Scottsdale’s economy has been hit so bad it will be paying attention to all of its dimes, pennies and nickels. But its Nichols of a different kind, City Treasurer Jeff Nichols, that looms as the most important person in Scottsdale over the next many months.
Not the Mayor or mayoral aspirants, not the tone-deaf anti-business candidates and not the City Manager. It’s the person whose public service sobriety will frame almost all key city decisions for the foreseeable future.
His job is not an enviable. Tourism has been gutted. How to project tourism taxes when you don’t know when people will get on airplanes again? How many downtown businesses will return in the fall? Which major special events will happen next year, and which won’t? How soon will two of the largest sales tax generators in the city – car dealers and Scottsdale Fashion Square – see sales return? Will crowds ever return to previous levels at malls? How long might restaurants be required to only serve to half capacity? The list goes on. 
Estimating, or guesstimating city budget figures in these unprecedented times, is something Newton would have difficulty with let alone Nichols. Yet, we have confidence in this denizen of southern Scottsdale.
If anyone has its finger on the Scottsdale economic pulse its Nichols. And his counsel is going to be critical to helping guide policies and outcomes that don’t leave one of the country’s great cities scrounging for coins in the couch for longer than it should.