As Tucson leaders debate the future of downtown – and whether it has much of a future at all – a new study on job sprawl provides needed direction.

More than 85 percent of Tucsonans work within 10 miles of downtown – one of the highest percentages in the nation.

And no city has a higher percentage of people working nearby but not downtown. Almost 2 of every 3 Tucsonans work more than three but fewer than 10 miles from downtown.

The figures are from Job Sprawl Revisited, a report by the Metropolitan Policy Program of the Brookings Institution, a nonprofit public policy organization based in Washington, D.C.

The study found that jobs are moving away from city centers nationwide – and the same is true in Tucson.

Since 1998, the number of jobs more than 10 miles from Tucson’s downtown has grown from 9.6 percent to 14.5 percent.

But Tucson remains a compact city. Only six cities have fewer jobs farther from the city center.

Why does this matter?

As the study notes, the geographical distribution of jobs has implications for a range of policy issues – including housing, transportation and economic development.

The cities that will be the most productive, inclusive and sustainable will be those cities in which jobs are not scattered across a large area.

The study points to a concern for Tucson – and one that can be addressed here while it is too late for many other American cities.

Cohesive planning policies for affordable housing, transportation – including automobiles and transit – and other factors must be drawn up with an eye toward keeping Tucson jobs from sprawling farther.

The value of this was explained by Laura Shaw of Tucson Regional Economic Opportunities:

“Many of our jobs are closer in to town, contrary to perception,” said Shaw, vice president of investor relations at TREO. “That puts us in a good position to attract a creative class that wants to live closer to town. From an economic development standpoint, we’re in good shape.”

Not everyone wants to live or work in the central city. But Tucson must put in place planning and zoning guidelines encouraging development of a compact city that leaves a smaller and less-intensive footprint.

The Brookings study shows it still can be accomplished.

A Tucson annexation of Raytheon Missile Systems property at Tucson International Airport, along with other local annexations, could increase tax revenues enough to help the city stave off its budget crisis.

Raytheon, long a good neighbor in the Tucson community, should move forward with annexation for its good as well as the city’s.

With annexation comes full rights to city services, including Tucson’s top-flight firefighters and police.

More than half of property owners in any district must agree to annexation, as must owners of property whose values amount to more than half of assessed valuation.

Annexations sought by City Manager Mike Hein could produce $1 million in tax revenue, a sorely needed infusion of funds that could save jobs and services in this dire economy.

We hope these property owners will agree to become part of Tucson.

Bishop Gerald Kicanas

Just two days after President Obama called the nation’s attention to Arizona’s housing crisis, a local group met to start a discussion on how to tackle the problem in Tucson.

Obama last week chose Arizona as the backdrop to unveil his housing policy. It wasn’t a surprising choice, as Arizona has become ground zero in the mortgage foreclosure crisis.

One study found that home prices in the Phoenix area tumbled 40 percent in a year, prompting investors to abandon their properties and leaving overextended homeowners to face foreclosure.

But housing problems existed in Arizona – and in Tucson – well before the current foreclosure crisis. And they will remain long after the housing market has bounced back.

That’s why Bishop Gerald Kicanas of the Catholic Diocese of Tucson invited Tucson Mayor Bob Walkup and Richard Elías, chairman of the Pima County Board of Supervisors, to help head a group taking a broader look at how to provide an adequate supply of safe and affordable housing in the Tucson area.

Kicanas, Walkup and Elías last week hosted a forum in which the first steps were taken to address local housing issues. A follow-up session will be held in April.

The goal of the program is not simply to have more people own homes, but to lay a foundation for sustainable home ownership. And if that is to happen, land use, transportation and other factors must be part of the discussion.

In many places where housing is more affordable, transportation costs are much higher – a connection not always taken into account. That leads to the phenomenon known as “drive until you qualify” in which people buy homes farther and farther from the city core because land costs – and home costs – decline.

The local housing forum will urge that zoning for affordable housing – including apartments and rental units – take into account the accessibility of mass transit. In that way, money saved on housing will not be gobbled up by higher commute costs.

A housing trust fund also is a critical component in an affordable housing plan. Such a fund is a dedicated source of revenue reserved solely for affordable homes. The funds usually are established at the state and local levels so they will not be encumbered by federal restrictions and can be used for local housing goals.

There is an Arizona Housing Trust Fund, and Tucson has one of its own, with developers contributing to it as a condition of rezoning or of other city action.

Affordable housing is essential to the long-term health and strength of a community. Good for Kicanas, who has stepped outside his traditional role as a clerical leader to help shape a discussion of this timely issue.

