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The story of Scottsdale politics is really quite simple. It revolves around three issues: subsidies, conflicts of interest and secrecy. These core issues, of course, lead to bad planning which leads to the congestion that has the City tied in knots.

Where to begin……………………..

After more than twenty years in Scottsdale, it continues to amaze me how the City slavishly gives away taxpayer money to everyone who asks for it. It doesn’t make any difference what development you have, if you want a subsidy, just ask for it.

This pathology has become biblical in proportion: "Ask and ye shall receive." In the last five years, the City has given away between $100 million and ^$200 million while the voter supported Preserve and many budget and infrastructure needs continue unmet.

A recent writer in The Scottsdale Republic commented that a current member of the Council, Ron McCullagh, has the City’s best interests at heart. I like Ron. We come from the same part of the Country and we both love Garrison Keillor.

The fact is that, however, Ron is the "Subsidizer in Chief" of the City Council who, along with Betty Drake and Mary Manross, gives away the City’s money at the drop of a hat all the while claiming that he is a fiscal conservative person.

As former felon John Mitchell once said: "Watch what I do, not what I say."

What Ron does is this: He has never, ever, ever rejected a request to give away taxpayer money. Can they all have been that good? Apparently so. But why?

The reason is because subsidies are good politics in Scottsdale. You promise to give them to get elected (i.e., "I am in favor of revitalization of the South"); and you vote to give them to get re-elected (i.e., "I have supported revitalization in the South").

In May, 2005, I proposed that guidelines be established and that a subsidy cap, like that in Phoenix, be adopted—with exemptions for police, fire and needed public services. Incredibly, Ron McCullagh, the fiscal conservative, with a smile on his face, voted against even having guidelines for giving away more than ^$100 million in taxpayer money. He was joined by liberal spending Betty Drake, Wayne Ecton and Mary Manross. They just give tax money away without any guidelines for doing so under a policy of "you’ll know it when you see it." That’s the same standard applies to whether something is pornographic; but, on second thought, maybe that analogy applies to how Ron, Betty and Mary operate.

There is no pretext that the subsidies will ever be repaid; or that the projects being subsidized would not occur without City help. SkySong is a prime example. Rather, Ron, Betty and Mary simply give away City tax revenues to whomever they desire, for as long as they want in whatever amount that they want—with no justification.

Of course, at election time, this type of "civic mindedness" is rewarded by campaign support by those who have benefited from the giveaway of tax money. Scottsdale will never have the government it deserves until those in charge win an election based on their merits rather than on giving away tax funds.

Subsidies go hand-in-hand with conflicts of interest. And when you consider conflicts of interest, nobody can match Betty Drake. Is Betty a good city planner? You bet. Does she represent precisely the people who need permits from the City? You bet; that IS her primary business.

The fact is, however, that Betty represents the public only as a hobby; she represents paying clients for a business. How do we know that?

Well, Betty has declared a conflict of interest no fewer than 22 documented times during her term of office. She is not a full time Council member. In fact, she is a full time planner representing precisely the interests that do business before the City.

The City’s Ethics Code was first suggested because of how cavalierly Betty carried out her business of representing special interests while, at the same time, serving on the Council.

Betty, along with the Mayor, opposed for months even considering the adoption of an ethics code by the City. Betty, in fact, is the poster child for why such a code was needed. McCullagh, to his credit, strongly supported the adoption of an ethics code from the start (as did Councilmember's Lane and Littlefield)—bothered by how they observed city government operating. But Betty just voted "no." And Mary lamented that she could not do her job if she had to "put up with an ethics code."

In this day and age of increasing and shameless public corruption, why would any elected official oppose even considering the adoption of an ethics code?

Secret decisions are bad decisions. The term "Executive Session" means secret. Mary Manross and her fellow travelers, Ron McCullagh and Betty Drake, routinely hold their debates in secret—in Executive Session. This is where critical debates occur—debates that, by state law, can never be divulged. This is where taxpayer money is given away; this is where building heights and increased congestion in the downtown and Air Park are debated. Even though the City’s Ethics Code REQUIRES a "mindset of openness" (language proposed by former Councilmember Ned O’Hearn), Ron McCullagh, Better Drake and Mary Manross without exception ignore that mandate when they routinely vote to support Executive Sessions. Secrecy does not protect the public; it protects the politicians from the public. If the discussion would help the politicians, they would be held in the open.

The time for a clean sweep has come.

The "Subsidizer-in-Chief" Ron McCullagh, the conflict-of-interest "Poster Child" Betty Drake and the "I can’t do my job if I have to put up with an ethics code" Mayor Manross must go.

If voters want independent government that represents tax payers, they need to vote for change; the status quo is unacceptable.

If voters want something other than the best government that money can buy, they need to vote for Nan Nesvig and Tom Giller who will, for a change, represent the public interest with open government and financial restraint. Nan and Tom have publicly pledged to "just say no" to subsidies, conflicts of interest and secrecy. They are adamantly against congestion in all parts of the City. They support the Preserve and they support trauma centers for Scottsdale Healthcare.

Jim Derouin
Scottsdale

Jim Derouin is a renowned attorney with Steptoe & Johnson, a 20+ year Scottsdale resident, former HOA Director, and was a member of the successful Ethics Code Task Force and other volunteer city entities.

A recent Scottsdale Republic editorial ("4 on council do right thing by tossing petitions") criticized me for "electioneering" at Council meetings because of my support of three recent citizen petitions considered by the City Council. 

Two of these petitions requested that the proposed far-reaching update to the Downtown Plan and the issue of allowing more height and density in Scottsdale both be put to a vote of the people at the earliest opportunity.  The third petition requested that the Council vote to oppose SRP moving an electric utility substation near a neighborhood in order to accommodate the proposed WaterView project. 

All three of these petitions were rejected by the Council majority of four -- Mayor Manross, Councilmember Drake, and Councilmen McCullagh and Ecton.

How funny that this editorial should accuse me of playing politics when, as last Tuesday’s meeting made crystal clear, it is the Council majority who are playing politics by trying to postpone votes on controversial issues until after the election!  One great example of this came when Councilman McCullagh said the voters will have the ultimate say on city issues in the City Council election on September 2nd, just before he voted to make it harder for voters to know where he and the other incumbents stand on the most pressing issues of that election!

Another way the Council majority of four is playing politics here is that, by delaying votes on these controversial issues until after the election they will make it literally twice as difficult for the voters to conduct successful referendums on any issues that are approved.  This is because, since the city elections will now be held in September and November at the same time as the State and National elections, the voter turnout is predicted to be twice as large as when the city elections were held by themselves in March and May.  This means twice the number of signatures will be required to refer a Council decision to a vote of the people, which makes it twice as hard to conduct a successful referendum.  If you do not have special-interest money behind you, gathering that many signatures will be virtually impossible.  In effect, Scottsdale’s citizens will lose the right of referendum.

Predictably (since he is running for Mayor against long-time Scottsdale Republic favorite Mary Manross), the editorial throws in some criticism of Jim Lane for supporting two of the petitions.  In fact, Lane did the right thing by making it clear that he differs from Manross on the issue of open government and protecting the public's right to know where their elected officials stand on important issues. Since Lane supports many of these taller and denser projects he deserves credit for being willing to put his beliefs to the test of a public vote.

I often read in the pages of the Scottsdale Republic that those of us who oppose the current trend of turning Scottsdale into Las Vegas are "out of touch" and that the majority of Scottsdale citizens support this trend.  If that is so, why are the proponents of this urbanization so fearful of any public vote on the issue, while we who oppose this policy are willing to put our beliefs on the line and let our citizens be heard? 

The answer could not be more obvious – the proponents fear that, contrary to their spin, the public is NOT with them on this issue and they fear having that fact exposed will cost them the election.

The editorial did get one thing right -- I do encourage voters to vote for Council candidates Tom Giller and Nan Nesvig, who support the citizens’ right to be heard on these important issues.

Vice Mayor Bob Littlefield
bob@boblittlefield.com

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Last week, Brian Powell of the Scottsdale Tribune ran an article which intimated that Suzanne Klapp was the first Council Candidate to receive a public endorsement from a sitting City Council member in the city's history.

The Scottsdale Activist would like to correct that article by clearly stating that historically, Scottsdale Council members and mayors have endorsed candidates in a non-partisan manner for decades both formally in print or verbally at meetings or to the press, sometimes in both ways.

Vice Mayor Littlefield publicly endorsed both Nan Nesvig and Tom Giller a few weeks ago so the article by Brian was not correct. I spoke with Brian and he said he meant for this election which I again reminded him that the Scottsdale Activist had endorsement words from Vice Mayor Littlefield a few weeks ago.

Brian is really a very good investigative reporter and is head and shoulders over anyone at the Scottsdale Republic who also has an investigative reporter. It is always my pleasure to speak with Brian and I got him this time so I guess we'll have to have lunch together one of these days.

We'll allow Brian to get by with this one this time. I suggested that he pay better and closer attention to the Scottsdale Activist because many times we beat both the Tribune and the Republic to the key Scottsdale stories!!

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Every voter needs to remember that Scottsdale City Elections are NON-PARTISAN according to the Scottsdale City Charter and they need to remain that way. Intrusions by either (any) political party need to be quashed at the first indication that they are trying to control or direct the election in any direction one way or the other. Candidates need to stand on their own reputations by not being publicly promoted by a popular county or state political figure of any political party.

We were very happy to receive comments from all candidates except the three incumbents and Oren Davis. This shows that the candidates responding to our request are serious about helping to get Scottsdale back on track with an open, fiscally responsible and responsive city government.

Although he never contacted this editor, we understand third hand that Mr. Davis’s son was in an accident or had a serious medical situation for which Mr. Davis was needed more than at any forum or to participate in our concerted effort in presenting each and every candidate.

We send Mr. Davis and his family our best wishes for his son’s recovery.

Some of our staff expected the incumbents to reply in some manner due to the watershed seriousness of the upcoming election and the serious problems that needed to be explained away.

Others laughed saying the incumbents would blow us off as an inconsequential inconvenience just as a mosquito bite becomes on a warm but comfortable summer evening in Arizona as the family gathers for a family evening and BBQ around the pool.

Being that the three incumbents refused to answer, acknowledge, or to contact us at all concerning our request which was individually addressed as follows …….

……we feel that they have little to no respect for the 16,000 to 21,000 weekly readers of this website. I would venture to say that all of these readers are citizens interested in the future of Scottsdale and more importantly, are registered Scottsdale voters.

For all of the staff, this was a very sad commentary on the availability and public stature and credibility of these three incumbents. Their failure to participate in free advertising and a free medium in which to reach up to 21,000 voters to expound on their plans for Scottsdale’s future exemplifies the past actions and poor decisions these three incumbents have made during their tenure as elected officials.

