Op-Ed: Zubia Too Friendly with Developers

Think about what still frustrates you: unwanted high-density apartments, strain on water from overdevelopment, neglected street maintenance, short-term rentals, sweetheart contracts, and road diets.

Those are the results of years of special-interest control.

Things changed in 2024, when residents elected a resident-friendly City Council majority.

Special interests didn’t approve of residents’ choices, and they’ve spent record sums to discredit council members who stood up to them and retake City Hall.

Now, they’re coalescing behind Raoul Zubia. His donations and backers align him with apartment developers, the short-term rental lobby, Bar District money, and an out-of-state super PAC linked to those developers — not to mention extreme partisans like the Democratic Socialists of America who have offered their endorsement.

Special interests threaten residents, but Zubia talks as if residents threaten special interests.

At a public forum, Zubia said Scottsdale’s problem was “a generation of citizens who want to keep Scottsdale the way it was.” He insisted that “unless we grow, we’re going to get stagnant.”

On the canceled 26,000-signature resident referendum on Axon’s apartment campus, Zubia defended the company’s end-run: they “had to go around everybody, go to the state, and get the law passed so they could move forward.”

Does that sound like someone who will stand up for you?

The surest way residents can keep special interests in check is to vote for Barry Graham and Michelle Ugenti-Rita.