. 5, and will focus on the eatery’s carne seca, the sun-dried beef cured in the swinging cage above the…