A crew installs a retaining wall on the west side of the interstate. The fill dirt came from other parts of the Interstate 10 construction job, and all of the old road was broken up and used as fill.

The predicted construction nightmare on Interstate 10 never materialized, and for that we tip our hats to the Arizona Department of Transportation and its contractors.

The mammoth, $200 million widening project now is expected to be completed by December – way ahead of the expected April 2010 finish.

It’s been under way since June 2007. And, yes, we’ve all experienced some detours and a few instances of slowed traffic.

But considering the scale of the work – widening the highway from six to eight lanes between Prince Road and 29th Street; erecting seven bridges and underpasses; and adding new exit and access ramps – drivers have suffered very little inconvenience.

The project managers have proven to be far better prepared and more efficient than locals expected. We commend them – and we thank them.

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.

New Sun Tran logo

A wider variety of transit services will be available throughout the metropolitan Tucson area under a needed expansion and unification of a sometimes fragmented and disjointed system.

The most visible changes will be a new look for Sun Tran buses and new names for other aspects of the system.

But underneath that will be a seamless system unified under the Regional Transportation Authority.

When voters approved, in 2006, a half-cent sales tax increase to pay for transportation, $500 million was designated for transit services over the two-decade life of the tax.

Residents throughout the county are paying the additional tax, so it is only equitable that all benefit from improved services.

Presently, Sun Tran primarily operates in the city, although tentacles of service extend into unincorporated areas under county contracts.

The city will continue operating Sun Tran and much of the transit system – but with the RTA overseeing all of it to make sure the different aspects work together.

And that is how it should be.

There will be additional express bus routes serving outlying areas and, in the future, circulator bus routes in Marana and Oro Valley. Rural areas will have park-and-ride lots.

And transit vehicles will sport a new silver, blue, yellow and white paint scheme that will be phased in as new equipment is purchased.

A regionwide transit system would offer transportation alternatives to far more people through regular buses, express buses, van- and car-pool programs and vans for handicapped people.

It makes sense – for riders and for the taxpayers who finance it – to bring it all under a single regional umbrella.

New Sun Tran bus design

In their push to balance the budget, leaders in the Arizona Legislature have proposed cuts that would decimate education and punch crushing holes in this state’s protective net of social services.

It is an unreasonable attack on some of Arizona’s neediest citizens and would make it far more difficult to put the state on the road to recovery once the recession ends.

With the state facing a projected $1.6 billion deficit in the current fiscal year ending June 30, and up to $3 billion more in the next fiscal year, there are no good solutions.

But the budget-balancing options put on the table by key Republican legislators show a shocking lack of thought and creativity.

For example, there is a proposal to eliminate KidsCare, a health insurance program for children whose parents earn too much for state-paid care. The savings of $18.3 million would be more than offset by costly emergency room visits and additional care provided by the Arizona Health Care Cost Containment System.

There also is a proposal to provide child care subsidies to fewer families. But savings of $8.1 million would be more than offset if some parents are forced to stop working and go on welfare.

Funding for school computers, textbooks and other equipment also may be chopped. But Arizona already is at or near the bottom in school funding. Will we be better off with worse schools? Obviously not.

Savage cuts also would devastate the university system. There is talk of cutting $388 million from the universities over the next 18 months.

As University of Arizona President Robert Shelton pointed out, “These figures are so extreme that they would absolutely cripple higher education in our state.”

The universities are the most powerful economic engine in Arizona – but they would be ill-equipped to jump-start the economy, making it far more difficult to recover from the recession.

In total, the proposals would cut $1.5 billion out of Arizona education in the next 18 months – something that probably would wipe out all-day kindergarten, libraries, school nurses, counselors and much more. There likely would be teacher layoffs and lower teacher salaries.

Arizona’s budget deficit is massive. We cannot cut our way out of it. Much more creative solutions are needed.

Legislators have vowed not to incur more debt – and the vast majority of the time, we’d agree with them. But we cannot eat our seed corn. We cannot permanently undermine the future strength of this state to dig our way out of the current – and temporary – financial mess.

Some limited borrowing would be far preferable than these devastating cuts proposed by legislators. Let’s get creative instead of wildly slashing at our future.

You can’t please everybody, heaven knows, but we’re confident that the Grant Road widening ultimately will benefit the vast majority of Tucsonans.

The Tucson City Council heard from vocal opponents Tuesday night before voting 6-1 to proceed with this enormous undertaking. Councilman Steve Leal dissented.

