Attention, downtown boosters: You might want to schedule a trip to the state Capitol on Wednesday.

The Senate Finance Committee is set to review Tucson’s Rio Nuevo spending, which is the first step toward eliminating it altogether.

The Finance Committee won’t be voting on a bill; instead, they’ll be examining Tucson’s progress with downtown revitalization and making a recommendation to the Senate Appropriations Committee, which has the job of drawing up a fix for a 2010 shortfall that’s been estimated at $3 billion.

Rio Nuevo is not going to be an easy sell on Wednesday afternoon. The Senate Finance Committee includes Sen. Ron Gould, a fiscal hawk from Lake Havasu, and Sen. Barbara Leff, who has had it in for Rio Nuevo for years. As we recall, it started after Republican Kathleen Dunbar, a close pal of Leff, went up there to badmouth the city of Tucson after voters kicked her off the City Council back in 2005.

The panel also includes Sen. Ken Cheuvront, a Democrat who has frequently railed against special taxing districts.

It doesn’t help that some GOP representatives from Southern Arizona–we’re looking your way, Frank Antenori–have dismissed Rio Nuevo as a “boondoggle.”

The meeting starts at 1:30 p.m.

This article appears in Feb 5-11, 2009.

Getting hassled by The Man Mild-mannered reporter

2 replies on “Rio Nuevo Review-O”

  1. If our local “leaders” go up there with their typical cheerleading, pollyanna attitude about Rio Nuevo turn out the lights. They need to go up there with some concrete solutions to wasted money, lack of progress, and idiotic projects (sink I-10, Science Center bridge come to mind). The response to William and Dame pulling out of Tucson by certain members of the Mayor and Council is illustrative. A failure spun as a victory. Every set back-Presidio Terrace, the Post, Science Center, arena, the brewery-is viewed by our Potemkin Village leaders as more manna from heaven. Instead of firing incompetent leaders, hiring independent auditors, and demanding results we get the same “its just around the corner” response. And now with the State going under you can pretty much count on it going away. After 9 years we only have ourselves to blame.

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