On The Media Takes On The Media, Polls + Poverty

Thank you WNYC, and especially Brooke Gladstone
Hit the link and listen >> http://www.wnyc.org/shows/otm/episodes

Got 5 Minutes? Help Shape ADOT’s Long-Range Transportation Plan

Arizona Department of Transportation sent this bulletin at 10/26/2016 02:26 PM MST. 

 

 

 

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Got five minutes? You can help shape ADOT’s Long-Range Transportation Plan Interactive online survey available until Nov. 11 lets you rank what’s most important

PHOENIX – In transportation, ADOT is constantly looking ahead. What needs will emerge over the next 25 years? What new technologies will influence how our transportation system operates? How will we fund necessary improvements? One of the ways the Arizona Department of Transportation looks to the future is “What Moves You Arizona,” the Long-Range Transportation Plan we up-dated every five years. They need your input to do that. ADOT has developed an interactive online survey that’s easy and engaging. It gives you the opportunity to rank six transportation priorities: preservation, expansion, safety, technology, accessibility, and maintenance and operations. You get a budget and determine how much of it you’d allocate for each priority. Then you decide tradeoff scenarios that further define your priorities. This survey lets you experience what we face as transportation planners: setting priorities and making difficult choices with limited resources.  Those who’ve participated so far have ranked safety and expansion highly. And when it comes to managing funds, preservation and expansion get the most dollars for transportation investments. ADOT wants to hear from more of you! The survey is available until Nov. 11 at whatmovesyouarizona.metroquest.com. It only takes a few minutes and can be completed on a computer, smartphone or tablet. A Spanish-language version of the survey is also available via the link. While ADOT’s Long-Range Transportation Plan isn’t project-specific, it does identify investment priorities based on current and projected transportation funding over the next 25 years. It’s up to the public, policymakers and communities to tell ADOT what’s important to them throughout the long-range planning process, and to prioritize projects and funding. Visit azdot.gov/WhatMovesYouArizona for more information on ADOT’s Long-Range Transportation Plan and to leave a comment. The website also lists study milestones, including a full summary of 12 workshops held earlier this year around the state.  The final version of the plan is expected to be complete in early 2017.       Uploaded on May 26, 2010 Views: 352 Part of a commitment to looking into the future, and working with all stakeholders to build a plan, ADOT community outreach staff from across the talk about the challenges, opportunities and critical need for public input into the process. (An award-winning video.) Category News & Politics

6.6 EARTHQUAKE/ITALY/TAU NUTRINOS

Published on Oct 30, 2016

SAN GRASSO UNDERGROUND LABORATORY, ITALY. OPERATION OPERA AND ICARUS.http://www.BPEarthWatch.Com
https://www.youtube.com/user/paulbegl...

Local First > Talented Documentary Film-Maker Bruce Nelson To Honor Mesa Veterans In New Project

 

One of the missions for this blog site it to encourage and support Creative Place Making here in The New Urban Downtown Mesa.
Back in March of last year there was a post about the Washington Escobedo Neighborhood in a feature about new initiatives regenerating a dark chapter in Mesa's history: segregation, neglect, demolition but more importantly re-building our diverse communities.
Many people have played active and engaging roles creating public and private partnerships, among them Gorman Construction Company and Bruce Nelson who was bred, born and raised here.
His previous two documentaries have been well-received and financially-supported by both individuals and local organizations.

Film screenings have taken place at the world famous Nile Theater here on Main Street since 1924, adding to the cachet and reputation of this arts-and-entertain venue.
The Nile Theater opened in 1924, as a “For Whites Only” theater it was owned by Menhennet, Nace, and Rickards as the prim-ere movie and live venue in Arizona. It hosted talkie films, silent short films, minstrel shows, vaudeville companies, and local community performances.
The Nile was segregated around the early to mid-1930’s. Now under the management of the Mantooth Group, the new Nile Theater is shamelessly taking the Arizona music scene by storm. Historically known for its voracious appetite for memorable hardcore, punk, metal, and rock shows, the “World Famous” Nile Theater is streaming precious life-blood into the desert one incredibly kick-ass show at a time. Your music. Your venue. Our community. Own it
Bruce has a new documentary in the works now that is currently raising funds for production

Current Project

Washington-Escobedo Veterans of WW I and WW II Exhibition and Documentary

Project overview

Actor/filmmaker Bruce Nelson is currently in pre-production to create a documentary film and historical exhibit about the African American & Latino Veterans of WW I and WWII who lived in Washington-Escobedo in Mesa. The exhibit includes personal family photos and newspaper articles about this group of unknown Veterans. The exhibit will be on display at Mesa Pubic Library (Main Branch downtown) and The Escobedo-Heritage Room located in the Washington-Escobedo Community to celebrate Black History Month 2017.

The documentary will screen at the Mesa Library Main Branch and world famous The Nile Theater in downtown Mesa. Nelson is a local actor /filmmaker whose documentary North Town was screened at the Mesa Arts Center in June 2015 and at the Mesa Library in February 2015. North Town: Heritage of A Black Community is about the once segregated African American community in Mesa. His current documentary Nile Theater is about the world famous Nile Theater in downtown Mesa and is an official selection of the Jerome Indie Film & Music Festival and the Long Beach International Indie Film Festival

Nelson has received a small grant from Gorman & Company of $500.00. Nelson is seeking your financial support. The budget for the project is $6,700.00 the funds will be used for the production cost. i.e. producer, writer, director of photography, lighting design, sound design, editor, photo copies, camera rental, etc. Any amount would be greatly appreciated.