Like Leal, we empathize with owners who long have operated small businesses along Grant Road. Their concerns, particularly in the current recession, are understandable.

But three facts underscore the soundness of the council’s decision:

• Voters already approved this five-mile, $166 million project as part of the Regional Transportation Plan adopted in 2006, so any move to jettison it now would conflict with that decision.

• Grant Road business owners and residents have had enormous input into this plan, with continual public meetings and focus groups over the past two years.

• And eventually, the widened Grant Road will accommodate more traffic – pedestrian, bicycle and vehicular – bringing more patrons to the merchants there.

Grant Road is to be expanded from two lanes to three lanes in each direction.

The widening, from Oracle Road to Swan Road, is critically needed.

Tucson has no good east-west crosstown roadway, and a wider Grant will somewhat ameliorate that shortcoming.

In addition, traffic is expected to flow much more smoothly with new turnarounds – special U-turn only lanes – replacing some left turn lanes, and with the new “bulb outs,” slight curvatures in the roadway that calm traffic.

Granted (forgive the pun), Tucson will have grown considerably by the time this project is completed in 2018. But that’s all the more reason to get this work under way.

The improved Grant Road also will feature bike lanes wider than others in Tucson, expansive pedestrian paths separated from the street by landscaping and space for a rail line down the middle of the street in case the city decides to add one later.

The change will be contentious for many people, despite the ultimate benefits to the majority.

The project will consume all or part of 320 commercial properties and 101 residential ones, including some homes dating to the 1920s.

That is a shame, and blame can be laid on poor city planning and zoning that long has failed to appropriately segregate commercial and residential zones, much less predict the growth that was certain to occur.

But the losses on Grant Road, albeit most regrettable, also are the price of progress. And those who travel Grant well know that progress there is long overdue.

Kris Mayes

With three new members now serving on the five-member Arizona Corporation Commission – arguably the most important and powerful agency in the state – we’re delighted that Kris Mayes has been elected chairwoman.

We long have been impressed with Mayes’ knowledge, industriousness and dedication to energy, utilities and transportation issues in our state.

We also appreciate her new plans to promote water conservation, energy efficiency and use of renewable energy.

Gov. Janet Napolitano appointed Republican Mayes to the ACC in 2003, and she won election in 2004 and 2006.

Her fellow Republican, continuing Commissioner Gary Pierce, also will lend veteran insights to the panel.

We congratulate new Commissioners Bob Stump, Paul Newman and Sandra Kennedy and wish them well.

Interstate 10 in April

The people again have spoken – again with a resounding “No!” – regarding a proposed bypass route for Interstate 10.

The vast majority of the some 100 people (including officials from three federal agencies) who turned out for last week’s state Transportation Board meeting vociferously opposed a bypass that would cut through an established wildlife corridor west of Tucson.

One of the speakers, Saguaro National Park Superintendent Sarah Craighead, said a bypass “could have grave consequences” for the west unit of the park, blocking animal migration, spreading invasive species and increasing light pollution.

Her objections echoed what opponents long have said about freeway bypasses: They hurt the environment, bring unwanted development and stress water resources.

We wish the state Transportation Board would listen. So far, it hasn’t, choosing to go ahead and study the proposal some more.

Yes, I-10 traffic only will get worse – in four years, 200,000 vehicles a day are predicted to make the trek between Tucson and Phoenix.

But addressing the issue simply by pouring another strip of concrete to allow carbon-monoxide-spewing vehicles to chug through pristine wilderness seems to be an old-fashioned, piecemeal approach. That the strip comes with at least a $6 billion price tag and no funding source makes it even more suspect.

Gov.-to-be Jan Brewer and the Arizona Legislature need to take on the transportation problem in a comprehensive, creative manner that includes a funding mechanism.

Something along the lines of the failed TIME initiative, which would have raised state sales taxes to produce $40 billion over the next 20 years to address Arizona’s transportation ills, would be a good place to start.

The state board’s decision isn’t the only bit of distressing transportation news to hit Tucson lately.

The city’s streetcar project, a key feature of the 2006 Regional Transportation Plan, will receive just one-third of the funding it expected from the federal government.

The city has yet to persuade the feds that it has met requirements to justify $75 million in grants for the project, which eventually would connect the University of Arizona area to downtown.

Meanwhile, in Phoenix, a spanking-new $1.4 billion light rail system will be inaugurated Saturday. On a typical day, some 26,000 passengers will be whisked through Phoenix, Mesa and Tempe along 20 miles of track.

When it comes to transportation, Phoenix has the right idea. Southern Arizona, unfortunately, is moving in the wrong direction.