You would have thought that with the pressure put upon the incumbents to explain themselves for their past failures, city and mayoral legal problems and over spending, they would have tried presenting some new "visions", programs or promises to smooth over the rough edges of their rocky tenure in their hope to be re-elected.

Unfortunately for them, that was not to be. So, here are the responses from those who did care enough about Scottsdale and the citizens to take their time to make their ideas, visions and ideals public for all to see.

As a twist, we’ll present them in the alphabetical order of their first names instead of their last names and without distinction of the office they seek. This way, the people who usually end up at the bottom of the list get a change of pace!!

These responders are to be congratulated for coming forward. We will critique each candidate at the bottom of the article after all responses have been posted.

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Married to Joanne and father of three grown children

Lived in Arizona since 1971 in Scottsdale since 1973.

Help me bring back the ideals of office to City Hall. Elective office is a Job, not a Reward™. I've been preparing for 2 years to be your city councilman, it's not just learning the issues, it's learning your views. "Positions" are what count, not opinions!

We must elect modern people who reflect the profile of the voters and want to solve problems. The old politics of alliance and ideology does not work. As a native of Arizona, my real estate management company has been in Scottsdale for 25 years and worked in four states. I have the political will and the skills to help.

~ Elective office is a job, which if properly performed will:

~ Establish a "New Business Division" to encourage entrepreneurship, cut the "red tape" permitting process, explore short term tax abatements to stimulate start-up businesses, not developers, and tap into the retired executive base for a mentoring program kind of like an old fashion "welcome wage".

~ Tourism makes us unique and is the key to our prosperity. It subsidizes and enhances our quality of life and influences everything around us. To maintain our tourism base, I will:

1. Protect the unique character of "Old Town Scottsdale".

2. Support the golf industry and the FBR Phoenix Open Golf Tournament.

3. Increase support for the Scottsdale Convention & Visitors Bureau.

4. Encourage the development of the Museum of the West in downtown Scottsdale.

5. Keep the Barrett-Jackson Collector Car Auction and the horse shows at West World.

6. A new Scottsdale Center for the Arts at West World can be a component of good planning.

7. Patiently complete the McDowell Sonoran Preserve and the Desert Discovery Center.

8. Promote and protect our downtown Scottsdale art galleries.

~ My goals: Institute progressive planning to manage growth and congestion. I also will lobby to focus staff's attention and money on small, quality of life issues.

1. We can add small (pocket) parks, add better basketball courts and playground equipment, and new products in the libraries.

2. Initiate a city-wide program for small street improvements to get us home quicker such as turning lanes, bus wide-outs and smarter signalization.

3. Sales taxes pay the bills and I will support contributing more marketing money for tourism, downtown businesses and art galleries.

4. I will support "seed-money" for conceptual designs for major future projects such as a new Scottsdale Center For The Arts which will stimulate fund raising.

5. I will support prudent, additional bond financing for major infrastructure projects to stimulate the economy and decrease future costs.

~ Preparation is vital and the better I'm prepared the better you're served. For 2 years I've attended every City Council meeting, study session, budget sessions, commission meetings and regularly interview City Department heads. Your voice counts, that's why I got 93% of my petition signatures myself.

~ Opinions? I can't have an opinion. As a councilman, it is my duty to have a position which is based on merit, the voter's views and the best interest of the City.

 ~Perspective is essential to elective office and I've lobbied congressmen in D.C. and my wife Linda and I just returned from the Middle East. I'm a member of the Arizona Town Council, Urban Land Institute, American Civil Liberties Union, NAACP, Scottsdale Chamber of Commerce, Anti Defamation League, USGA, The Phoenix Zoo and the Center for Biological Diversity, an environmental organization in Tucson, and many animal rights organizations.

~ Professional background: I have been a self-starting business owner for more than 3 decades with an office in Scottsdale for 25 years. Leading the JBI Company and managing shopping and business centers in four states. As a construction and real estate entrepreneur, I have purchased land, moved utilities, built streets, excavated drainage systems and hired engineers and architects. As a builder, I have negotiated with cities and executed leases with national tenants. This is valuable experience, as 75% of every city council decision in 2006 and 2007 has been real estate related. I can help and have the political will and the skills for the job.

~ I do not pull the plug on growth - manage it to find balance: Managing growth is the number one issue in the election and will be my priority. Tourism is a primary driver of growth and the businesses and tenants it attracts influence the design of buildings, and to remain prosperous we must stay unique. We can have better architecture and more certified green buildings by tying height limitations to the number of floors and design elements instead of linear feet. To stay unique we can limit maximum height to 2 to 6 floors depending on the location. We must enforce guidelines near residential areas that establish floor level "step-backs" plus deeper landscaped buffers plus street level parking that opens view corridors and reduces noise.

~ Good planning guides development or says "No. Start over". Nothing can have a more positive effect on a city or deliver what residents want than proactive planning. By thoughtfully focusing projects Downtown, along Scottsdale Road and the 101 Freeway, we can maintain our commercial base and reduce sprawl by bringing people closer to services and work, and actually reduce overall density. And why not plan a grocery store and a park in downtown Scottsdale.

~ We have a community to run and pay for and real estate rent taxes and sales taxes pay the bills. We can't roll back the clock based on a slogan - the West's most Western Town and in these turbulent times, we can't increase taxes for residents or businesses. The business community needs buildings for growth and they pay the cost of their own water, electricity and trash and the rent and property taxes more than pay the costs of city services such as fire and police. We are getting people out of cars which reduces congestion.

~ No on subsidies: Scottsdale cannot partner with developers using taxpayers money. (Subsidies are artificial and adversely affect the marketplace).

If our elected officials expect to keep the job, they must do the job. Scottsdale is a paradise despite this council, not because of this council, and you made it happen.

This council has not had one original idea, jumps from problem to problem and draws out issues creating controversy, law-suits, condemnation actions and referendums.

7502 East Buena Terra Way • Scottsdale, Arizona 85250 •

Ph 480.946.6949 • Fax 480.946.7078, Email - joel@votebramowethforcouncil.com

You can find greater detail on my positions at www.ScottsdaleCitizen.com.

Process, Inclusion, Honesty, Respect, Trust. These are the biggest issues facing Scottsdale. We MUST restore TRUST between the citizens and their elected representatives, before we can effectively address more specific issues.

Growth, Height, and Density. The low-scale, suburban environment in Downtown is one of the major reasons it is so attractive to me and other folks who live here, to folks who want to move here, and to folks who want to vacation or visit here. Tourism is VITAL to our economy and our great quality of life. It is one of our main products!

We must understand what makes us special and unique. Our leaders must honor and protect our unique Civic character instead of advancing their personal agendas.

The price of growth is traffic and congestion, diluted public safety and other municipal services, and more erosion of our civic character. That last point--civic character--is something with which the Manross administration has been woefully negligent.

We have begun a state-mandated General Plan update. The Downtown Plan Update process was completely hijacked...well, not completely because the hijackers had a lot of help from the inside. The City's Advance Planning staff (who are paid to facilitate development) contracted it out to a development professional (architect). 37% of the attendees weren't even Scottsdale residents. 25% self-identified as development professionals (developers, architects, real estate brokers, etc.). And it recommends...more development!

Transportation, Light Rail. More people living in Scottsdale will only make traffic worse. We need honesty outreach by the Mayor and Council on how much more congestion we are willing to accept in the name of growth. We paid a transportation consultant ^$1.2 million dollars to tell us we have a traffic problem and we should study it some more!

I do not support light rail or any fixed-route mass transit. We already have cheaper, more flexible alternative transportation methods, including a good bus and trolley system that needs some tweaking. We need more express buses. We need a jitney/share taxi, similar to Dial-a-Ride. We need more home-based businesses and telecommuting.

Except for summer heat, we have one of the greatest bicycling environments in the world with flat terrain, wide streets and bike paths, and great weather. The engineers in traffic planning need a lot more support to include cycling in planning. There are still disconnects in our bicycle routes as well as inadequate facilities for securing/storing bikes, taking showers, etc.

Dust Control is unnecessary and burdensome on citizens. Instead of trying to help the county and state ram this down our throats, the Mayor and City Council should be doing their damndest to protect us from this. Maricopa County has areas where particulate pollution is a problem, but Scottsdale is not one of them.

West World. The community has always seen WestWorld first as an equestrian facility, followed by more general use as an event or exhibition center.

An agreement for a period of perhaps up to 5 years would be appropriate for any large user of public facilities. Events such as the Barrett-Jackson Auction are best planned well in advance. However, I do not support unreasonable concessions or leases of ridiculous length. SkySong is a case in point for both issues. Our leadership has often been bullied into giving away the store. We need to make it clear to all that we are reasonable, but not gullible.

Fiscally responsible completion of the McDowell Sonoran Preserve and the Desert Discovery Center are important goals. It is a shame that Scottsdale’s finances will force prioritizing future land purchases. If not for the monumental blunders of the Mayor and Council Majority, we might be talking about EXPANDING the Preserve.

The principles of Frank Lloyd Wright's Taliesin West should be respected in completing the DDC. In the words of architect Peter Dominick, "Buildings that end up being beloved grow out of a sense of place." We should embrace this design principle for ALL of Scottsdale!

I fear politicization of the DDC and the relationships between stakeholders. The Preserve Ordinance is our framework. We should CAREFULLY modify this document to clarify relationships. The Preserve would not exist without Carla and the Conservancy. We should respect that history, and all the Conservancy contributes. However, the DDC Task Force has been given its marching orders.

Fiscal Responsibility and the Economy. As a premier tourist destination, Scottsdale enjoys some insulation from the faltering national economy. However, the more our leaders shift us toward a growth-addicted economy and away from a tourism economy, the more we suffer.

Communities around envy our tourism-based quality of life. They are working hard to "out-Scottsdale" us. We only help them by discarding our community's unique character.

The economy and the price of fuel have hit tourism hard nationally. Here in Scottsdale, our sales tax revenue was just reported to be off 15 percent from this time last year. We have to work harder now than ever to compete even more effectively for the loyalty of our guests.

Foreclosures in Scottsdale are up 300 PERCENT in the first quarter. We are losing massive amounts of property tax revenue. We must work harder to maintain the appearance and desirability of our neighborhoods. This is quite a contrast to the Mayor's broken record about "^$3.3 Billion dollars of private investment in Downtown and South Scottsdale," that of course was primarily due to the utterly criminal sub-prime mortgage sweepstakes.

We must stop wasting OUR tax dollars on silliness like the shameful deal we made on the Los Arcos/SkySong property, the millions of dollars wasted on the Hualapai water treatment property lease/purchase, and the ^$1.2 million dollars we paid for a transportation consultant to tell us we have a traffic problem that needs more study.

