Several members of the Tucson City Council this week violated the spirit – and possibly the letter – of the state’s Open Meetings Law.

The law was written to ensure that decisions by public bodies are made in public. That didn’t happen when several council members got together ahead of the meeting to reach consensus on controversial budget cuts.

It’s a practice that must not be repeated.

Before Tuesday’s meeting, Councilwoman Nina Trasoff said she had met with some colleagues “in twos or in threes” to discuss funding cuts to nonprofit groups and other jurisdictions.

Trasoff said that since four council members had not been together, there never was a quorum so it didn’t violate the state Open Meetings Law.

That’s defining the law too narrowly – and flies in the face of several opinions from the state Attorney General’s Office.

The law says this: “All meetings of any public body shall be public meetings and all persons so desiring shall be permitted to attend and listen to the deliberations and proceedings.”

But that’s just the beginning. Public bodies cannot circumvent the intent of the law by meeting in smaller groups ahead of time to reach consensus. That prohibition extends to the exchange of e-mails among members of a body in an attempt to reach an agreement.

A 1975 opinion by the state Attorney General’s Office said “all discussions, deliberations, considerations or consultations among a majority of the members of a governing body regarding matters which may foreseeably require final action or final decision of the governing body constitute ‘legal action’ and must be conducted in an open meeting.”

The same opinion says that discussions taking place among fewer than a majority of the members “to circumvent the purpose of the Open Meeting Act . . . would constitute a violation.”

That covers almost precisely what Trasoff did with Regina Romero, Karin Uhlich and Shirley Scott.

The discussion involved possible budget cuts so the city could avoid instituting a tax on residential rentals. That tax was the subject of lengthy and heated public hearings that drew hundreds of Tucsonans recently.

Council members should have continued that discussion in public so citizens could hear the entire messy process with all views expressed.

The talk should not have taken place in a series of private conversations and telephone calls, with the resulting consensus presented in public as a neatly packaged fait accompli.

City Council members must be educated not only on the Open Meetings Law, but also on the way it has been interpreted over the years. Public business must be conducted in public.

As the city of Tucson examines a plethora of new revenue sources in a struggle to balance its budget, Pima County is on much more sound financial footing.

Part of it is because the county relies on a different revenue source than the city. But it also is due to solid financial planning and management by County Administrator Chuck Huckelberry, members of his staff and other county administrators.

When the economy turned sour, Huckelberry ordered across-the-board spending cuts of 7 percent to 10 percent. The Sheriff’s Department was exempt. That early move means the county will be able to cut the property tax rate while still ending the year with a surplus of about $24.5 million.

Compare that with the city. Then-City Manager Mike Hein proposed cuts, but the City Council dithered and took no action – until it decided to fire Hein. Now the city is hunting for new revenue and faces a deficit.

A large part of the city’s problem is its reliance on sales tax revenue. The county relies on property taxes, where revenue lags a year or two behind the economic downturn.

Nonetheless, problems loom for the county. The most significant is the uncertain future and unknown costs of operating University Physicians Healthcare Hospital at Kino Campus.

There is no inexpensive way to provide health care to the county’s indigent population. In past years, the county operated Kino, and it was a financial debacle.

University Physicians Inc., which employs doctors who work in the University of Arizona College of Medicine, took over operation of the hospital in 2004. The group has a 20-year contract to run the hospital but can back out at any time.

In the past five years, the hospital’s losses have been deeper than forecast, largely because every year the hospital provides about $12 million in care to uninsured people.

County Supervisor Ann Day has called for an independent audit of University Physicians’ books – a reasonable request. The county must ensure it is paying the fair costs of running the hospital but not unrelated costs of training UA medical students who work at the hospital.

Nonetheless, in this miserable economy, Pima County is doing a laudable job of providing essential public services within the confines of its budget.

The intersection of East Grant and North Swan roads are among those where Regional Transportation Authority funds will help ease congestion.

When questions were raised about the successful 2006 Regional Transportation Authority election, opponents cited polls as reason for suspicion.

Polling conducted before the election indicated a likely defeat for the plan and a half-cent sales tax to pay for it, opponents claimed.

So when both questions easily passed, something was fishy, they said.

