Is it safe to visit Southern Arizona ?
by Hugh Holub on May. 22, 2010, under border issues, SB 1070, tucson life and heritage
St. Anne's church in Tubac
We run a vacation rental business down in Tubac, and noticed we haven’t even had a call or an email in a few weeks inquiring about our accommodations.
Last winter and through April we had great guests from as far away as Canada and Massachusetts.
Then it got really quiet. Maybe this was just the summer slump a lot of tourism oriented businesses suffer from here, we thought at first.
This is our first season in the tourist business. But we were not even getting calls about next winter, which we had been getting until the SB 1070 flap exploded across the nation.
So, after making a few calls, we learned a surprising thing: people don’t think it is safe to visit Southern Arizona, especially as close to the border as we are (20 miles).
Pictures of armed drug smugglers carrying automatic weapons (courtesy of the Pinal County Sheriff), the murder of Douglas rancher Robert Krentz, and the flash bang national news coverage of Arizona’s immigration problem has convinced many that Arizona is a war zone.
Wait just a minute.
Sure, there are some areas right near the border no one wants to venture into at night. But I can think of lots of places in Los Angeles, New York City and other big cities where I wouldn’t want to drive around at night. But that doesn’t stop me from going to LA or New York or wherever.
The city of Nogales, for example, which is right on the border, has one of the lowest crime rates in the state. There hasn’t been a drive by shooting in Nogales…ever. Rarely does a week go by when there’s one of those in Tucson.
The presence of the Border Patrol in some areas frightens visitors because they think, “with that many Border Patrol there must be a problem”. Nope. We just have a lot of Border Patrol running around the Tubac area because they seem to think this is the way to stop illegal immigration by staying 20 miles away from the border and driving through our neighborhoods where they are unlikely going to find uncodumented workers.
Interestingly, after the vistors have been here a few days, they begin to understand the immigration problem and the border. The stereotypes are replaced by reality. This is good for the national debate. The more people who actually see and experience our border, the more people will support BOTH a concentration of Border Patrol at the border, and some sane immigration law reform.
I actually run a “border tour” taking vistors through the checkpoint, out to ARivaca, down Ruby Road to Nogales and back. I ask them to count the Border Patrol they see. By the time they have been through this, they get it about why our border is broken. And their fear is gone because they’ve been to the border and it didn’t bite them.
During the entire season, not a single one of our visitors encountered an undocumented worker heading north. They don’t walk through the middle of the town, and you don’t find them on the Anza Trail and other places during the day, either.
Sure, at night we sometimes see more undocumented workers passing through the area than you might in Tucson. But that has always been the case. The folks seeking work mean us no harm, and bien viaje. The only problem is the increase of plastic water bottles left behind at specific locations on our trails. We use them as “teaching moments” on hikes.
A lot of businesses really need Arizona’s Republicans to find some other issue to beat on Democrats besides immigration.
We’ve gotten enough attention about the failure of the US government and Congress to deal with the immigration issue.
We don’t need to create the image that tourists are at some kind of risk from attack by undocumented workers who are probably headed to where our visitors live the rest of the year.
May 22nd, 2010 on 7:11 am
No way I am staying away
May 22nd, 2010 on 8:57 pm
WHY? Are you afraid or illegal yourself?
May 22nd, 2010 on 7:46 am
This is an excellent account that I’m going to share with friends and family from other states who ‘fear’ for my life.
May 22nd, 2010 on 8:07 am
People are just stupid. They believe everything they see on the major news. Give it a few weeks when the next major sex scandal makes the news and everyone forgets about Arizona. People will come back to AZ. We live in a beautiful state.
May 22nd, 2010 on 8:13 am
It is very interesting what media can do for your business, huh? So, I say keep writing about it and business is bound to pick up! Being a citizen of Tucson, I am feeling very safe actually—but people outside Arizona don’t know that.
May 22nd, 2010 on 8:30 am
Gee, Hugh. Think there’s any connection to “all those Border Patrol” vehicles driving around and no alien problem in Tubac?
May 22nd, 2010 on 2:17 pm
Like I said…day time….local estimate are about 1,000 a day passing through at night
May 22nd, 2010 on 8:31 am
Think the Border Patrol should stay out of Tubac, then let’s see what happens, smart guy!
May 22nd, 2010 on 2:18 pm
if they were down at the border, no problem.
May 22nd, 2010 on 11:50 am
I have a friend who is trying to get a bunch of adventurers together to rent a small cruise ship to sail up and down the coast off Somalia to see if any pirates might take the bait and want to party.
The cruise will have various weapons aboard, such as AK-47s, UZIs, RPGs, .50 cal. MGs, and maybe a few TOW missiles aboard for your enjoyment.
So Hugh, if the cruise falls through, and Baja Arizona heats up a little more, can I give my friend your address in Tubac?
Somali pirates, narco-terrorist dope runners . . . they all pretty much look the same thru the sights of a .50 cal. machine gun. <g>
Yer pal, Ferrari Bubba
May 22nd, 2010 on 2:19 pm
Send them down to the border. They might find themselves outgunned.
May 22nd, 2010 on 12:01 pm
i moved from LA to rio rico az. i feel safer here , 12 miles from the border, even 2 steps from the border is safer that LA , tucson and phoenix,, border patrol is needed to keep everything under control…,,,,
May 22nd, 2010 on 12:43 pm
Hey Rio: It depends on which part of L.A. you lived in, my friend.