Charter Officers. There’s no permanent City Manager. The Mayor and Council Majority don’t even acknowledge the need or City Charter requirement for a permanent, independent City Treasurer. They've even erased it off the list of Departments and Divisions giving responsibility to the City Manager. That same group flat ran the City Auditor out of office for doing her job. For all intents and purposes we don't have a City Attorney, either. The residency requirement must be clarified and rectified as soon as possible.

A local newspaper editor recently recommended eliminating residency requirements for ALL Charter Officers. If that's the case, let’s just offshore the jobs. Why make them live in this COUNTRY if they aren't passionate enough about Scottsdale to move here. The Charter recognizes that the top non-elected jobs in our government have higher responsibilities that require a higher level of commitment.

Mayor, Council Salaries and Staff. The Mayor makes ^$36,000 per year. Councilmember’s make ^$18,000. There's no wonder the makeup of our City Council doesn't reflect the needs and desires of the average Scottsdale citizen. You have to be comfortably retired, have a working spouse who makes plenty of money, live in comparative poverty, or have income that isn't readily apparent in order to serve.

I'd like to see these salaries at ^$100,000 and ^$50,000, so that real people can look at them as real jobs. They should at least pay as much as the Charter positions. Even half those amounts would help. It would add a small amount to the City's budget...but what's the price of honesty? I'm appalled at the lack of quality candidates.

Boards and Commissions. If we could take some of the burden off elective offices it makes them more desirable and more effective. The Mayor has dedicated staff. However, Council members share office staff, and have none to advise on issues or process save those report to Charter Officers (or the semi-, pseudo-Charter Officer of City Attorney).

The Boards and Commissions should do some of this work for the Council. However, the selection process ensures that these groups contain little dissent! Especially with land use issues and zoning, we have repeatedly seen huge, ugly projects get rubberstamped by the Planning Commission and the Development Review Board.

I am not the first to suggest that each Council member should select a representative to each of these bodies. This would give Council a de facto staff with whom they could communicate directly and rely upon. It would also help eliminate surprises when issues are brought to Council, as well as much of the acrimonious posturing that wastes so much time in the Council meetings.

Board and Commission members are non-paid, volunteer public servants. These are pretty specific jobs and require less time than elected office. Therefore, people from all walks of life are willing to serve without pay in exchange for experience and contributing to the community.

Send my YOUR questions, issues, or concerns. I’m happy to discuss them with you anytime.

Respectfully,

John Washington
Write-in Candidate for Mayor
480.229.1831
john@ReactionResearch.com

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I have spent almost my entire life in Scottsdale. I attended school here, founded my law practice here and I am now proud to be raising my daughter here as well. I love this city and I am thankful for the opportunities it has provided me and will provide for my little girl.

One of those opportunities is the prospect of becoming one of your Scottsdale City Council members. Though I love Scottsdale and proudly call it home, I believe we are facing significant challenges. If we do not meet these challenges, I believe the proud traditions and character of our city may be at risk.

Our current City Council has adopted a philosophy of secrecy that does not serve the citizens of Scottsdale. In the past eight years they have gone into secret, behind-closed-doors Executive Sessions an unbelievable 190 times. That’s 190 times the people of Scottsdale have been shut out of the decision-making process, 190 times we haven’t even been told what went into the decision-making process or how choices were made.

Executive Sessions are a necessary tool for the Council when they’re discussing confidential personnel issues or sensitive legal matters. They should be a last resort and not a routine exercise.

It isn’t just Executive Sessions that deprive us of valuable information. The Mayor and Council are currently considering whether or not to initiate condemnation proceedings aimed at taking control of the All American Water Company. A contingency fund of $10 million of our tax dollars has been set aside for this purpose. It is likely that legal action in opposition to the proposed takeover will cost us even more. But now the City Attorney wants the meetings, in which this decision will be discussed, to be secret and protected under the cloak of lawyer-client privilege. We may be asked to pay at least $10 million without ever knowing why the decision was made in the first place.

In addition, the written evaluations of our top city staffers are off limits to the general public. In fact, there aren’t any written evaluations. This is not an open way to operate a city. There must be accountability which would be enhanced through job performance evaluations for all to view.

The solution is simple: open up the City Council’s decision-making process, hold Executive Sessions only when absolutely necessary, evaluate top staffers openly to encourage accountability and trust Scottsdale citizens with the truth.

One of Scottsdale’s strongest assets has always been the involvement of our citizens in their government. That asset is now woefully underutilized.

We have Citizen Boards and Commissions on almost every topic important to Scottsdale residents. The volunteer members give us their time and expertise and provide invaluable insights and direction. However, they are frequently ignored by the current Mayor and Council. When the recent $1.2 million preliminary transportation options were being developed, the Citizens Transportation Board wasn’t consulted or even allowed to participate. That’s a terrible waste of a valuable resource and it discourages citizens who might otherwise want to participate on our Boards and Commissions.

Not only does the current Council consistently ignore our Boards and Commissions, their neighborhood outreach is almost non-existent. When was the last time a member of the Council reached out to your community to talk about issues important to you and your neighbors? Isn’t it about time we did?

Getting from point A to point B in Scottsdale has become an exercise in frustration and futility. The recently developed preliminary transportation plan is heavily loaded to lean toward very expensive and disruptive light rail at the expense of more practical and affordable solutions. Unfortunately, this situation worsens as a result of the lack of leadership on the current Council.

Mayor Manross is our representative on the Board of the Maricopa Association of Governments (MAG). They decide how our Regional Transportation Sales Tax (RTST) is divided among Valley cities. You’d think we would be well represented and our transportation tax dollars protected. The reality is just the opposite. For every dollar Scottsdale residents pay in RTST taxes, we get back only 23^¢ in road work, maintenance and services. That means we involuntarily "donate" a staggering 77^¢ of our tax dollars to other Valley cities. So our taxes are being used in Mesa and Phoenix and elsewhere in the Valley while our traffic congestion gets worse and our transportation needs continue to go unmet. And since this agreement lasts for 20 years, Scottsdale taxpayers will lose at least ^$1 billion. That’s ^$1,000,000,000 we won’t have for our essential transportation infrastructure and needs for the next two decades. It’s no wonder Mayor Manross was recently appointed Chair of the Board of MAG since she has done such a good job giving Scottsdale’s money to other Valley cities.

There are practical, common sense solutions to our traffic problems. For example, we should synchronize our traffic lights, create pull-out lanes for our buses and trolleys and create right turn lanes to help ease traffic congestion. We should revitalize the Citizens Transportation Board so our business owners and homeowners have a real say in developing our transportation plans for the future. And we should demand the Mayor revisit her outrageous decision to give away more than 75% of our transportation tax dollars to the rest of the Valley.

Protecting taxpayer’s money is an essential role of a City Council member. Scottsdale has always been a generous community but we didn’t become successful by wasting tax dollars. That waste has now become common in Scottsdale.

In addition to the ^$1 billion in transportation taxes we now give to other Valley cities, the mistakes and waste of the current council has cost us tens of millions more. The Toll Brothers land fiasco resulted in our paying ^$50 million more than we had to for additional Preserve land. The land adjacent to the Water Campus was another ^$10 million hit. At Skysong we paid ^$30 million more than the land was appraised at and gave it to ASU. Add it up and that’s ^$1.09 billion dollars-money we could have used for vital infrastructure, transportation solutions, Mountain Preserve acquisitions and other needed improvements in Scottsdale.

Small business owners have always been the backbone of Scottsdale’s economy. Our entrepreneurial spirit and hard work have made Scottsdale the premier city in the Southwest. But too often our small business owners are now left out of the decision-making loop entirely. Providing huge tax breaks and incentives to mega-developers can often be justified as essential to our growth and development. But not when those incentives come at the expense of already existing businesses.

Belief in the free market system has long been a hallmark of Scottsdale business owners. But that belief is sorely tested when the council decides to favor large developments that drive local, family-owned businesses that might have been here for decades out of the city.

Additionally, our city bureaucracy has become a maze of red tape, rules and regulations new business owners must negotiate, often times for months and months, just to open their doors. I’ve heard from countless business owners how challenging and frustrating the process is to open or expand a business here. Why wouldn’t they go elsewhere?

We must do a better job of advocating for our local business owners, streamline the bureaucracy and cut red tape or we will lose one of the great strengths of Scottsdale.

Scottsdale is a wonderful place but we’re in danger of risking the essential nature and characteristics that have made us the envy of the Valley.

We must:

We need a Scottsdale City Council that puts our residents first and operates openly and honestly.

As your City Council member I pledge I will do just that. But I need your help and your vote on September 2, 2008.

Thank you, Lisa Borowsky

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I am running for City Council because I know that with your help, we can make a difference in Scottsdale’s future. Scottsdale is a beautiful and desirable place in which to live, but we can lose what we have by being complacent and not fighting to protect our quality of life.

As a 12 plus year resident of south Scottsdale, I believe that our city's resources, character, uniqueness and variety of offerings are of utmost importance to our citizens. What we do with our today will markedly influence how we function as a city tomorrow. Therefore, we must make positive, well-thought out decisions now, so that we have a prosperous, balanced future in Scottsdale.

Being a citizen, neighborhood, and business advocate in Scottsdale has been my primary focus throughout this City Council campaign. I have been active in city politics as well as neighborhood and citizen advocacy for more than five years.

Over the years I have:

I believe in a transparent government system. I abhor decision-making by secret Executive Sessions as a means by which to hide decisions from the public. I support an open government that promotes goodwill between the leaders and citizens and prompts citizen interaction with leadership.

Our City Staff and Council need to be fully accountable to the citizens and businesses of Scottsdale. I will seek to hire the right person for the City Manger's position; a dynamic, competent individual with a can-do attitude, who will be cognizant of Scottsdale's needs and strictly adhere to policy, procedure, and maintenance of our quality of life. I will commit to improve City employee morale.

The current City Council majority has done a terrible job of negotiating on behalf of Scottsdale’s citizens and that we must alter our attitude as to how we do business in our city. Scottsdale maintains a litigious approach to problem solving and, at the end of the day, this always proves to be disadvantageous for us. I believe in full disclosure of all facets of a project and discussion of same. We should seek to resolve, not litigate, issues. Projects should involve the public before they are substantially completed and presented to the Boards and Council. Everyone, in my mind, deserves a seat at the table.

Our City’s spending habits are out of control. We should focus our resources on providing for vital governmental services. Our revenues are down and Council has failed to police our monies. I will be a watchdog of our city’s monies and finances. I will ask the hard questions of Staff and demand answers that are coherent and plausible. I do not believe in smoke and mirrors accounting.

Years of poor planning and development standards have led to increased height/density, upzonings and uncontrolled growth in our city. Inconsistent applications of policy decisions have led to negative outcomes for citizens and businesses. I will support fair, ethical, application of standards, policies and procedures as well as controlled growth with an eye toward the needs of our citizens, neighborhoods and businesses.