There’s only one problem. It’s not true.

Polls never showed the questions being defeated. In fact, polls taken in the days leading up to the election were amazingly accurate in predicting the actual results of May 16, 2006.

That, of course, doesn’t prove anything. But when election results mirror polling results, it makes it hard to believe the results might have been flipped, as opponents claimed.

Now there certainly were areas of concern. Two computer experts who examined how Pima County runs its vote-counting operation were less than impressed. One said, “The facts available match an ‘election hacking’ incident.”

That evaluation came after computer records showed that early ballots had been run through the county computers before Election Day, with totals of the early vote printed out.

The county said it was part of the routine equipment-check process. Others said the county could have peeked at the data, seen the RTA questions were headed to defeat, then schemed to have the “yes” votes counted as “no” votes and vice versa.

Adding to the suspicion were Tucsonans’ record in transportation elections. In 1984, 1986, 1990, 2002 and 2003, voters rejected sales tax increases to pay for transportation improvements. Then came the victory in 2006.

That led to all sorts of suspicions, a drawn-out legal battle demanding county computer records and finally to an investigation by Arizona Attorney General Terry Goddard.

Last week, Goddard said vote totals announced by the county three years ago matched almost exactly the totals found in a hand-count of the ballots overseen by his office.

Both counts showed about 60 percent supported the RTA plan and about 58 percent supported the half-cent sales tax increase.

That also was predicted in a poll days before the election.

Pete Zimmerman of Zimmerman and Associates, a local political consulting firm, was hired by supporters of the RTA to run the “yes” campaign. And Chris Baker of Tucson-based Marketing Intelligence conducted polling to gauge public support.

Three days before the vote, Baker’s polls suggested the plan would pass with support of 58.3 percent to 67.3 percent. The sales tax also would pass, his poll suggested, with slightly lower support.

He was right on both counts with the totals falling within his predicted margin.

Baker started conducting polls in December 2005 – five months before the election. In the final two weeks before the vote, daily polls were conducted. And never did any poll show either RTA question losing.

Zimmerman said he never believed allegations that the vote had been flipped. The key was Ajo, which is in Pima County but was not going to benefit from any of the RTA projects, Zimmerman said.

“If the vote had actually been flipped, we would have won Ajo,” Zimmerman said. “And there was no way we were going to win Ajo.”

Mark Kimble appears at 6:30 p.m. Fridays on the Roundtable segment of “Arizona Illustrated” on KUAT-TV, Channel 6. Phone 573-4662 or e-mail mkimble@tucsoncitizen.com.

<strong>Clarissa Bettini</strong> (center) holds up a sign protesting a rental tax during a public hearing before the City Council Tuesday evening at the Tucson Convention Center. More than 600 people were in the meeting room and another 400 people were outside the meeting room.

We trust the Tucson City Council heard the message loud and clear Tuesday night, as hundreds of citizens poured out to protest a proposed rent tax.

Our elected officials face a challenge in drafting a budget with a serious shortfall of revenue.

But they must seriously consider the burden that extra taxes impose on low-income residents during this dire recession.

With unemployment at extremely high levels, state social services being slashed and no relief in sight, the prospect of a new rent tax did not sit well with Tucson voters – and understandably so.

City officials now should head straight back to the drawing board to search for other ways to raise revenues or, better yet, cut costs.

The people have spoken – loudly. Now the City Council needs to acknowledge that it got the message.

There is something for almost everyone in the budget proposal released by newly appointed City Manager Mike Letcher.

But city taxpayers won’t like what is in it for them: higher water bills, higher electric bills, higher trash collection fees and a new tax for renters. And no new services.

The higher charges are a sharp change from the direction proposed by ousted City Manager Mike Hein. He had suggested spending cuts in some areas popular with the City Council – cuts that have been eliminated or reduced in Letcher’s budget.

It is a change in direction that we don’t support – and we doubt taxpayers will, either.

Hein, for example, had proposed that the city reduce its spending on outside agencies by $4 million. Letcher has reduced that to a $1 million cut.

All of the outside agencies are worthwhile – such as the Community Food Bank, Metropolitan Tucson Convention & Visitors Bureau, Tucson Regional Economic Opportunities, 88-CRIME and numerous other human-service nonprofits.