If it was Watts, East L.A., Inglewood, Rialto, Fontana, San Fernando, or areas like that, you had problems. If, on the other hand, you lived in the ‘better parts’ of town, you didn’t have too much problem.
When I moved to the Old Pueblo in 1985, I lived in an apt. above Skyline for a year and had no problems, except the tennis court lights went off @10:00 pm. Bummer. Then I bought a home up in Bear Canyon, which I lived in until 2005, when we moved to the Wilds of Arkansas. Bear Canyon was a snap too. But if I’d been living somewhere around Park & Irvington, that may have been a different matter.
I had 4 friends shot to death while having a beer after work one night at Station 2, the Firemens’ Hall on Benson Hwy., and I would have been #5, if I had not been on vacation. Just another robbery gone bad.
I was amazed how much real estate had appreciated in 20 years!
Things were so cheap back here, that we bought our house here for what I paid for the Bear Canyon house in 1986, just a tad over $100K. Go figure.
Yer pal, Ferrari Bubba
May 22nd, 2010 on 8:06 pm
I’d stay away from WalMart parking lots, FB. I hear a crazy just killed two police before he and his son were killed in Little Rock. What’s the world coming to when you’re not even safe at a WM in Arkansas?
May 22nd, 2010 on 8:53 pm
Arizona is probably safer that Los Angeles!! All the hype is the media playing this rotten game. IF you are a legal resident – where is the problem? If you are pulled over in ANY state – you need a valid driver’s licence, proof of insurance and registration. We are no different! It is ILLEGAL immigrants who do NOT belong here – and they are the ones who should be leaving. This is one of the most beautiful states and it is a shame the media has painted this picture in peoples minds – you will be stopped and run out of town! NOT TRUE at all. The police have other things to do than round up people just for the fun of it. New Mexico is a LOT worse than here, as they have NO rules for immigrants! Richardson is all for the illegals there – so let them be there. We are just sick of the crimes they commit, the murders, home invasions and car jacking, just to name a few of their misdeeds. Come on down and enjoy a lot of safety – IF YOU ARE LEGAL! IT IS THE ILLEGAL ONES DOING THE YELLING! Most of the people in Washington haven’t even read the law, and are guessinig what it is. Janet Napolatino – our EX-Governer hasn’t even read it and comdeming us! Read if before you jump to conclusions. NO RACIAL PROFILING IS ALLOWED. When you have the facts – make up your mind, and avoid the talk shows.
May 23rd, 2010 on 12:18 pm
“NO RACIAL PROFILING IS ALLOWED” will mean absolutely nothing to a law enforcement officer who is all caught up in the word “illegal” like so many people are as though that word has any meaning to some poor stiff struggling to survive. How many of us would, if we were desperate and starving, because corporations had paved over your farms and stripped your jungles, destroying your income – how many of us would stand at a border, knowing there are jobs beyond that border paying more money than you had ever dreamed of, and say, with a gaping hole in a fence and nobody there to stop you: “Oh, dang, I can’t go over there; that’s illegal. That wouldn’t be right.”
One horrible aspect of racism, as I’ve observed it as a recipient of it, is it doesn’t allow a person to think rationally. Having to have someone in the category of “less than” seems to be so compelling in the racist mind; racism destroys empathy and sympathy and can cause one to see the “lesser than” as not a human who loves and cares but someone who murders and rapes and pillages and steals your cars and takes your jobs. Racism dehumanizes. And scares the hell out of children. God, I’d hate to be the brown faced little child who gets caught up in this madness. But I’d tell that child: “You, mijo/mija can get passed this; you can make a life for yourself and learn to love your fellow human beings and want to make the world better for everybody. I know. I was you with a darker face. In Arizona. Tucson, Arizona.
The main reason I will not boycott my beloved state is that I can’t wait to get over there to see the beautiful brown faces, to see how the children are faring as their world crumbles around them, as they face what I faced growing up: hatefulness. Jim Crow’s great-grandchildren are alive and sicker than ever. ARIZONA, get your act together.
May 22nd, 2010 on 9:15 pm
Why don’t you thank Raul
Grijalva for all of his positive support on this issue. How can providing your driver’s license be so hard for legal folks. Oh, illegals can’t get one legally, silly me!
May 23rd, 2010 on 8:18 am
Good point, Keith Adams.
The President of the USA, the LA City Council, the chair of the House Progressive Caucus, the national MSM—all dominated by Democratic Party members or enthusiasts—trash on Arizona…and it’s the Arizona Republicans who are hurting our economy.
May 23rd, 2010 on 10:53 am
Sorry, Don. It is the Republicans in the AZ legislature whose little experiment in social engineering that started this whole debacle.
Boycott, demonstrate and organize until this law is gone and until Tom Horne’s law is gone. Like Sherman in Georgia, “Make them howl”.
May 23rd, 2010 on 11:10 am
If you’re sorry, Left—it’s OK; you’re forgiven.
I’d tell you to just not demagogue again…but that would be the same as telling you not to breathe, so…
May 23rd, 2010 on 11:08 am
To be fair, Hugh’s point (as I understand it) is that people are avoiding the border because they perceive it as an unsafe place to be. Most of the voices raising concerns about safety along the border have been Republican ones. Thus, it’s fair for a border businessman to be unhappy with state Republicans, in that narrow sense.
I also suspect that businesses are unhappy with some state, and many national, Democrats for their demagoguing of the SB 1070 issue and their attempts to harm Arizona’s economy—but that’s a subject for another blog, I suppose.