Our citizens and developers need certainty in a Downtown plan. There are currently no rules for Downtown development, only ad hoc decisions made to benefit politically connected special interests. I support completion of our Downtown Plan and approval by the citizens and businesses before moving forward with any further projects. Height and density may have their place but it is certainly not adjacent to neighborhoods and not if it interferes with quality of life in Scottsdale.

Additionally, I will not support zoning changes specific to increased heights or density in excess of what is already established for the Downtown, Airpark or north of the CAP areas, unless these changes are specifically designated for public good and are approved by the citizens and businesses of Scottsdale. I will entertain discussion on public good projects such as the inclusion of a larger trauma center to the Scottsdale Healthcare campus in the south Scottsdale area. Even though the city has projected future growth in the north Scottsdale area, I maintain the position that we do not need height, density or subdividing lots to accommodate a greater number of residents.

I support a realistic, cost-effective resolution to our transportation issues but I oppose a costly and ineffective fixed-rail system within city boundaries. I do, however, support discussion of a connector rail system along the 101 freeway with park and ride options into the Downtown and Airpark areas of Scottsdale. This type of system may prove beneficial in removing some of our road congestion from sister city commuters who work in or travel through Scottsdale. It is important to give our citizens practical options for transportation. I support expanding our current trolley routes, bus services and roadways (without ruining existing neighborhoods). We can also accommodate our larger Scottsdale employers through dedicated transportation systems for their organizations, carpool, and park and ride options.

Preservation of our City’s history and investment in the future of our City’s infrastructure are paramount to our long-term success. We cannot expect to build new structures on ground which houses ailing infrastructure. I will endorse committing funds to repair, revitalize and renew our infrastructure to deliver better services to our existent neighborhoods and provide adequate supply to our new neighbors. I will also protect our historic neighborhoods.

I support completing the McDowell Sonoran Preserve. I believe that the Preserve, with its peacefulness and serenity, is one of Scottsdale's great landmarks and should not be commercialized. The gateway Desert Discovery Center should serve to represent the city's commitment to preserving the Sonoran Desert, not exploit it.

I vigorously oppose the policy of the current City Council majority to provide a subsidy to anyone who asks for it. Our Council majority has refused to place a cap on subsidy provisions. We shouldn’t give developers money or zoning allowances to build in Scottsdale – if they want to build here, they should play by the rules.

I have supported Scottsdale’s businesses and appreciate the revenue that they generate. Scottsdale was built on the concept that business owners could live fruitful prosperous lives in this city. When tourism falters or our visitor numbers decline, it will be our local businesses who will carry the day with revenue.

I will continue to support the arts in Scottsdale, as this is part of our eclectic, unique heritage and business community. We need to make it easier to do business in Scottsdale and find better ways to support our existent businesses.

Our future safety depends on strong support of our core City services like police, fire and code enforcement. I will support strong management and enhancement of these services in conjunction with Scottsdale's growth and needs.

For years, major municipal decisions have been made absent public or business input. The result has been a reduced quality of life and a reduction in our city’s character and uniqueness. The current Council majority has a simple policy: no building too high, no subsidy too big and no density too great. I disagree with these issues.

With my 20 plus years in the legal and business profession and years of involvement in city related issues, I am qualified to hold a seat on the Council. I have the necessary commitment to make a positive difference in how we do business in the future.

Being a member of Council is about public service - being able to represent the voice of those who you serve without undue influence or promises made to special interests.

My campaign has been financially supported by private citizen donations, not developer or special interest monies.

Respectfully,

Nan Nesvig
www.nannesvig.com
nannesvig@aol.com
480-368-8701

She is committed to building upon her experience, proven leadership abilities and community involvement to improve citizens’ satisfaction with Council decisions. Suzanne will be a positive policy maker and a voice for citizens and their interests in the city. She will increase dialogue with more councilman/citizens meetings and is open and available for communications at any time.

If you want real experience, real leadership and real commitment from your councilmen, then vote for Suzanne Klapp for one of the three open City Council seats on September 2.

She grew up in Evansville, IN and worked as a clerk in a business office during high school and several years after graduation, saving money to attend the University of Evansville. She was the first person in her family to graduate from high school and considers a college degree as a great personal achievement. She was Campus Editor of the school newspaper and graduated with a degree in English and Journalism.

Suzanne has been involved in business management for 35 years, starting her career with Whirlpool Corporation and experiencing a rapid rise in the company. She held a variety of staff and operations management positions in human resources, production, material control and marketing throughout her 14 years with Whirlpool. While on a one year educational leave from the company, she earned an MBA degree from Southern Methodist University in Dallas, TX. She served an internship as a business writer for the Dallas Times Herald and in the relocation office of a large residential realtor while completing her graduate degree.

In the 1990’s, Suzanne was General Manager of Larson Juhl’s logistics center for five years in Los Angeles, CA, overseeing sales and operations for the framing products distributor throughout southern California and Hawaii. The company’s facility provided products to retail customers and also transferred inventory from other Larson Juhl distribution centers and the Los Angeles Port. In 1996, she married her husband, Tim, who was a customer at the time and she joined the FastFrame custom framing franchise operation in 1997 as a retailer in the Los Angeles area.

She and her husband moved to Scottsdale in 1998 and since then have owned custom framing retail stores in Scottsdale and in Phoenix. She is also Regional Developer for the FastFrame group of stores in Arizona, searching for new store locations and assisting new owners to open and operate their businesses. In the last ten years, she has helped grow the franchise in the state from two stores to twelve. She personally manages the only store she currently owns, which is located in Scottsdale.

Commitment to community has been a mission that runs parallel to her commitment to her career. She is active in the Scottsdale Area Chamber of Commerce’s Public Policy Advisory Committee, Rotary Club of Pinnacle Peak Executive Committee, Scottsdale Leadership’s Community and Alumni Committee, Valley Leadership, Scottsdale Sister Cities Board, Scottsdale Mountain Community Association Board, Women of Scottsdale, Paradise Valley Republican Women’s Club and the Legislative District 8 Republican Committee as an elected precinct committeeman. She also served previously on the Scottsdale City Council’s Districts Advisory Task Force.

In her hometown, Suzanne graduated from the first Leadership Evansville class and was the first graduate to be named the organization’s president. She was also President of Evansville Civic Theatre, President of the Salvation Army Advisory Board, board member of the Deaconess Hospital Foundation, and board member of the Evansville Philharmonic.

Suzanne has been endorsed by a number of elected officials and former officeholders, including Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio, Arizona Senator Carolyn Allen, Arizona Representatives Michele Reagan and John Kavanagh, Scottsdale City Councilman Wayne Ecton, and former Scottsdale Councilmen Jim Bruner and Jim Burke.

Contact her at suzanne@suzanneklapp.com or suzanneklapp@flash.net. Her website is www.suzanneklapp.com and her telephone number is 480-767-9660.

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My name is Tom Giller and I am running for Scottsdale City Council because of my concern for maintaining the character of our community as well as for the process by which City Council decisions are made without regard to neighborhood input.

I believe that the major issues facing the Scottsdale City Council are controlled growth, improved development standards, transportation solutions and making the planning and approval process more transparent and responsive to citizens.

If elected, my goals are to:

I was born and raised in Columbus, Ohio. I graduated from The Ohio State University with a degree in business administration and a major in real estate, working during the days in property management of apartments and attending classes in the evening.

Having found a deep appreciation for the openness and vast expanse of the West while working in Park City, Utah during college, I decided to move to Arizona in the early 1980’s to work with my father in a business serving the bottled water industry. After three years, I left that job to return to real estate, working in the corporate real estate department at The Greyhound Corporation on Central Avenue in Phoenix for more than 7 years. 

From the day I moved to Arizona, I have lived in and near downtown Scottsdale. I bought my first home in Southwest Village at Indian School and 68th Street, and then moved to where I currently live in the Whitwood neighborhood adjoining the heart of downtown Scottsdale.

Leaving Greyhound when it divested its interest in the Greyhound Bus Lines in 1991, I started my own business in property management focusing in small retail buildings downtown Scottsdale’s Fifth Avenue, Old Town and Main Street Arts districts.

I have throughout this career been active in downtown’ property owner associations and merchant groups to promote the unique resort character of Scottsdale. As part of my community involvement, I worked on a City committee which instituted a program requiring major developments to devote 1% of the project’s construction cost to public art on site. Over the years I have been actively involved with Scottsdale Sister Cities, Valley Big Brothers and The Sojourn Center. I also worked to oppose the condemnation efforts of the City and redevelopment plan of The Canals, a project that was defeated by public vote. Recently, I again opposed oversized and poorly planned development in downtown Scottsdale by leading the effort to seek a vote on the Hanover Project.

As a single father, I spend as much time as possible with my 9-year-old daughter Gwyneth who attends Hopi Elementary School. A primary reason for entering the campaign for City Council is to give citizens and neighborhoods a real voice in Scottsdale city government, where today the dialogue and process is all too often dominated by developers.

I respectfully ask for your vote on September 2^nd.

Tom Giller
www.tomgiller.com
votegiller08@cox.net
480-227-4150

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Mary Manross, Betty Drake and Ron McCullagh should not be considered as electable due to their failure to perform as promised and failing to keep the public fully involved in all processes. Therefore, in our humble opinion, the incumbents should not be considered as persons to be voted for in the upcoming election. All we have to go on to judge their abilities are their past performances which are dismal, secret and developer driven at best.

We will start our critique of the responding candidates in the order presented above. Make sure to read their offerings above so that you see the entire picture. We will only mention a few of their qualifications or negatives in these critiques:

Jim is a very affable, experienced and very educated person who knows finance and procedures very well. He attends community citizen meetings on many occasions and will meet with you one-on-one if requested. He fully believes in the open government process and vows to reopen city government to the citizens as it used to be.

He seems to lean toward more height and density than we like but he too has limits and where they are placed which Mary Manross doesn’t have or like and he is beginning to see that height and density can bring far more problems than benefits without proper planning and infrastructure upgrading first.

He knows that sales tax revenues, not property taxes, pay the way for the city and also knows that the major priority is to get more businesses into the city to reach that goal. Check cashing stores are not his idea of sales tax revenue producing businesses which the city needs, especially in the south.

He may not be the quintessential candidate for Mayor for some, but he is far and away the better qualified candidate than anyone else listed on the ballot for that position.

As Joel will tell you himself, he is an "enigma". Joel has a great heart and a deep love for Scottsdale but we don’t feel some of his ideas, although novel and innovative, really express what the citizens have asked for council candidates to possess. His take on height and density really don’t meet our expectations or those of the citizens.

He did hit the nail on the head when he expressed that the reason for all the citizen petitions of late is the inability of the council majority to see the needs and wants of the residents.