But in difficult economic times – and these are the most difficult anyone can remember – the city needs to focus on core services.

Funding for outside agencies can certainly be reduced by the amount Hein recommended.

But outside agencies have the ear of council members and cutting them is politically unpopular. So the proposal is to raise taxes and keep funding the agencies.

The same is true of the Housing Trust Fund, which helps provide housing for low-income residents. That’s also worthwhile – and it also has strong support among some on the council.

Hein had recommended no city contribution to the fund in these tight times.

Letcher’s budget calls for a $2 million contribution – which will come from higher taxes.

And who would get taxed? Everyone. The proposed budget includes new and higher taxes on Tucson Water and Tucson Electric Power Co. – taxes that will be passed along to everyone who buys water and electricity.

The biggest new revenue source also will be the most controversial: a 2 percent tax on residential rentals imposed on all landlords with more than three units. The tax will certainly be passed along to renters.

Letcher estimates that will cost the average Tucson renter $144 per year. But that’s based on an average monthly rent of $600. A year ago, the average monthly rent for a Tucson apartment was $665.

Tucson is in bad financial shape. But instead of looking only at ways to rake in more money, the council must exercise some spending discipline, too.

BUDGET HEARING

The City Council will hold a hearing on the proposed budget for fiscal 2010 during its Tuesday meeting. The meeting begins at 5:30 p.m. at the Tucson Convention Center downtown.

City budget: Cut spending,

don’t rely on higher taxes

When Mike Hein was fired, power and authority shifted to Deputy City Manager Mike Letcher, who has assumed the role of acting city manager.

Letcher is knowledgeable and well acquainted with the way the city operates. But he steps in with vacancies in several key city positions.

There is no police chief. Hein tried to hire one after a national search was conducted and the field was narrowed to four – two outside candidates and two local ones.

Then the City Council stepped in and ordered the process restarted – with only local candidates considered.

The city also has no finance director and no Community Services director.

The fire chief is new to the job, having come to Tucson in November.

Letcher certainly has his hands full.

With their unexpected and ill- conceived firing of City Manager Mike Hein this week, City Council members now face a litany of critical issues.

Hein was criticized for taking on many important tasks himself and delegating relatively few. Maybe so. But that is a situation the council should have taken into account before it gave Hein the boot.

No timetable has been set to find a replacement for Hein. In the meantime, Deputy City Manager Mike Letcher is leading city government – but Letcher has said he plans to retire in November.

Finding someone competent and willing to run the city must certainly be the primary responsibility of the council. But there are other pressing matters:

• The Rio Nuevo downtown redevelopment effort may be threatened.

Money diverted from state coffers is key to Rio Nuevo’s progress. But some legislators displeased with the slow pace of Rio Nuevo have threatened to cancel future funding.

Hein was in direct charge of Rio Nuevo, and his departure further muddies the downtown waters. Who will now be in charge? And will that mollify or anger legislators who have their hands on the purse strings?

• The city budget is awash in red ink this year and next. Hein had several ideas for addressing that, all of which now are in limbo.

Hein had hoped to renegotiate contracts with the city’s unions to cut $10 million in costs. Those talks, led by Hein, were ongoing when he was fired.

Hein also asked the council to increase revenue by $5 million per year through higher fees or taxes. The council has not addressed that.

And Hein asked the council to decide how to cut $4 million from funding to outside agencies. The council has not addressed that, either.

• Hein had announced plans to merge the Urban Planning and Development Services departments, with some jobs eliminated. Hein was overseeing that effort, now in limbo.

Savings from the merger were to help ease next year’s budget problems.

• The city is about to refinance millions of dollars in bonds and certificates of deposit for lower interest rates and to delay some payments because of budget problems. That is in limbo. More refinancings were planned for next year.

It is not known what Hein’s sudden departure will mean for interest rates. Will bond buyers demand higher interest payments because of uncertainty at the top?

Steve Leal, Regina Romero, Shirley Scott and Karin Uhlich – the four City Council members who voted to fire Hein – have said that dispatching him would clear up a lot of problems within the city.