It is good news for South Side shoppers – and for the Tucson economy – that a third Costco Wholesale store may be on the way.

Costco is under contract to buy 16 acres near South Kino Parkway and Interstate 10.

In that location, it would attract shoppers from Green Valley, Mexico and other points south of Tucson. It also would provide a sales tax boost for the city.

The store would be on the southern tip of a 356-acre development that also will include a hotel, the University of Arizona Bioscience Park and residential and commercial development.

Until recently, the southern portion of Tucson has lagged in development of retail and high-end office space. That is changing, especially with the construction of this multiuse project.

Costco will offer South Side residents one more retail option. It’s about time.

People are dying in emergency medical helicopter crashes while federal officials still haven’t implemented safety recommendations made almost three years ago.

The National Transportation Safety Board, which made the recommendations, says the Federal Aviation Administration is implementing them – but not fast enough.

Not quickly enough, certainly, for the families of seven people killed in June when two copters collided while arriving at Flagstaff Medical Center – or for the 1-year-old and three adults killed this month in Aurora, Ill.

The safety board asked the FAA to, among other things, require the copters to have Terrain Awareness Warning Systems, to have a formal risk evaluation before each flight and to apply stringent safety rules now in place for flights carrying patients and donated organs to also include flights of medical personnel.

The FAA should implement these basic safety improvements at once.

Pima County’s plans to raise its transportation impact fee for new homes is overdue – despite the protestations of homebuilders and sellers.

The county should also press ahead with discussions to make the impact fee apply countywide instead of being limited to certain areas.

It has been 12 years since the Pima County Board of Supervisors approved a fee of $1,550 per new home to help pay for roads that would be needed by new residents.

The fee has been increased several times and now stands at about $4,600 per home. Chuck Huckelberry, the Pima County administrator, says he will recommend an increase to $8,800 to be imposed before the middle of 2009.

With the recession driving home building and sales to their lowest levels in decades, builders and real estate agents are rightly concerned about the increase, which would be passed along to buyers.

But if there are new developments, roads must be built to serve those residents. And with the county transportation budget already stretched serving existing developed areas, new residents must “buy” into the infrastructure.

Under state law, transportation impact fees can be imposed in designated areas only, with the money raised in those areas spent there for road improvements.

Huckelberry is recommending a regionwide impact fee – something that would require the cooperation of the incorporated cities in Pima County.

That is worth considering. New residents don’t drive solely in their corner of the county. The impacts of growth and additional traffic are felt regionwide. Several states allow regional impact fees, and Arizona should do the same.

Pima County should be able to spend money raised from impact fees anywhere on projects necessitated by growth.

With five cities and towns sprinkled across the unincorporated area of Pima County, roads can and do pass through several jurisdictions. The Regional Transportation Authority was created to bridge those jurisdictional gaps. Having a regionwide impact fee for transportation is a logical next step.

Current impact fees are based on road construction costs from six years ago. There is no question they must be increased so new development helps pay some of the additional costs it creates.

It's not often our state legislators make government more transparent. This one's a doozy, which I think they all realized, because it passed the Senate unanimously and only five representatives voted against it.

Margaret Click, a family member of the Jim Click auto dealership empire, gave $2,300 to Arizona Sen. John McCain’s campaign for president March 17.

Christine Olson, the soon-to-be former Mrs. Lute Olson, gave state Rep. Tim Bee’s campaign for Congress $2,300 March 31.

Joan Diamond, part of the Don Diamond land empire, gave $390 Oct. 19 to state Rep. Pete Hershberger’s District 26 state Senate campaign. He’s being term-limited out of the House.

How do I know about these donations? I looked them up. It took about five minutes of searching each on the Federal Election Commission’s and the Arizona Secretary of State’s Web sites.

Candidates for the U.S. House and president file their campaign reports electronically. But the Senate still files by paper.

Candidates for state office also file their campaign reports electronically.

That’s not true for local elections, but it’s about to change after the governor signed SB 1024 last week, requiring most counties and municipalities to post campaign finance reports online.

There are two election cycles in any campaign: the one in which ballots are cast and the one in which checks are cashed, the latter mostly preceding the former.

Sources of money candidates use to persuade voters often reveal more about these candidates than any impassioned stump speech, no matter how much candidates deny that donated money buys or influences their votes.

Watchdog groups have been taking these federal files and dumping them into searchable databases so voters can see, for example, that the finance and insurance industry is giving more money to Democrats this elections cycle than to Republi-cans, $50 million to $44 million. That’s a switch from just two years ago when the industry gave more to Republicans.

