Ward 6 City Councilwoman Nina Trasoff, who had previously stopped short of telling voters to reject the Public Safety First initiative, came out against Prop 200 yesterday during press conference yesterday at the Reid Park Zoo. (We didn’t attend the conference, which also featured representatives from the business community, labor unions and social-service non-profits, but from what we’ve seen of the coverage on local news stations, it looks like it was a disaster.)
City Councilman Rodney Glassman also came out against the initiative this week. We’ve seen an e-mail in which Glassman states: “I will not be voting for Proposition 200 and do not support it. I support increasing law enforcement but this is the wrong way to do it.”
With Councilwoman Regina Romero and Councilman Steve Leal also opposing the initiative and Councilwoman Shirley Scott supporting it, that leaves only Councilwoman Karin Uhlich as the fence-straddler in the fight over Prop 200. Uhlich issued a statement yesterday that tags Prop 200 as a bad idea, but she has, so far, been unwilling to say people should vote against it:
Proposition 200 is a very serious issue before the voters. Today, as early ballots are mailed to homes across the city, it is important that voters know the facts.
As I have stated all along, I have serious reservations about Prop 200,
beginning with how it would be paid for.
Because Prop 200 mandates hiring quotas during a recession and lacks an identified funding source, I am concerned that should it pass, a couple of bad outcomes are likely: the City would be forced to either make substantial cuts to other vital services like Parks and Recreation and road maintenance — on top of the cuts we have made in these areas over the past two years — or raise taxes.
The City of Tucson has already established the same public safety staffing goals as are laid out in Proposition 200. We passed the Sustainability Plan in 2006 to establish these goals and prioritize funding to reach them, and I remain 100 percent committed to making sure we get there.
The difference between the Sustainability Plan and Prop 200, however, is that the Sustainability Plan calls for reaching the goals through a dedicated percentage of increased City revenues, based on economic growth.
In other words, it has an identified revenue source. Prop 200 does not.
As I have said before, I trust the voters to make good decisions when equipped with full information.
This article appears in Oct 8-14, 2009.
Their toes were getting prune-like from dipping them in the water for so long. Glad they finally decided that it’s O.K. to jump in. Such courageous ambiguity. Brilliant strategy.
Disaster, in what way? The Bud Foster coverage on Channel 13 at 6 pm was truly awesome. Channel 9 at 6 pm was terrible – all about Letcher’s walk back from his first Zoo comments. Nothing at all about prop 200 or the supporters or opponents. Tried to make it look like opponents are liars. Typical Journal Broadcase Goup stuff. Didn’t see 4’s coverage. And, as usual, the Star did nothing.
Jeff: I was referencing the Channel 9 report. And the Channel 4 report I saw on Prop 200–which didn’t cover the press conference, but did talk about the proposition–was pretty screwy, with the reporter referring to national averages as “federal standards.” Missed the Channel 13 report.
I don’t think it helped when the anti-200 guy said that the passage of Prop 200 would shut off your water supply…but I hear Jack Camper did an impressive job of staying on message.
But I should have clarified that it wasn’t that the conference was a disaster; rather, the resulting coverage was not exactly what the anti-200 crowd wanted, especially with the absence of a story in the morning daily.
Well, you were 2/3 correct. See if you can get a video of 13’s coverage. Bud was great. He focused on how the proposition had bought together a strange coalition of the left and right with Brain Flag, PCIC, Primavera of the left & Jack Camper & Cox, etc of the right. They went into detail about costs and the current budget deficit. Hell, it was such a good report that I thought maybe they lifted it from your piece this week. You’re right about channel 9. It was absolutely pathetic and embarassing. I’m never surprised by how 4 covers police issues. They can’t take a chance on blowing all of Lupita’s secret sources inside TPD that keep her first in line on crime stories and internal affairs investigations.
Those trying to decide on support or opposition should ask themselves this question: what is the basic role of a government, any government? If your answer is to help create society and an economy, then 200 will work against that, as it forces money into just one role – protection of the citizens. If, however, you believe that protection of the citizens is “Job One” for any level of government, then you should support 200, as it mandates this. THAT is the question, not who says it’s okay or not, or which news outlet does what. That’s all smoke and mirrors. What do YOU believe government should spend money on?