Joel has vacillated on a number of issues which is too bad because he really means well. He also will tell you that this election season has been far too long and things have changed, especially with Dolan and Gray "leaving".

John has made it his goal to force important city issues out into the open and into the mayoral race and has very effectively done exactly that. This kind of campaigning has not bothered Jim Lane at all (has actually helped Jim) but has really rattled and upset Mary Manross because her secretive cover and numerous cover ups have been very effectively blown wide open.

Can John be elected as a Write-in candidate? It’s never been done and a very long shot at best, but a possibility. He would much rather throw whatever weight he has in another direction if his definition of issues mesh with someone else’s in the near future (before the mail-in ballots are sent out).

Lisa is an attorney, a very intelligent and educated person who is very interested in being on the council and helping the city. She is very personable and easily approached and she wants to learn and be more involved to help the city out of this malaise it has been forced into by the current administrations failures. She believes in open government and controlled spending with the citizens being fully involved.

Her negative points are that she has not been involved or attended any citizen organization meetings, hasn’t participated to any degree in the council meetings, hasn’t served on any boards, commissions or committees, and is really a political novice with a lot to learn.

Is that a bad thing? Not particularly, but she hasn’t come up with firm answers on height and density either downtown or at the airpark, and she passed on that issue north of the CAP canal stating that she would have to know more before she could comment.

Can she learn? Yes. Is that what we want to see in a council candidate walking into a tough council situation today, Not particularly in our mind. With a couple of years in the trenches "learning the ropes", she’ll be a fine candidate.

Nan has "put her money where her mouth is" by openly participating in many city or citizen driven issues. Nan has an excellent background in city procedures, rules regulations and the politics that come with those issues having fought a number of battles and won many. Nan is very approachable, is extremely compassionate, very articulate, and has an excellent law education with 20 years of business law experience. She is a member of most citizen organizations and a willing and active participant as well. She has participated in many city actions and contributed to the Ethics decision and the transportation plan. She is an extremely fast learner who can currently express herself very succinctly on almost any subject related to the city and its problems.

Nan is very citizen and spending control oriented and will defend the citizen’s rights as hard as necessary to protect their rights as well as those of the city from outsiders such as rogue developers who are looking for nothing more than a fast buck and a quick trip out of town with taxpayer money. Nan will not support secrecy in any form and fully supports full citizen involvement in all city processes.

She does not support height and density in the southern portion of the city unless it follows a distinct plan, is approved by the voters, is determined to be "for the public good" and doesn’t offend the neighbors.

She is totally against any reduction of lot size or more height and density for the north, we have fought long and hard to maintain the special lifestyle in the north and she will not allow that to be compromised on her watch if elected.

With her strong feeling concerning ethics and honesty, her tenacity and her vast experience and knowledge in and of the city of Scottsdale, we feel Nan is the number one choice for the council position.

Suzanne is a very intelligent, likeable, compassionate and educated person who is very adept at knowing business procedures. She has a lot of experience with city provided or sponsored programs but very little with actual "citizen on the street" political experience. She has only served on one committee and we have not seen her at any of the citizen organization meetings except at candidate forum meetings this year which many feel must be a very important part of any candidate’s portfolio.

She is a strong supporter and active member of the Scottsdale Area Chamber of Commerce which may not be in the best interest of many of the citizens or Suzanne for that matter.

Scores of citizens judge those within the Chamber based on the positions which the Chamber has taken which have been deemed by many to be against the everyday citizens on too many occasions.

Our consensus is that Suzanne would be an excellent candidate if she had a lot more ground floor citizen contact and had been an active member of some of the citizen organizations. She will also need to be very visible to everyday citizens so they know her as someone they can count on; the Chamber cannot be trusted to help any citizen with any problem as shown by all the bad Manross Administration decisions which have been supported 100% by the Chamber.

We feel strongly but sadly, that the strong Chamber connection is a major negative during this election for Suzanne.

Tom has also "put his money where his mouth is" by openly protesting the poorly designed and located Hanover Project all the way to the Appellate court. Tom and Nan successfully helped POP in Paradise Valley fend off the Ritz-Carlton mess. At least to date, POP is in the saddle on this one.

Tom has an excellent education and knows his business when it comes to real estate, spending, budgets and city affairs.

Tom has been behind the scenes on a number of city issues and knows the territory very well. He is very tenacious and wants what’s best for the citizens of Scottsdale. He believes 100% in open city government, controlled spending, has serious problems with height and density which don’t "fit" the neighborhood or are outside the currently designated areas where reasonable height and density are allowed.

He believes, as does Nan, that the "common man" is the heart of any city and should be treated in that manner by the politicians, something we haven’t seen since Herb Drinkwater. Tom and Nan agree on many issues.

Tom is our other choice for a top City Council position in this election.

Those are the staffs feeling on the candidates as they sit today. We feel that all candidates are qualified to some degree or they wouldn’t still be in the race. Could there be revelation which could possibly change things? Possibly, but the only possibility would be that Washington and Lane could come to agreements on certain issues on which they aren’t far apart, and one of the remaining council candidates could rise above the others to take the third position on our slate.

Who do we think would be the best third council candidate? We want to hold on to that one until all the forums have all been completed and we hear their final "pitches" to the voters.

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Dear Mr. Little,

I am the president of the Scottsdale Small Business Alliance and also the owner of Scottsdale Studios, a video production company in Scottsdale.  I am interested in producing a show and broadcasting it on Channel 11. This show would present the issues affecting small business owners and other residents in Scottsdale. For example, such issues as transportation, economic development, finances, etc. would be discusses.

I noticed that the City sponsors Links (Ned O'Hearn's show) and also the AZ Republic Forum.  These shows are very informational, but I feel they give a very narrow view of issues that people care about and are representative of a very small group in the community.

What is the procedure for having an opportunity to place a show on the City public access network?

Susan Wood
480-551-1410
Scottsdale Studios

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Hands down the award for the best candidate forum for City Council and Mayor goes to COPP. Not only do they have a well organized public meeting, but their compilation of candidate answers to the questions they submit before the actual public meeting were organized in a spiral binder provided to those citizen who care, and it is included here in the Scottsdale Activist with a huge "Thanks" to the COPP Board for sharing it with all of you readers. (Click Here to see COPP Questionnaire)

Linda Whitehead and Bob Vairo did an excellent job with their timely and hard hitting program.

I have to say that those seeking office for the first time, in Scottsdale, did a very good job, all of them. It is very clear that they have been doing their homework but it seems very apparent that some of them have been listening to the messages of Candidates Nesvig and Giller who have never waivered from their original messages as others have. It seems they have also been listening to the concerns of the community, north and south, some for the first time apparently.

They made no promises, except to improve communications between the residents and City Hall. We hear those same remarks with every election.

Whenever I hear the incumbents mention neighborhood revitalization I cringe. They know they are just saying that because that is what they think we want to hear.

Well, yeah, we do, but we want them to mean what they say, then do as they say. So far it has all been talk. We have yet to see any council member take the bull by the horns and get things moving to address the Neighborhood elements in the General Plan, let alone work with staff and community on real issues of neighborhood revitalization.

Don’t for a minute think that if a project like WaterView a.k.a. Solis, on the canal bank north of Camelback Road, were to be proposed impacting another older residential neighborhood, the current council majority would throw that neighborhood under the bus, in the name of progress and commerce as they have already tried to do with others.

When the subject of petitions and referendums came up at the COPP forum the incumbents just did not get it, or if they did they would not admit it. Four of the "first timers" said that those petitions, 28 to date this year, are indicative of a total disconnect between residents and their city government and the councils continued direction of "We’ll do it our way, to hell with the citizens wants and needs, we know better".

You have to wonder why residents have to be pushed to taking those time consuming steps, particularly when incumbents admit that, "yeah we looked at the situations then and yep changes were needed."

Scottsdale might need to do a Charter review to fine tune the way it handles the peoples business because something is not working….. or is it the current council does what it wants to pad the pockets of those that are already allowed to feed at the public trough, residents be damned, by not abiding by the City Charter?

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The voters approved them in 2000 and Mary Mary quite contrary spent the money elsewhere on something frivolous.

Here is one excellent reason why we should ask for them again!

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The Coalition of Pinnacle Peak (COPP) performed a top-quality service to the community with their All-Candidates' Forum held Thursday night at the Legend Trails Clubhouse.  Not only was the program well-structured but the candidate time limits were firmly enforced which allowed more coverage of audience questions.

COPP funded and distributed a bound booklet containing written candidate responses to 20 important issues.  An interesting question was included, "Is there anything in your background that you would not like publicized on the front page of local newspapers?"--not all candidates replied "No" and Ron McCullagh didn't respond. Early voters would do well to get a copy and do their own evaluation of the candidates. (Click Here to see COPP Questionnaire)

All of the candidates had participated the previous night at the Sonoran Conservancy forum on questions limited to the Preserve issues.  That night all were more vocal compared to the COPP forum performances. 

The sheer number of City Council candidates made it difficult for a single candidate to "stand out".  If was fun however to listen to who’s trying to steal who’s thunder by changing their campaigns slightly to copy what another successful candidate has been stressing for months.

Lisa Borowsky was particularly quiet when given the opportunity for additional input on a topic.  Her concluding remarks for the evening explained that she was hearing the same [incumbent] words over and over and it was time for serious change.

After multiple incumbents touted their years and years of experience on the Council and other boards, Tom Giller provided humor with the comparison of what being an experienced hunter had done for Dick Cheney. 

Nan Nesvig continued to expand on the same theme she has had since day one of the campaign. Interestingly enough, a number of the candidates have picked up on her theme, but not very successfully.

Joel BramOweth commanded the microphone whenever possible and spoke passionately for the audience to understand and accept some of his positions that favor developers over residents' interests and increased density over what the general public expects to keep. Two of his memorable comments were something to the effect that he was seen by many as an "enigma", and that the reason there have been so many citizen petitions to the council was indicative of a council which is either out of control or out of touch.

Mary Manross accepted all credit possible for all positive results for the 7 member city council over the past 8 years, but the number of negatives were never mentioned.  Mary seriously contradicted herself when she stated that "No one has seen the Downtown Plan"....then within the next two minutes, "Well, I received the draft today."  Typical Mary.

Jim Lane supports sending the height and density segment of the Downtown Plan to the public vote.  He also supports limited height and density in specific areas of the city without being particularly explicit. Reduced spending and much better use of taxpayer money is very important to him.

John Washington and Ron McCullagh disagreed that entitlements will be automatic when the Council approves the Downtown Plan.

Betty Drake insisted that the Downtown Plan has to be specific or she won't "go along with it" while Mary kept saying it would be policy-only.

Do these people get the same information from staff or are there only a privileged few who see this stuff?