But they are more likely to discover the problems have been magnified and intensified.

City Manager Mike Hein (left) at Tuesday's City Council meeting, where he was fired. Behind him is Assistant City Manager Mike Letcher, who was named acting city manager.

Not content with botching the hiring of a police chief, the Tucson City Council on Tuesday made a far more grievous error by firing City Manager Mike Hein.

This was a colossal mistake on the part of four council members who sought to cover up the inadequacies of the council’s performance by throwing out the only person they have the power to fire.

The firing of Hein comes as the city struggles to persuade the Legislature that it is capable of managing the massive Rio Nuevo downtown redevelopment project.

With the council badly splintered and the city’s leader tossed out with little explanation, the Legislature now has no reason to have confidence in Tucson’s future performance.

And Hein’s firing comes as the city attempts to balance a budget swimming in red ink. Hein was supposed to present a budget proposal in only nine days – a task that now falls into far less experienced hands.

The four council members who voted to fire Hein – Steve Leal, Karin Uhlich, Regina Romero and Shirley Scott – have blamed the city’s financial problems on Hein – even though the city clearly was swamped by the same international recession that has hit the private sector and government at all levels.

Hein has consistently made recommendations to reduce the city’s projected $80 million deficit. But he was unable to get the council to agree on much of anything – whether it was raising bus fares, cutting funding for outside agencies or increasing fees.

Hein also ran into council indecision when it came to hiring a police chief – one of the city’s most high-profile and important employees.

The City Charter gives Hein the authority to hire the chief, who then is approved or rejected by the council. But the process never got that far. After meetings and thousands of dollars spent narrowing the field to four, the council members interjected themselves into the process and ordered it started over – with only local candidates considered.

It is impossible to imagine any qualified municipal executive who would want to work for this fractured and dysfunctional group.

Hein came to the city from Pima County and led an era of unprecedented city-county cooperation.

The council and others have blamed Hein for a lack of downtown progress. But council members themselves have been hapless bystanders, not visionary leaders.

The council now has no scapegoat. If the Legislature kills Rio Nuevo funding, it will be its fault. If city services are deeply cut to balance the budget, it will be the council’s doing.

This splintered City Council now must hire a city manager and oversee the hiring of a police chief. Members of the council have done nothing to engender confidence that they can do either competently.

Mike Hein answers questions on the budget during a March 24 City Council meeting. In the background is Mayor Bob Walkup.

The city of Tucson is drifting toward its worst budget crisis ever, but City Council members seem unwilling to do more than point fingers.

The city is looking at an $80 million revenue shortfall this fiscal year and a shortfall that big or larger for the fiscal year beginning July 1.

Some council members are determined to blame City Manager Mike Hein for not fixing the problem. The real culprits, however, council members will find in the mirror.

The council next week will conduct an annual evaluation of Hein’s performance and decide if he should be retained. But if a majority of the council decides Hein should go – and that is a possibility – that will do nothing to solve the budget problems or put the city on firmer financial footing.

Tucson operates under a manager-council form of government in which the elected mayor and council set policy and the appointed manager works with the staff to implement it. In budget matters, it should be up to Hein to propose possible solutions to council members, then act as they decide.

But they won’t decide.

As early as January 2008 – 14 months ago – Hein warned of fiscal problems and gave the council a list of agencies that could see reduced city support. The council didn’t act on that until October – nine months later.

In the meantime, Hein took other steps including proposing higher bus fares to raise $1 million. The council rejected that idea and threatened to fire Hein before voting unanimously to support him – but not raise the fares.

Last month, as the budget outlook worsened, Hein proposed another series of cuts. The council said it would support them, then last week said they wanted to think about it more.

Hein last month also proposed possible increases in taxes and fees and asked the council to pick $5 million worth. Nothing has happened.

While all this has been going on, the council discussed suspending impact fees, then decided to study it, then ignored the study. Some council members threatened to remove Hein from oversight of the Rio Nuevo downtown development project, then changed their minds. And the council decided to start over on a search for a new police chief after the candidates had met with residents and local groups and Hein had picked four finalists.

The pattern has been set: Hein asks for council direction, no direction is set, the council tells Hein to figure out how to proceed, Hein does that, the council criticizes him.

