Search query: arizona

Recently, a bipartisan group in Arizona has gone public with its intention to promote a constitutional amendment for a non-partisan primary modeled after California's Proposition 14, which decisively passed last year. A few days later, I was forwarded a message from Mark Hinkle, Chairman of the Libertarian Party, by Christina Tobin, a respected advocate of fair elections, stating, "Make no mistake, they are trying to kill off all competition at the ballot box.” (emphasis added). Who 'they’ are,

There’s a new level of political theater that’s premiered in America, and it’s not primary season – it’s recall season.  While the national focus has been on the recall of six Wisconsin Republican state legislators (two of whom were replaced by Democrats), there has been little national coverage thus far of the movement to recall Arizona State Senate President and anti-immigration activist Russell Pearce. The recall election, which has just been approved by the Maricopa County Superior Court to

The U.S. Department of Energy has finalized a $967 million loan guarantee for a 290 MW solar photovoltaic plant on 2400 acres between Yuma and Phoenix. The Aqua Caliente project is now the world's largest PV project under construction.  This follows plans by EnviroMission to build the world's first grid-scale solar updraft tower in Arizona, which is now on the leading edge of big solar power (along with California and Nevada.) Both plants will be using state-of-the art technology to build solar

Earlier this month, the Arizona Open Government Committee officially launched its campaign to bring a top-two style open primary system to the Grand Canyon State by ballot initiative in next year’s elections. On August 3rd, the group unveiled their proposed constitutional amendment, entitled “The Open Government Act,” that would do away with the state’s current semi-closed partisan primary elections and instead institute a top-two open primary system similar to that adopted by California voters

A recent proposal by the Arizona Department of Water Resources (ADWR) to amend its assured water supply rules would provide grandfathered irrigation water rights to farmlands that were retired for development. The new rules would apply only to lands that previously had irrigation water rights and that are still capable of being irrigated. We all know the story: beginning in 2005 and lasting until 2007, a speculative-driven bubble inflated land and real-estate values beyond market recognition. A

As dissatisfaction with public education in Arizona grows and the debate over school choice intensifies, local and national experts are predicting a steady rise in the number of homeschooled students in Arizona. According to the Maricopa County Education Service Agency, there are already 22,500 homeschooled students in the state of Arizona and over 10,000 of them reside in Maricopa County. This Monday, the Tuscon Citizen published a detailed look into the homeschooling community in Arizona, wit

The dirty little secret about power generation is that most states, including Arizona, rely heavily on coal. Sure, Arizona has mandated 15% renewable energy by 2025 but for now, King Coal reigns. Even California, which has a much more ambitious plan of 33% renewable by 2020, relies heavily on coal. However, and somewhat hypocritically, California has banned coal plants within its borders while importing a vast amount of coal power from neighboring states, including Nevada, Arizona, and New Mexi

By most accounts, the Arizona border appears to be safer than ever. Illegal border crossings are down, mainly because the Department of Homeland Security is able to monitor more of the border than ever before. That's the conclusion reached by The Center for American Progress (CAP), a progressive advocacy and research organization, after its recent trip to the Arizona border. In its detailed report, the organization documents the recent history and build-up of border security, stating in a matte

Members of the Tea Party movement have been called a lot of nasty things before like: crazy, extremists, teabaggers, and racists, but in the final hours of the debt ceiling debate, just one month before the ten-year anniversary of the 9-11 terrorist attacks, many Democrats, including Vice President Joe Biden, have been calling Tea Party members the nastiest name yet: terrorists. Sources in the room told The Politico that in a closed-door meeting of House Democrats with Vice President Joe Biden,

Research shows that almost half of all Arizona mortgages were "underwater” by the end of the first fiscal quarter of 2011. Only Nevada, at 63 percent, had a higher rate of homes with negative equity, this according to the most recent report by the private research firm CoreLogic. Although the overall number of Arizona homeowners who were underwater outdid most in the nation, their average negative equity was $5,000 below the national average of $65,000, highlighting the large disparities in hou