What changed? The Democrats run Congress now.

In Arizona, newspapers will download the financial files for state House and Senate races and tell voters who’s getting the developer and construction money or which union gathered gobs of $5 donations for a candidate to qualify for public campaign funds.

But what about financing of county supervisor races? Or city and town councils? Or school, fire and water boards?

For example, who has given money to District 4 Supervisor Ray Carroll’s re-election campaign and why?

I don’t know.

I could find out, certainly, but I’d have to drive down to the county Election Division’s office on East 22nd Street and get copies of the paper filings.

To be sure, Tucson Citizen reporters will retrieve Ray’s reports and those for all of the other local races. That’s our job.

But what if you didn’t want to wait for the newspaper to report it? Or didn’t believe what you read in the paper?

You’d have to go down to East 22nd Street, too. Few do.

Senate Bill 1024 changes that. The law goes into effect 90 days after the Legislature adjourns, which is expected to happen next month, certainly before June 30, the end of the fiscal year.

That means the campaign finance reports for the county September primaries likely won’t make it online. But they will for the general election in November.

Brad Nelson, the county’s elections director, said his office anticipated the bill’s passing and has been testing a beta version of a campaign finance Web page for the past couple of weeks. He may make it live before the law goes into effect, he said.

The new law does not require electronic filing, so most counties and municipalities will just scan in the documents and post the images on their sites.

Reporters and interested voters still will have to create their own databases or break out the calculator to find out how much Don Diamond and the like are donating to local candidates.

It’s not often our state legislators make government more transparent. This one’s a doozy, which I think they all realized, because it passed the Senate unanimously and only five representatives voted against it.

Well done.

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READ MORE
Read Tucson Citizen Assistant City Editor Mark B. Evans’ blog, “Why a Free Press?”

If you need help accessing records, call 573-4614 or e-mail mevans@tucsoncitizen.com

Ted refused to run negative campaign

Your endorsement (Tuesday “Ted Downing best for Dist. 28 Senate seat“) accurately portrays his independence and integrity.

I am impressed by his consistent defense of our civil liberties as indicated by his fight to ensure every vote counts.

Ted has refused to go negative. He sets an example many candidates fail to follow. A vote for him will help clean up dirty politics, now dominated by money and demogogy.

BERTRAM LOEB

Downing would be tenacious, effective

Ted Downing would not quit in his push to make fair and accurate elections a reality.

Despite defeats of his bills over several sessions – and opposition by Secretary of State Jan Brewer, House and Senate leaders and election officials from 15 counties – Downing’s persistence paid off when SB 1557 became law.

Immediately after the Nov. 7 election, random hand counts of 2 percent of Arizona precincts will provide a check against electronic voting totals.

Downing’s leadership and negotiating skills compelled legislators to understand all parties have a stake in election integrity. He is a hero to election integrity activists.

Downing and Sen. Karen Johnson, R-Mesa, tirelessly worked for votes while seeking county officials’ support. They maneuvered the bill to victory in the House and Senate.

Downing gets the job done. His insistence on integrity and accountability and work as chairman of our Democratic Election Integrity Committee attest to his character.

Downing would be a tenacious and effective senator.

SANDRA SPANGLER

Aboud will represent women, our interests

I support state Sen. Paula Aboud for District 28.

She has been a terrific senator and has gained the respect of lawmakers.

One of the biggest Tucson issues in the past session was the extension of tax-increment financing for Rio Nuevo.

State Rep. Ted Downing opposed the extension. Sen. Aboud was a champion of it.

Isn’t the essence of campaigning to point out differences between candidates? Why is Ted crying “dirty politics” when his voting record is revealed?

In another important issue, Downing was the only Democrat to vote against extending the penalties for rape to spousal rape. Why is Ted so upset that people are pointing this out?

Rape is rape. “Deb” courageously came before the Legislature with her story of her husband’s repeated rapes of her. She asked that the law be changed.

Downing was just plain wrong in his vote on this issue. I am confused as to why pointing this out constitutes “dirty politics.”

It was unacceptable for Ted to vote as he did, and it is an issue in this campaign.

I hope we can step away from the hysteria Ted is spreading, that any criticism of his record is a smear campaign.

This is his record. This is why I don’t believe he should be elected to the Senate.

We need a strong senator who represents not only Tucson’s interests, but also women. This is why I support Sen. Paula Aboud.

PAMELA SUTHERLAND

committeewoman, Democratic Precinct 79;

executive director, Arizona List