If council members had set clear direction when Hein first brought budget problems to them, cuts could have been put in place sooner and the city would be in a better position now going into next fiscal year.

None of this is the fault of Mike Hein. Council members need to look at their job description – setting policy – and start doing that.

As businesses close, unemployment rates climb and newly disenfranchised Americans erect tent cities across our nation, Tucson officials have just figured out that the city’s savings are almost depleted.

Brilliant.

News of this sudden realization Tuesday is less than reassuring, despite City Manager Mike Hein’s extensive explanations about confusing terminology and how budget officials figure differently than finance officials, whose numbers are different than those of department accountants.

We’re sorry, but where does the buck stop if not with Hein?

The city of Tucson now has accumulated millions of dollars in debt that will draw down its savings to 2.5 percent of discretionary spending – one-fourth of the City Council’s stated goal.

And with savings levels this low, the city could face higher interest rates when it borrows money.

“You’re not alone in finding out the gravity of the numbers at this late date,” Hein told council members Tuesday.

That’s little consolation to Tucson taxpayers, who count on city officials to have some clue as to how to handle their money.

But Tuesday’s City Council meeting disclosed more than another set of grim financial figures.

It also revealed city leaders’ disturbing lack of attentiveness to budget details and disappointingly lax responsibility for fiscal matters.

If, indeed, three different categories of city fiscal overseers have been miscommunicating in three separate languages, such egregious nonsense should have been identified and righted long ago.

Instances such as these continue to erode public confidence – if any remains – in Tucson’s business dealings, including but not limited to the Rio Nuevo downtown redevelopment.

And the pathetic explanation for these oversights only further fuels doubts among legislators, who are threatening to withdraw the tax-increment financing that supports Rio Nuevo developments.

That would be a catastrophe for Tucson, which finally has begun to make some progress downtown.

But it would be somewhat understandable, given our city officials’ amateurish and nonchalant approach to financial matters.

In Tucson and across America, people are carefully counting their pennies amid record job losses and home foreclosure rates.

Today’s financial challenges are extremely serious, and city officials need to address them in that regard.

Trying to blame confusing terminology for a lack of accountability is far too little, far too late. Such sloppiness among public officials is unacceptable.

The city council does the right thing.

Normally we would not applaud Tucson City Council members for delaying decisive action, but their hesitancy to lay off workers in this economy is commendable.

Yes, the financial forecast is grim and the city budget situation is dire.

Yes, difficult decisions must be made.

And yes, perhaps City Manager Mike Hein’s recommended 30 or so layoffs would result in more city “efficiency,” as he says.

But as we at the Tucson Citizen know all too well, losing a job in this economy is an especially terrible fate.

Every layoff sends ripple effects through the local economy – and those effects hit city government, too.

So the council members are wise to continue their work on other options, such as 12-day furloughs.

City leaders should contemplate other creative alternatives as well to save money without eliminating jobs.

Employees should be offered unpaid, voluntary sabbaticals, with their jobs reserved for them until they return.

Also, most workers undoubtedly would prefer to accept a sizable pay cut on a temporary basis rather than lose their jobs permanently.

Or, some portion of employee salaries could be deferred for a year while the economy recovers (let’s hope).

And if some employees’ jobs in the development arena no longer are needed, as Hein reports, then the city should try to devise a way to transfer those workers to other vacant positions.

In that way, when the construction industry picks up again – and it will – the city will not have to hire and train new employees to perform permitting and other development-related functions.

Councilwoman Karin Uhlich recently told the Citizen, “Obviously I’m concerned about the high-quality staff we have throughout the Planning Department and making sure we don’t lose the benefit of their guidance in any way.”

The federal stimulus bill also “could fill in some of these blanks,” Councilwoman Nina Trasoff recently noted. “It’d be fabulous if it does. The city has done a good job of poising itself with shovel-ready projects if it does.

“I hate to see anybody lose a job.”

So do we. Director Fred Gray’s ideas to reduce services in the Parks & Recreation Department would preserve full-time jobs but eliminate part-time ones.

He would cut the summer swimming season by three weeks, close three pools, reduce adult sports leagues by half and eliminate up to 40 leisure classes.