All in all, it was a very good program with many chinks in the armor showing up in the incumbents as well a lack of knowledge concerning the common citizen wants and needs in some of the candidates.

Many commented that the incumbents went away seemingly upset while the challengers seemed satisfied with their performances and presentations.

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We watched the AZ Republic Mayoral Forum on Wednesday evening on City Channel 11.

As soon as the forum concluded, the next program started immediately. We saw the words "ASU - SkySong-  DREAM" go across the screen.  A celebration of the opening of SkySong.

Then we saw Regent Ernest Calderon, introduce Mayor Mary Manross with glowing compliments like, "one of the architects of Scottsdale's business and cultural center is Scottsdale's Mayor. I've been pleased to work with Mary Manross in the past and I can tell you ASU is very blessed to have such a partner."

Then Manross takes the podium, glowing in the spotlight of adoration.  And the show continued.

If that isn't a political ad, I don't know what is and I question the legality of using public access broadcasting to endorse a political candidate by placing that program directly following the Mayoral debate.

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~ Miscellaneous but Important City Information

Do you own a Southern Scottsdale Business ? (that would be anything south of Indian Bend Road)  Please check out this website and sign up for one of the repeating forums July 24th, Aug 7th,21st, and Sept 11th at various locations--hosted by the city.

www.scottsdaleaz.gov/planning/areaplans

Channel 11 Candidate Interviews Available for Your Viewing: July 22 --You can attend at Scottsdale City Hall. Mayoral candidates Jim Lane and Mary Manross, along with mayoral write-in candidate John Washington, will answer questions from 6 p.m. to 7 p.m.  Council candidates will be interviewed 7:30 to 8:30 PM. Rebroadcasts will occur on July 29th and August 8th both dates at 7 pm and 8 pm......

Can you host candidates in your home? Candidates need the opportunity to speak with you and your neighbors. Door-to-door isn't the best answer in 110F heat. Would you gather 5 to 15 people and invite a candidate?....or invite 2 or 3 and stagger their arrival and departure times?  We recommend that your priority be "new faces" rather than incumbents. Council meeting history already informs you on the incumbents.  Give the 5 new faces a chance to share their positions on issues in your informal setting.  Thanks! email cogsaz@cox.net if you need any contact phone numbers.

New Issue Brewing?  The City of Scottsdale has no formal noise ordinance. As new residential projects are approved in the downtown core, as existing neighborhoods nearby are impacted, and as new liquor and nightclub licenses are approved----abusive noise levels are an increasing problem for local residents.  We have one COGS member who reports that a nearby club plays live music until 2 AM with their doors open.  The level of noise is unlivable---and unsleepable in their home. They have received no enforcement from the police department. 

In the Thursday night COPP candidates' forum, one sitting councilman stated that the only noise violation at this time is called "disorderly conduct"---hardly a specific description or sufficient business fine to stop the practices.  Share you experience with us.  Perhaps a Citizen Task Force to research noise ordinances in other cities and to recommend to the City Council is in order.  Let us know of your interest.

Tuesday July 22nd: Dog and Art Event- Stetson Public Plaza-5:30pm to 8:30 pm--view painters capturing all things canine. For more information call 480 874 1200.

Thursday   July 24th "Christmas in July" toy drive that benefits the Child  Crisis Center. Bring your one, new, unwrapped gift to Do Gringos on Craftsman's Court (just south of 5th Avenue) starting at 4 PM. You will enjoy a complimentary appetizer, drink specials and have your picture taken with Mr. and Mrs. Santa Claus. More info at www.dosgringosaz.com and www.childcrisis.org

Thursday July and August nights ==DOGS AND JAZZ... From 7 to 9 PM on 7111 5th Avenue bring your dog and hear good jazz music. There will be dog fashions, gift items, ladies' jewelry and an "animal rescue" raffle. For more information call 480 970 1894 or www.classy-jazzy.com.  ...and finally....Free Fridays at the Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art 10 am to 5 PM

CITY BUSINESS.........

The Museum of the West public hearing schedule.....August 13th Planning Commission hearing, September 9th City Council decision. Further information

http://www.scotsdaleaz.gov/projects/projectsinnews/SMW.asp and

http://eservices.scottsdaleaz.gov/cases/casesheet.aspx?caseid=35143   

The Downtown Plan Update: The public hearing process for the update is scheduled for the fall. First draft should be available by the end of July.

http://www.scottsdaleaz.gov/downtown/updates.asp  

The public will have an internet opportunity to respond to the text and "visions".

Camelback and Indian School Road construction continues....82nd Street will close briefly at Indian School Rd...Camelback Rd east of Scottsdale Road will reduce to one lane in each direction from now to October for a new water and sewer line. 

The SRP electrical substation on the NE corner of Scottsdale Rd and Camelback--eastern side of the canal bank....The City Council will vote at the July 22nd meeting on a Resolution to keep the SRP substation in its current location.  The staff is "working on the language" for that resolution. At the last council meeting, only Councilmen Littlefield and Nelssen would commit publicly to reject the relocation to the 68th and Indian School site. 

Councilman Littlefield then asked Acting City Manager, John Little, to agendize the issue as a Resolution prior to the Council's summer break.  We may be asking you to fill the city hall and/or email boxes in support of the potentially impacted neighborhoods...stay tuned!....

Southern Area Business Focus Groups...If you own a business south of Indian Bend Road, please attend one of these 6 to 8 PM events: July 24th at SkySong, August 7th at Chaparral Park office, August 21st at Granite Reef Senior Center, September 11th at Kerr Cultural Center. Register prior to this Thursday, July 17th. Call 480 312 7990 or www.scottsdaleaz.gov/planning/areaplans

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Below are the city links to the Campaign Finance Reports for all candidates for the September 2^nd election. To get past page one, click on the small right/left arrows where the page designator is located in the upper center portion of the form.

We think it’s very important for all voters to look at who the contributors are and what their occupation is. Be aware that just because they say they are retired, doesn’t mean they are not working for someone or representing someone who could possibly expect special considerations from the city council.

As an example, Incumbent councilman Ron McCullagh has a majority of contractors, builders and developers as his major contributors while others have none of those types of contributors, so who would you suspect would have the least political pressure on them if elected? The candidate with lots of builder/developer/mover & shaker contributions, or the candidate with little or no contributions from that group?

Another example would be the paper work of the Manross campaign which is so messy, it cannot be read in many cases. Was this done because of pure sloppiness and lack of attention to detail, or deliberately so readers wouldn’t be able to determine who the contributor actually is?

Many contribute to a number of candidates and others contribute to only one or two. To decide who is collecting what from whom, look for the bigger dollar donations (^$100 or more) and note if those contributors are part of the developer or builder community, a political entity, or some other organization where "having a friend on the council" might be a good thing.

Just because a candidate has collected a lot of money doesn’t mean they are the most popular or most qualified. It could mean that there is a lot of political pressure there or that possibly favors could be expected. It’s also important to note whether the contributor has been in front of the council asking for something such as special zoning, height and density, or some other issue falling outside the current General Plan.

As has happened in the past, just because a candidate has a lot of money doesn’t mean they win. In a number of cases, they have lost because of their poor or questionable performance or to whom they are connected by their campaign contributions.

Be very careful and study the candidates and who they might be representing if elected, other than the taxpayers of Scottsdale.

Lisa Borowsky

http://eservices.scottsdaleaz.gov/clerkpacs/viewer.aspx?n=4693589&v=9507678&t=TIFF

Joel BramOweth

http://eservices.scottsdaleaz.gov/clerkpacs/viewer.aspx?n=4692777&v=9506054&t=TIFF

Oren Davis

http://eservices.scottsdaleaz.gov/clerkpacs/viewer.aspx?n=4690027&v=9500549&t=TIFF

Betty Drake

http://eservices.scottsdaleaz.gov/clerkpacs/viewer.aspx?n=4693592&v=9507684&t=TIFF

Tom Giller

http://eservices.scottsdaleaz.gov/clerkpacs/viewer.aspx?n=4693304&v=9507108&t=TIFF

Suzanne Klapp

http://eservices.scottsdaleaz.gov/clerkpacs/viewer.aspx?n=4690695&v=9501890&t=TIFF

W. Jim Lane

http://eservices.scottsdaleaz.gov/clerkpacs/viewer.aspx?n=4668118&v=9456564&t=TIFF

Mary Manross

http://eservices.scottsdaleaz.gov/clerkpacs/viewer.aspx?n=4693419&v=9507338&t=TIFF

Ron McCullagh

http://eservices.scottsdaleaz.gov/clerkpacs/viewer.aspx?n=4679748&v=9479908&t=TIFF

Nan Nesvig

http://eservices.scottsdaleaz.gov/clerkpacs/viewer.aspx?n=4690605&v=9501715&t=TIFF

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 ~ Candidates Corner

This area of the Scottsdale Activist is open to any and all candidates for city elected offices at absolutely no charge. We invite any and all candidates to take advantage of this free service to the community. Candidates are limited to one article per week and limited to 650 words and no graphics unless they are graphs or tables.

Manross, in her campaign television commercials and print ads, says property rates have decreased 50% during her tenure. But we all know our actual property tax payments just keep going up. In fact, they increased every year the mayor has been in office. Please click on

www.lane4scottsdale.com/media.cfm to read more on "It's about Trust". 

Further, the Mayor told Scottsdale Republic columnist Laurie Roberts recently that "I may have signed that", referring to the lease signed on land adjacent to our Water Campus. She had no legal authority to make that deal.  All in one breath, the mayor further said, "In fact I did sign that"; "The point is I can't talk about it".  Again secrecy and it didn't seem to trouble our mayor that it will cost taxpayers millions.

Please click on www.lane4scottsdale.com/media.cfm to read more on A Legacy of Mistakes and Waste. 

September 2nd will be a pivotal date for our city. I need and want your support to become Mayor. You can help by getting involved, by a contribution and by forwarding this email to people you know.  

Please click on www.lane4Scottsdale.com. 

Sincerely,
 
Jim Lane
jim@lane4scottsdale.com
480-299-2114

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Tuesday 22 July 6:00 p.m. Scottsdale Tribune’s Mayoral Candidates Forum. Broadcast live on City Cable Channel 11 from 6 to 7 p.m. Tuesday, from the Kiva of Scottsdale City Hall. Mark Scarp will moderate, accompanied by a fellow Tribune editor to be determined. It is to be rebroadcast on Channel 11 at 7 p.m. and 10 p.m. on these dates:

(The City Council candidate forums will be broadcast live from 7:30 to 8:30 p.m. July 22 and replayed on the above three dates at 6 p.m. and 9 p.m.)

