Us at the Arizona Progress Gazette take seriously our duty to provide for you well thought out and reasonable takes (not hot takes, but perhaps medium/mild takes), and we do love to talk local politics. We love to mix the quantitative with the qualitative and add a few dashes of insider baseball to figure out what’s really going on. In … Read More
Guest Editorial: Barry Graham is Wrong for Scottsdale
By Larry Kush When Barry Graham was first appointed to the Scottsdale Planning Commission eyes rolled in the Scottsdale Planning Department as staff was aware that Mr. Graham had exactly zero experience in the planning and zoning practice and policies needed to make intelligent zoning decisions. He went on to prove their fears, by voting no on nearly every, much … Read More
Further Turmoil at SUSD: Lawsuits are Filed Against the Greenburgs
Well we had about one week of kumbaya-esque good feelings about the Scottsdale Unified School District; as regular readers will note, just last week we wrote about Scott Menzel’s contract extension and how much he deserves it, having navigated SUSD through a significant amount of turmoil. Well grab your popcorn folks, because Menzel is going to earn that extension. This … Read More
Scottsdale’s New Spending Plan: What’s In It, What’s Not
The City of Scottsdale recently released their spending plan, a robust $2.1 billion plan that partly came about as a result of unexpectedly strong revenue. Sales tax revenue is at $46.4 million above what was budgeted for the last two years COMBINED, according to City Treasurer Sonia Andrews, a strong indicator of the major bounceback that we’ve had in tourism, … Read More
Paradise Valley Candidates Sound Off: What We Would Like to See
As you likely know, we will have a contested race for both the Paradise Valley Town Council as well as Mayor. If you read this regularly (or even occasionally) you know that we are not a gigantic fan of Paul Dembow and precisely why. But what else is there to focus on in Paradise Valley? What are we looking for … Read More
Guest Editorial: Kudos to Larry Kush on Hat Trick – If Only Our Leaders Listened to Him More Often
By Ronald Sampson I am unapologetically a fan of pro-growth policies. I believe that our communities are better off with elected officials who believe that building is typically preferred to not building, that housing prices are best when they are suppressed by solid supply, and that NIMBYism hurts nearly all of us. In that spirit, I was very pleased to … Read More
Guest Editorial: The Problem with Extremism
By Councilwoman Betty Janik Extremism was once considered an ideology, a belief system, outside of the common sense attitudes of society. Unfortunately, it now seems to be the norm. With the constant news stream of outrageous commentary, we are tempted to believe what we hear and frequently what we are shown. Social media has been used effectively to promote extremist positions … Read More
Amidst Continued Turmoil at SUSD, Scott Menzel Received a Much-Deserved Extension – We Are Fortunate
For it being one of the premier school districts in the state and perhaps the country, the Scottsdale Unified School District has had a rough go of it recently, as we have noted. It has become a hot-button and magnet for far-right activists for reasons which make no logical sense, and has even had the Q-Anon Congressional candidate stop by … Read More
Guest Editorial: Scottsdale Police & Fire Endorse Councilwoman Solange Whitehead
By Councilwoman Solange Whitehead Catch the full video here.
Guest Editorial: Preserving Paradise Valley – Thank You PV Team to Stop Pacaso
By Councilmember Julie Pace Thank you PV Team to Stop Pacaso It was a large group effort involving various stakeholders to stop Pacaso, which is a company looking to develop and promote timeshares in Paradise Valley. Thank you to Town council candidate Christine Labelle for being the first person to inform the community about Pacaso timeshares and for taking the … Read More