WE JUST OBJECT TO THE PROCESS
Unfortunately, our deadline required us to write this column before
the Tucson City Council had its big budget meeting at the Tucson
Convention Center, but we think it’s safe to predict that council
members got their asses chewed by an unhappy public.
We also suspect that the Democrats on the council just aren’t going
to be able to say no to most of the new taxes proposed by City Manager
Mike Letcher, who evidently figures that as long as he’s asking
them to raise a few taxes, he might as well ask them to raise a lot of
them. Why settle for one bite of the apple when there’s a fruit salad
to enjoy?
We’re not sure that we object to all of the taxes themselves, but we
don’t think the city is going about it in the right way. It just
doesn’t seem like a very transparent process—first, they fire a
city manager after meeting behind closed doors, and then they spring
all these new taxes on us. It’s just a terrible way of doing business.
How are we supposed to have trust and confidence?
Or at least that’s the sort of criticism we used to hear from
Karin Uhlich and Nina Trasoff back when they were on the
campaign trail attacking their GOP predecessors as heartless fiends who
raised taxes in an entirely inappropriate manner.
Will we now learn the right way to raise taxes—like, say, on
renters in the midst of an economic collapse?
Here’s one option that Trasoff hinted at in her last bulletin to
constituents: Raise the proposed housing rental tax, which is estimated
to be worth about $12 million to the city, by 1 percent instead of 2
percent. The upside: The Democrats can say they whittled down the
staff’s increase request. The downside: The amount of the increase
isn’t going to matter in most voters’ minds, and the City Council
members get half as much money to fund all of their favorite
causes.
We’ll have photos and a report from the budget meeting at the
all-new Range, our daily dispatch at a blog.tucsonweekly.com.
DEAD END
It’s the end of the road for the Regional Transportation Authority
election conspiracy.
As Mari Herreras reports on this page, Attorney General Terry
Goddard last week released the results of his investigation into
the RTA ballots, informing us that a hand count shows that the election
count was right on Election Day way back in May 2006.
This whole saga has certainly had its moments. Remember the
mysterious keystrokes that showed when the files were altered? Or the
affidavit from Zbig Osmolski, who claimed that he’d
heard—while perched at the bar at the Boondocks Lounge—the
county’s software man himself confess that the election had been
rigged? Remember the 19,000 ballots that went missing during the hand
count?
You couldn’t make this stuff up! Wait—now that we think about
it, we guess somebody did make it up.
It was a grand, grand plot: The election fixers grew from a small
cabal within the Elections Division to a massive conspiracy that
included, at various times, the Democrats on the Board of Supervisors,
County Administrator Chuck Huckelberry, County Attorney
Barbara LaWall and the stooges on her staff, Pima County
Treasurer Beth Ford, political consultant Pete Zimmerman and various other “big guys,” to use political gadfly John
Kromko‘s words.
We think Goddard himself was in on it. And we may have been,
too!
We’ve seen seasons of 24 that made more sense. (And were less
torturous.)
Attorney Bill Risner’s conspiracy theory just grew too big to
be believed, especially once guys like Kromko started running with
it.
We’ll give Risner this much: He made us much more aware of the
security flaws in the election-counting software. But the hysteria over
the RTA results was often based on bullshit, to put it kindly, and all
of this CSI talk of forensic examinations to discover whether
Goddard counted the real ballots is the last gasp of dead-enders.
The Scooby gang needs to give it a rest. We know that dreams die
hard, but at no point is Chuck Huckelberry going to say: “And I
would have gotten away with it, too, if it weren’t for you meddlesome
kids!”
POLITICAL PROSECUTION
Just days after AG Terry Goddard announced the results of the
RTA investigation, the morning daily broke the news that noted
conspiracy theorist and political gadfly John Kromko was facing
charges that he fabricated signatures on his petitions for his
ill-fated 2008 House of Representatives campaign.
Kromko got clobbered in District 27 by incumbent Democrats Phil
Lopes and Olivia Cajero Bedford.
During the campaign, a strange story percolated up: A few dead
people had evidently signed Kromko’s petitions—which is a pretty
big red flag that something is not on the up-and-up.
Evidently, that was enough to persuade investigators to dig into
those petitions. Earlier this month, Pima County Attorney Barbara
LaWall hit Kromko with a 19-count indictment accusing him of fraud,
identity theft and fraudulent schemes. While he didn’t call us back,
Kromko has told the dailies that the charges are bogus.
We’ve had our doubts about Kromko’s credibility in the past, and
wouldn’t be at all surprised to find out he took some shortcuts on the
petitions. Most of his recent campaign efforts have been half-assed, at
best.
But socking him with identity-theft charges appears to be serious
overkill. Kromko is a pain in the ass, but he doesn’t belong behind
bars—and he doesn’t deserve to have the book thrown at him like
he is some crook committing credit-card fraud and ripping people
off.
Even if he beats the charges, this episode is going to cost Kromko,
who appears to be on the hook for his own attorney. The court file
notes that he planned to hire his own lawyer, but requested a public
defender because he didn’t want to permanently surrender his right to
one.
We predict Bill Risner is going to have a grand time with all
of this.
THE BIG SWIPE
With April drawing to a close, GOP leaders finally unveiled their
budget proposal this week—and it’s hardly gimmick-free.
We don’t have much space, but one Big Reveal stands out: a plan to
swipe hundreds of millions of dollars in impact fees that are in the
bank accounts of local governments.
We’re not sure that’s even legal, given that the money was collected
as part of an agreement with developers to provide wider roads and
other infrastructure near their homes, offices and shops.
We hear legislative leaders may try to buy off developers by
introducing a moratorium on impact fees for a few years. Hey, why not?
It’s not like anybody’s building anything anyway.
There’s also a plan to lift $330 million from school districts.
We’re not sure how that squares with the demand that education funding
is maintained at a certain level for the state to qualify for federal
stimulus dollars.
This sausage is gonna have to spend a lot more time on the grill
before it’s cooked.
Find early and late-breaking Skinny at The Range, our new daily
dispatch, at blog.tucsonweekly.com.
See Jim Nintzel share his conspiracy theories at 6:30 p.m.,
Friday, on KUAT Channel 6’s Arizona Illustrated. This week’s
guests: Republican Vic Williams and Democrat Daniel Patterson of the
Arizona House of Representatives. Nintzel also talks politics with
radio ringmaster John C. Scott between 4:30 and 5 p.m., Thursday, on
KJLL AM 1330.
This article appears in Apr 30 – May 6, 2009.