We urge the council to continue carefully calculating its strategies. If the federal infusion of funds can eliminate the need for layoffs, we hope the money will be used in that regard.

It’s a good idea for the Tucson City Council to be looking at ways of stimulating the moribund local economy.

But the stumbling, bumbling way in which the council approached the idea – before throwing it all in the lap of a task force – does not engender confidence that council members have really thought things through.

Instead, it appears council members are more concerned about the process and who gets the credit and less concerned about the end results.

The debate was publicly launched last week when Councilman Rodney Glassman proposed temporarily suspending impact fees – charges made by the city to developers to cover the infrastructure costs of growth.

Glassman rallied developers and environmentalists behind the idea and pushed it as a way to spur homebuilding and to put people in that industry back to work.

There are a couple of concerns with that proposal:

• The problems with the housing industry are far larger than the cost of Tucson’s impact fees. This is a nationwide and especially an Arizona slowdown. Suspending the fees may have a small, localized effect, but it won’t be significant.

• Should impact fees be suspended equally and entirely citywide? Wouldn’t it make more sense to give larger breaks to development in the city core, where infrastructure already is in place while giving smaller or no breaks to development on the periphery?

• What would the fee suspension mean for the city’s goal of increasing affordable housing?

• They are called “impact fees” for a reason. Development does have a financial impact on the city. If fees are not collected, that doesn’t mean the cost of the impact vanishes. It merely shifts the cost to other taxpayers.

Nonetheless, a discussion of the proposal was sidetracked by angry council members who claimed Glassman took credit for an idea some of them already were considering.

Fine. A good idea has a thousand fathers, but a bad idea is an orphan.

So Glassman’s idea was booted to one of the city’s ubiquitous task forces. The group of undetermined size and makeup is supposed to discuss the proposal and come back with a recommendation within 30 days.

That doesn’t make much sense. The task force members haven’t all been selected. Yet it has been determined that the group’s discussions will be coordinated by the Metropolitan-Pima Alliance, whose members are largely in the building industry.

If council members want to discuss ways of stimulating the local economy, they should look at available options and work with city staff to evaluate the relative merits and disadvantages of each. Then they should make a decision without first filtering it through a task force of undetermined composition and unclear usefulness.

Our confidence level is not high.

County Administrator Chuck Huckelberry

The Pima County Board of Supervisors did the right thing this week when it voted to give a four-year contract extension to County Administrator Chuck Huckelberry.

We have differed with Huckelberry on some issues. But overall, he has done an admirable job of running the county – especially in this challenging economy.

When Huckelberry took over the top position in 1993, Pima County was in a mess. A previous board had installed a political crony in the job and chaos reigned.

He has brought professional management and administration to the job. The visionary Sonoran Desert Conservation Plan is but one of his notable achievements.

We’re glad the supervisors have asked Huckelberry to stay.

Despite publicity, Arizona voter turnout fell far short of a record.

Once I lunched with an Englishman who remarked, upon receiving his sandwich, “I’d forgotten how big everything in America is.”

I thought of that Tuesday when a reporter noted that 20 cars were idling in line at Starbucks, waiting to get a free cup of coffee for voting.

At Starbucks, a “tall” means small – that is, 12 ounces. A cup of coffee doesn’t cut it.

Hey, caffeine addiction I understand. The part I boggle at is the 20 cars waiting in line.

For all our concerns about energy conservation, global warming and dependence on foreign oil, we’ll still burn gallons of fossil fuel to get a free cuppa joe.

Maybe the answer to our lower-than-expected turnout is drive-through voting. And a doughnut.

Payday loans, TUSD override, presidential race get voters to the polls

Arizona voter turnout much lower than expected

Obama’s historic win sparks hope, fear in Arizona

EYES ON US: America’s robust appetites are matched by its larger-than-life international profile. While many Americans pay scant attention to world news, the U.S. presidential election was a big deal around the planet

Photographs from The Associated Press reflected intense interest in Japan, Africa, the Philippines, Vietnam, Iraq and pretty much everywhere else.

It reminded me that “people of color,” otherwise known as “people,” make up the bulk of the planet.