Conversational style with no set time limits, although, time permitting, you will each be asked to give a one-minute closing statement at the end of the forum. Questions will provide candidates to give their views on a range of city issues. We will also ask about candidate qualifications as well as similarities and differences in candidates’ approaches. Some questions will be for all candidates while others will be directed at particular candidates. Many will be compiled from Tribune staff; however, during the next four weeks we hope to also gather questions from among our readers.
 You may direct questions during that period to city editor Bill Bertolino at bbertolino@evtrib.com or by calling (480) 970-2352. We’re looking forward to a detailed and lively discussion.

Mark J. Scarp moderator, mscarp@scottsdaletribune.com (480) 970-2351, Columnist-editorial writer, East Valley & Scottsdale Tribune Thursday 7 August 7:00 p.m. Scottsdale Area Association of Realtors Forum At the Kiva, 6 pm for Council candidates 7 pm for

Mayoral candidates, www.saaronline.com Bill Gray moderator.
Contact John Packham, john@saaronline.com, 480.945.2651, SAAR Government Affairs Director.

Wednesday 13 August 8:00 a.m. Heart of Scottsdale Realtor's Tour Group (Heart of Scottsdale covers from Cactus Rd. & Thomas/112th to Scottsdale Rd). Realtors, Finance people, Inspectors, and Title people (about 50 of us) will hear why you think you're the best candidate for the Council and what you most want to see happening in our great city of Scottsdale!!! at the McCormick Ranch Golf Club---networking at 8:00....speakers at 8:30

https://www.saaronline.com/marketing/residential.php?id=1   or

http://heartofscottsdalehometours.com/tours.htm

Contact Sue Murray, smurray@russlyon.com, 480-560-7706, Director.

Monday 18 August 2:30 p.m. Second Arizona Republic Mayoral Forum
City Cable 11 studios. This half-hour forum would likely be one of the last times to discuss the issues with voters leading up to election day. This program will start airing soon after the taping on City Cable 11 and there will be coverage in the Scottsdale Republic, The Arizona Republic and on the Republic Web sites. No guests will be allowed in the studio.
Mike Ryan moderates. mike.ryan@pni.com (602) 444-5810.

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~Letters to the Editor  

Mayor Manross, Members of Council:

The Mayor's comments following the discussion of the petition re the SRP substation are disingenuous at best.

If Council had been more proactive in suggesting what developers need to in regard to their projects and their responsibilities to the existing community, we would not be in the situation that we are in now.

This project, WaterView/Solis has been in the pipelines since January of 2007 and the developer was working with staff including assistant City Managers.

If you did not know what was being discussed, why not? Did your city manager(s) not discuss this with you? Is there no process in place to address these issues before they get out of hand, as this has?

The answer is no to both questions. There is no implementation process for all of the elements of the General Plan which has allowed you to disregard many important things, like infrastructure, neighborhoods and housing, to name three.

Certainly as our city government and the Chamber of Commerce promoted, with great enthusiasm, the increased height and density for the mature areas of Scottsdale, at least a minor thought was given to the impacts of those increases on existing neighborhoods.

It does not look to be so, sadly. The ball is in your court as leadership. You have no constraints upon you when it comes to encouraging specific guidelines or standards for developers and developments impacting the mature residential neighborhoods.

You refused to deal with these issues regarding SkySong, all of the Downtown condo developments and the redevelopment of the Canal Bank.

The residents vote you into office and our tax dollars pay your salaries. Not the developers from out of town.

Nancy Cantor
nancyanncantor@cox.net

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It would seem the "Old Guard" was finally caught with their trousers and skirts down around their ankles so to speak as the new candidates for city council repeatedly keep them off balance with ideas, facts and suggestions which the old guard has heard many times but never acted upon for what I see as totally selfish reasons.

This was the case for all forums I have either attended or seen on City Channel 11 TV.

Mary, Betty and Ron were all out of their element of totally controlling their subjects, questions and the issues to which they continue to speak and espouse without the citizens in mind. The community and the new candidates have totally exposed that attempted iron-fisted control and have tried to force the incumbents to speak truthfully about the subjects with some success.

Their demeanor strongly suggests that the three incumbents are very uncomfortable facing their challengers who, for the most part, are very articulate and accurate in their fact-filled suggestions to accommodate real change and put Scottsdale back on the level internationally as it was once accustomed.

This was obvious because of the number of mental errors made by all three. Mary and Ron contradicted themselves more than once and Betty made statements that were not correct which were immediately corrected by the other candidates publicly embarrassing Betty while on the panel at COPP.

I think it boils down to whom do you believe; the one’s in office who I feel have sold the citizens out and bungled the positions and responsibilities they were elected to carry out, or those who have the courage to challenge those who were elected by speaking the truth with facts and making excellent suggestions for fixing what has gone procedurally and financially wrong in Scottsdale city government in the last eight years.

Your editorials and Letters to the Editor keep asking over and over if it’s time for a change.

To answer that question for my part, I say it is past time for a change and my family and  I will support those new candidates who are not part of the "establishment" or the Chamber, express themselves well, know and respect city history, and can think for themselves and promise to include the citizens in their decisions for a change.

Long live "The West's Most Western Town".

E. Slocomb
Scottsdale

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  Living in the Land of Oz

Well I am sure our editor did not take the time off that he should have while we took a break from the Activist last week and I wish he would have because I sure as heck did, but now we are back and here are bits and pieces of the stupidity that happened over that period of time.

Let’s begin with yet another Planning and Development nightmare of yet another property wishing to rezone from CS to guess what? Yep C-3 commercial zoning and again it is abutting what? Yep you got it again, a residential community. This time it is the new Lowes store on Hayden and McDowell roads. Okay, now guess why they want to, or have to change zoning in this instance? Well, under C-S zoning they can not have a truck rental outlet and they also cannot have outside displays, so instead of looking for a solution like we gave the city council readers regarding the other property just down the street who wants to also switch to C-3 zoning and all for nothing more than an animal hospital, we again have to ask the logical question of "why is not easier to just amend the uses category instead of changing the zoning to yet again one of the highest and most intense commercial uses you can get?"

This case was continued because the community stepped up to the plate to say, I don’t think so. You see the issue they also have with this is that Lowes is already in violation of multiple code violations for operations that are not supposed to be going on according to the development agreement from the original allowance to build the project there. They must have forgotten that they fall under the Big Box Ordinance of the city.

It appears that over the break one of the things I had been warning voters up North about is the issue of how quickly this council will bend to a developer to begin destroying the northern section of the city and low and behold on July 13^th the Oz Tribune ran a story entitled "proposed HIGH-RISE hotel draws criticism".

Now, guess where this hotel is planned to go and has already been approved by none other than whom? Yep, the city has already approved this plan and it is going to go up at Bell and the Loop 101; so tell me again who has your back with the present council majority and leadership? 5 stories tall and right smack dab in the mix of the preserve and mountain views and like I have been telling you folks up North who supported and voted these morons into office, they don’t give a rats patoot about you, your views, your preserve, and your quality of life and it has again been proven by their actions so expect more of this to start going farther North as the precedent has now been set and you will now get a taste of what we have been telling you about for the last 5 years. The population projections for the north provided by the city itself show a doubling of the population numbers. Where are they going to put those new residents?

Betty Drake thinks she is the target of a TV hit piece that is being run by Lamar Whitmer and Michael Fernandez as well as Susan Woods, and Betty cannot figure it out that when she opened her mouth about traffic congestion and told viewers that if they wanted less traffic congestion, then they should move to Ajo. Well Betty, here is the truth to the issue and it is an old lesson that goes, "open mouth and insert foot." Checkout the fun at www.scottsdaletraffic.com and enjoy all the other things that our illustrious leader and the Craven Weasel of the West have said to the residents of the city.

For those of you that are still riled about the "dust ordinance" that we adopted here is the usual saying the city gives you, "do as we tell you, not as we do". Now do you wonder why I repeat this verse that we see from the city? Well over the last week I had noted some rather strange happenings as I was driving about, like the other day when I noted that the folks cleaning the medians and sidewalks over in McCormick Ranch were blowing the debris into the street, or just Friday morning on my way to work I noted a city employee at the senior center using a gas powered blower at 5 A.M. to blow the dirt and dust from the sidewalk to where? Yep, you got it, right into the street. So the next time you hear "Do as we say not as we do" I will hope you are in a voting booth.

I have to wonder when some are going to except the truth and come to their senses and hopefully before the election is over. The past Manross lies in her campaign for Mayor are now spilling over to the lips of none other than Buckaroo Betty as she was quoted in the paper speaking of the ‘economic boom" in the Downtown revitalization efforts of her majesty.

Really? An economic boom for whom; the city or the developers, I mean really, is Lane telling the truth that the Mayor is out of touch with reality and is Drake in the same boat with the mayor?

What boom are they talking about since the reality is that stores in downtown are closing in projects that are the new, hip, eclectic architecture of the 24/7 live, work, play dream. City figures not only show that retail revenue is down, yet again for all of this great work the Mayor and her cronies have allowed to take place, their work has ruined what Scottsdale was known for. Again I have to ask where is the economic boom when developments are failing to meet deadlines and foreclosures are abundant as well as the lack of anyone showing any signs of life in all this great new development.

Let’s not forget that the city is not collecting any revenue from these projects into the city coffers as it is well known that mixed use developments such as the ones we are building return no real revenue to the city. Remember this you conservation nuts for the preserve, with sales tax revenues declining at the rate they have been and which has actually been happening for longer than this recession means less money to purchase land for the completion of the preserve.

Now the Mayor and Betty are claiming that the southern portion of the city is in great shape thanks to their votes and I have to wonder how great they think it is as crime is not down, it is increasing in the south. We now have one grocery store to shop at for everyone from Thomas Road south to McKellips since Bashas closed their doors thanks to developer Rick Sodja and company. The motor mile departures are now turning into what the Chamber of Commerce calls a positive sign, used car dealerships reminiscent of the continued deteriorization of downtown Phoenix along Osborn and other East-West core area streets.

The city council is approving zoning changes that will destroy mature communities by allowing multiple properties to flip their zoning because of a use issue that can be cured by amending the use text instead of zoning everything C-3 commercial. There is no retail shopping left in the South because of bad planning and Sky Swindle has reduced its development agreement that had retail on all lower level floors of all 4 buildings to know just 2 buildings. The last sit down, full menu restaurant is now closed and sits vacant on the corner of Scottsdale and McDowell road.

Now today I read in the paper the Manross article claiming she will accelerate projects impacting Scottsdale which in Manross talk means since she is now the Chairman of MAG she will open the doors to all developers looking for handouts.

And last but not least in her recent article is "growth management" and "open space" and I guess she must really be as stupid as she sounds since she told city leaders from all over that the state is not ready for all this growth and she builds higher and denser projects in her city with a failing infrastructure that is being rebuilt on the taxpayers backs so she can have a legacy.

The biggest joke to be mentioned by both of these clueless twits is the issue of sustainability and both of these one-hit wonders must have missed the light rail train on this.

Yep, great job you folks are doing and you are leading this city straight into the dumper.

Let’s do ourselves and the city a favor come Election Day and vote all three of these folks out of office for being just plain stupid and liars.

VOTE "NO" ON MANROSS, MCCULLAGH, AND DRAKE, FOR A REAL BRIGHTER FUTURE FOR THE CITY.

Michael Merrill
"The Brutal Critic"
Scottsdale

What happens when our overlords in Congress, the White House and the Federal Reserve destroy the economy and ruin millions of lives? They get invited to cocktail parties and news shows, and are treated with respect and dignity by the public.

What happens when some poor schlemiel gets caught with several ounces of dope for his own use and hasn’t harmed anyone? He goes to prison.

HAVE WE LOST OUR MINDS?

HAVE WE LOST ALL SENSE OF PROPORTIONALITY AND JUSTICE?

Sorry, but please allow me one more emotional outburst: WHAT KIND OF MIND CONTROL HAS TAKEN PLACE TO KEEP AMERICANS FROM THINKING ABOUT THROWING THEIR OVERLORDS IN PRISON?

That’s not a facetious question. If you thought it was, then perhaps you don’t know what the overlords have been doing to us for the last three decades to bring us close to economic collapse today. They have knowingly turned the country into a debtor nation, given average folks an incentive to spend more than they make, created the housing bubble and other bubbles, given us trillions of dollars of free stuff without any intention of paying the bill, debased the dollar and thus our standard of living, and covered their crimes with economic bunkum, populist hokum, and money borrowed from foreigners.

If you don’t think that Alan Greenspan, Nancy Pelosi, Barack Obama, and John McCain should be wearing prison stripes and eating from metal plates instead of going to Washington cocktail parties, then you must want to empty prisons of all convicted burglars, because, collectively, burglars have done far less harm to society than Congress, the White House and the Fed.

Or perhaps you don’t know the facts, which would be understandable, given that government K-12 schools and government-dependent universities don’t educate students about the economic crimes of the government. Some of those students become reporters and pundits, who don’t know enough about economics and economic history to tell their audiences about the crimes. However, in their defense they know a lot about A-Rod’s affair with Madonna.

A day doesn’t go by without someone sending an email to me about Big Oil, regurgitating some tripe he heard in the imbecilic media about Exxon Mobil’s profits and oil speculators. The senders don’t know that Exxon Mobil is a small player compared to the real Big Oil -- the state-owned oil companies around the world. Even more telling, the senders never say anything about Big Fanny. No, not their rear ends, where many of them keep their heads; but Fannie Mae, the voracious monster created by the government to give mortgages to people who shouldn’t get mortgages.

Big Fanny has become a slush fund for political payoffs and cronyism. Its former CEO, who made ^$90 million a year, was fired for cooking the books; yet he became an advisor to Mr. Change, Barack Obama. More capital has gone through Big Fanny than crap through the fannies of every goose in the world. If the company runs out of capital, the government could be on the hook for ^$5 trillion

Psst! Let me whisper a secret to you: The government is YOU!!

Amazingly, Big Fanny is a small burglary ring compared to Big Congress and Big Fed, the members of which deserve to be sent to the Big House and have their fannies lusted after by their fellow inmates.

Yeah, I know: You’re powerless to mete out justice and imprison them. But the least you can do is stop treating them with respect and start treating them like the Big Crooks and Big Asses that they are.

An author and columnist, Mr. Cantoni can be reached at ccan2@aol.com.

 ~ Council and Mayoral Candidates Information

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 ~Too Busy for a Friend? 

One day a teacher asked her students to list the names of the other students in the room on two sheets of paper, leaving a space between each name. 

Then she told them to think of the nicest thing they could say about each of their classmates and write it down. 

It took the remainder of the class period to finish their assignment, and as the students left the room, each one handed in the papers. 

That Saturday, the teacher wrote down the name of each student on a separate sheet of paper, and listed what everyone else had said about that individual.  

On Monday she gave each student his or her list. Before long, the entire class was smiling. "Really?" she heard whispered. "I never knew that I meant anything to anyone!" and, "I didn't know others liked me so much." were most of the comments.  

No one ever mentioned those papers in class again. She never knew if they discussed them after class or with their parents, but it didn't matter. The exercise had accomplished its purpose. The students were happy with themselves and one another.

That group of students moved on. 

Several years later, one of the students was killed in Viet Nam and his teacher attended the funeral of that special student. She had never seen a serviceman in a military coffin before. He looked so handsome, so mature. 

The church was packed with his friends. One by one those who loved him took a last walk by the coffin The teacher was the last one to bless the coffin. 

As she stood there, one of the soldiers who acted as pallbearer came up to her. "Were you Mark's math teacher?" he asked. She nodded: "yes." Then he said: "Mark  talked about you a lot." 

After the funeral, most of Mark's former classmates went together to a luncheon.  

Mark's mother and father were there, obviously waiting to speak with his teacher. "We want to show you something," his father said, taking a wallet out of his pocket. "They found this on Mark when he was killed. We thought you might recognize it." 

Opening the billfold, he carefully removed two worn pieces of notebook paper that had obviously been taped, folded and refolded many times. The teacher knew without looking that the papers were the ones on which she had listed all the good things each of Mark's classmates had said about him. "Thank you so much for doing that," Mark's mother said. "As you can see, Mark treasured it." All of Mark's former classmates started to gather around.

Charlie smiled rather sheepishly and said, "I still have my list. It's in the top drawer of my desk at home."  

Chuck's wife said, "Chuck asked me to put his in our wedding album."  

"I have mine too," Marilyn said. "It's in my diary."  

Then Vicki, another classmate, reached into her pocketbook, took out her wallet and showed her worn and frazzled list to the group "I carry this with me at all times," Vicki said and without batting an eyelash, she continued: "I think we all saved our lists." 

That's when the teacher finally sat down and cried. She cried for Mark and for all his friends who would never see him again. 

The density of people in society is so thick that we forget that life will end one day. And we don't know when that one day will be. 

So please, tell the people you love and care for, that they are special and important. Tell them, before it is too late.

And One Way To Accomplish This Is: Send this message on. If you do not send it, you will have, once again passed up the wonderful opportunity to do something nice and beautiful. 

If you've received this, it is because someone cares for you and it means there is probably at least someone for whom you care.  

If you're "too busy" to take those few minutes right now to forward this message on, would this be the VERY first time you didn't do that little thing that would make a difference in your relationships?  

The more people that you send this to, the better you'll be at reaching out to those you care about.  

Remember, you reap what you sow. What you put into the lives of others comes back into your own. 

May your day be as blessed as You Are Special Too Busy for a Friend? 

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~ Information You Can Use

Just click on the logos below to go to these websites.

Send our Brave Troops "Something from Home", Click on  Links below.

Gathering of  Eagles Website was launched 2/9/07. Click on the Logo above for more information on how they are protecting America's Memorials.

~ UPDATE!! A "Must See" for All Americans

Every American should check out all of these websites to learn more about what the American population is about to have to deal with.

This is NOT for Children.

I don't normally allow anything but Scottsdale information in the Scottsdale Activist but after receiving many emails about this and viewing it, I think that it's imperative that every adult at least look at what's offered here if for  nothing more than their own education and to have everyone stop and think about the future of our country. Click on the link below,

 www.obsessionthemovie.com

If you don't have Adobe Flash, install it from the bottom of the page that comes up after you click on the link above. You should be able to view all available links within the main page.

The website below is of great interest as seen from a Lebanese point of view:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-8fa9yKQeTY

The website below gives some history of Terrorist attacks:

http://patriotfiles.org/civilizationcalls.htm

This website tell you what REALLY happened:

http://www.terrorismawareness.org/what-really-happened

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~ Arizona Tax Revolt

~ Prop 13 Arizona

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~ View Past City Council Meetings

We can now access the city council meetings by clicking on the following link:

If you have any problems, check your firewall and other safety features which could block access to the city site.

~Continuing Light Rail Information

The Scottsdale Citizens Transportation Study Committee invites you to view their website for more questions and answers at  www.norailforscottsdale.com .

================================================================

Simply click on the links below to get all the information you'll ever need concerning Light Rail.

     Goldwater Institute Report

     American Dream Coalition

    The Public Purpose

If you have any questions about light rail, send them to editor@scottsdaleactivist.com and we'll get the answers to you as soon as we can.

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~ For Continuing Information on Photo Radar,
Click on the Logo below.

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 ~Are Red-Light Cameras Fair to Drivers?

These modern-day robocops make ticketing easier and can be huge moneymakers for local governments. But critics question their accuracy and fret over privacy issues.

Click on the link below , then scroll down to read the article:

http://articles.moneycentral.msn.com/Insurance/InsureYourCar/AreRedLightCamerasFairToDrivers.aspx

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The Scottsdale Activist is very pleased to announce an effort on the behalf of the residents and taxpayers of the city of Scottsdale to promote open, honest and accountable city government. The Scottsdale Legal Defense Fund (SLDF) has been created to take legal action to hold the City accountable when its actions are contrary to state law, the City Charter, City ordinances or the public interest.

The most necessary ingredient to make the SLDF work will be confidential contributions from concerned Scottsdale citizens who are willing to help their community.  By contributing, we can change the way City Hall does business and insure that our tax dollars will be spent wisely.

No funds from the SLDF will or can be used for any political purpose.

Contributions shall be kept confidential as permissible by law and can be made in any Washington Mutual Bank to account number 3114165786 for the Scottsdale Legal Defense Fund. Branch locations are listed below. Contributions are not tax deductible.

The SLDF has retained the law firm of Miller LaSota & Peters, PLC, in connection with the patently illegal action taken by the Mayor and Council appointing the most recent Scottsdale City Attorney, while ignoring the residency requirement of the Scottsdale City Charter even though the new City Attorney’s contract (according to Scottsdale Republic reporter Laurie Roberts) requires that she reside in Scottsdale.  The City Council action was based on a legal opinion which was reportedly rendered during a closed door Executive Session of the City Council by a subordinate to the then acting City Attorney, who was subsequently appointed to the City Attorney position by a vote during a public City Council meeting. The opinion has been requested as a public document under state law, but the City has not yet provided it. The SLDF will take other appropriate legal actions based on the conduct of the Mayor and Council.

Washington Mutual Bank Locations at which contributions to the SLDF can be made are:

72^nd & Shea                    7337 E. Shea Blvd #120                480-609-8524
Hayden & Chaparral     7908 E. Chaparral # C-113            480-949-0069
Horizon                            14854 N Frank Lloyd Wright         480-614-6660
Scottsdale Ranch          10155 E. Via Linda Blvd #131       480-767-2060
Kierland Village              6501 E. Greenway Pkwy #133     480-315-2905

There are many other branches throughout the Valley.