It’s wrong to elect a president on the basis of color. That’s not how President-elect Barack Obama earned his win.

And yet – looks mattered. Obama’s sleek, multicultural magnetism puts an unexpected face on the American presidency. If performance matches promise, we will be well on our way to renewed respect around the world.

Around the world, U.S. vote sparks buzz for change

WHAT ABOUT ARIZONA? While Democrats may celebrate national election results, Arizona could take a sharp turn to the right.

The Legislature remains Republican-dominated, and some of those Republicans are not of a moderate stripe.

Gov. Janet Napolitano, who jumped early on the Obama bandwagon, will advise him during the transition to the presidency and stands a good chance of winning a spot in his Cabinet.

That would make Republican Secretary of State Jan Brewer governor.

The consequences could be dire for Arizona. Napolitano helped steer a course of moderation, and voters rewarded her.

If Napolitano jumps now, the picture won’t be pretty.

Democrats’ hopes for Arizona House gains fizzles

Napolitano will be adviser to Obama’s White House transition

IN OTHER NEWS: OK, so much for the election. What else has been happening in Tucson?

Not much, it seems, except for the usual dismal array of shootings.

We had a bloody Sunday, with victims ages 18, 20 and 21 dying in separate incidents.

On Wednesday, a struggle over a police pistol ended when the officer involved regained control and shot to death 27-year-old Dwaine Andrew Holmes.

Also on Wednesday, another 27-year-old man, Quincey Arto Brown, was fatally shot near Golf Links and Alvernon.

Seven people shot, 3 die in 3 incidents

Suspect in shooting death of Sunnyside student has lengthy record

Man killed by cops had knives, attacked ‘without provocation’

Man shot, killed outside business; van seen leaving scene

ON THE BORDER: This week, for the second time, a jury couldn’t reach a verdict in a case against Border Patrol Agent Nicholas Corbett.

Corbett is accused of shooting an illegal immigrant to death without provocation. He has said he believed his life was in danger.

His case is just a tiny piece of the immigration disaster in our state. Drug violence is erupting on both sides of the border. Anti-illegal-immigration activists find themselves branded as racist – sometimes with good cause. Business groups squawk about needing cheap labor, scores of people die in southern Arizona each year and both immigrant traffic and efforts to stop it take a toll on our environment.

Now that Sen. John McCain’s not running for president, it’s time to take care of Arizona.

He knows what to do. And he can take the heat.

Border agent could be tried 3rd time in migrant’s shooting death

ICE: Deportations from Arizona up 65 percent

Top Sonoran police official gunned down

Contact Judy Carlock at 573-4608 or jcarlock@tucsoncitizen.com.

"Haven't we had enough of politicians willing to say anything to get elected?" Bronson's flier asks next to the Bush and Brenner photos.

George W. Bush is among the most unpopular politicians in the nation. So it’s understandable that Democratic candidates want to tie their opponents to Bush.

But what does the president of the United States have to do with a race for the Pima County Board of Supervisors?

Sharon Bronson, a Democrat seeking re-election to the Board of Supervisors, sent out a mailer this week with grainy side-by-side photos of Bush and Barney Brenner, her Republican opponent.

That’s strange. Bush hasn’t campaigned for Brenner, and Bush hasn’t expressed any opinions on Pima County rezoning cases or any other Pima County issue.

So what’s the connection?

“Haven’t we had enough of politicians willing to say anything to get elected?” Bronson’s flier (above) asks next to the Bush and Brenner photos.

In some cases, it actually makes sense to tie Bush to a candidate. Republican Tim Bee, who is running for the U.S. House against Democrat Gabrielle Giffords, brought Bush to town for a fundraiser. Bee got a ton of money from the event, but he’s also had a ton of grief from the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, which is running TV ads hanging Bush around Bee’s neck.

The Brenner-Bush tie is a lot more tenuous.

The flier directs voters to a Web site – www.SayAnythingBarney.com – set up by Bronson’s campaign where some Brenner campaign promises are rebutted. From there, voters can visit Bronson’s and Brenner’s sites.

Now that’s dirty politics: comparing someone to George Bush.

• For more blogs, go to www.tucsoncitizen.com/blog