Please consider encouraging and supporting this local talent
Here's a link for more information and to make  a donation > http://nebproduction.com/projects/

Re: Question 1 on Nov 8 > ONE WEEK TO GO VOTE NO

It is wrong for many reasons, some of which are exposed here by one candidate in the only open campaign for Mesa City Council District 2, Jeremy Whittaker.
He's been featured in a number of posts on this blog site.
Other posts here have grappled with issues of politics here in The New Urban Downtown Mesa - anywhere there are people there are politics; that's what the word means.
Your MesaZona blogger is thrilled and excited to report that this blog has received over 64,000 views to date.
You don't get news, information and opinion like this anymore.
So let's get on with it ... [link to source after excerpts]



Jeremy Whittaker @ City Hall Plaza

Why I do not support the Mesa Question 1 which is a massive 23% tax hike
My opponent supports raising Mesa sales tax by 23%.  This must be approved by voters and will be on the November ballot.  There are primarily three reasons why I do not support raising the Mesa sales tax from 1.75% to 2.15%.  When a government entity whether it be city, county, state, or federal says they want to raise our current tax rate by 23% everyone should be paying attention.  The first reason is a lot more simpler than the other two.  We should not be bundling public safety and education when asking voters to approve a 23% tax increase.  The second reason is multiple studies show we are in a higher education bubble.  When this bubble bursts one has to ask if the city of Mesa has built in protections against the higher education occupants of these buildings that we’re all subsidizing with our tax dollars.  Xavier just did this same exact thing in downtown Gilbert and the taxpayers in Gilbert were left footing the bill – http://www.azcentral.com/story/news/local/gilbert/2016/05/31/gilberts-saint-xavier-university-close/85207474/.  The last reason I do not support this 23% tax increase a little more difficult and will take some time to explain.  In summary we have a special interest group buying our city council candidates.  They buy them because they can then use them, once elected, to raise taxes rather than address the insolvent public safety pension system.  This needs to be fixed at a state level.  Instead of dealing with the reality that they bankrupt the system they would rather raise taxes and force our city into more debt through unfunded liabilities.  I believe we need to face this issue head on.  But we cannot do this without first addressing that the leaders of the system have purchased our council candidates.
Why this is another taxpayer bailout
I will preface this by stating that our public safety personnel are critical to a well-functioning city but the problem is their leadership has failed them. Unfortunately, the money is gone and nobody wants to talk about it. As we’ve come too familiar with in politics we just try to patch the issue.  The problem is with the PSPRS (Public Safety Personnel Retirement System) management. We as taxpayers in Mesa and every other municipality have already funded the retirement system through taxation. So much so that in the early 2000’s it was almost 130% funded. The pension was gambled away and all of the assets were put at risk. Now to date it is somewhere around 50.13% funded and that is assuming a 7.5% annualized return, which is also not realistic given central banks imposing negative interest rates around the world.  Some estimates have said this system is as much as $49 billion in the red.
We should ask, why are none of the politicians and leaders of PSPRS watching out for the beat cop and firefighter who risk their lives every day to protect us?  Our leadership has bankrupt their pension and if elected I would demand we investigate and file a lawsuit against those who have a fiduciary responsibility to watch out for our public safety workers.
These men and women risk their lives every day.  The last thing they should have to worry about is if their pension is going to be there when they’re done serving our community.

In this chart (to the right) you can see this system used to be fully funded in 2003. Now in 2015 it’s 48% funded.  This is almost $6.6 billion dollars in the red.
Keep in mind this is assuming the system can return 7.5% a year.  Since 2002 it has barely cracked 5%

This loss of capital by the pension management has created a huge unfunded liability for the city, as the city is on the hook to refund these lost funds. This also becomes apparent when you look at the skyrocketing cost of hiring a new public safety official. This simple chart shows the drastic increase in cost for a public safety worker over the last 10 years. The majority of this is due to the pressure of the pension system in which the funds were gambled away by the leadership.  I should be clear, this is not the fault of the men and women who defend our city every day.  This is the result of reckless gambling by the leadership of this system.  The state legislature needs to fix this before it is too late.  

Did the state legislature make this problem worse?
As bad as this situation is the state legislature this year passed SB1428 which allows for new public safety workers to opt out of the pension system and into a 401K like program or tier.  This relinquishes their responsibility to support any public safety worker hired prior to 2012. If you are a public safety worker and were hired prior to 2012 you should be paying attention to what this does.  

It does not take a highly intelligent person to figure out what happens to a pension system when it’s 49% funded and $6.5 billion in the red and new public safety workers can opt out. The system gets top heavy when older workers retire, then the system collapses. Here is an example of what happened when the city of we got rid of the elected official retirement pension or EORP. It took 2 years but the you can clearly see as the older workers retired the unfunded liability jumped off the charts. Luckily the membership in this system is EORP pension is low. That is not the case with PSPRS which is billions of dollars.  Furthermore it is important to note that the new hires under SB1428 are only responsible for their own tier of unfunded liabilities.  This almost guarantees the system will collapse and municipalities around the state of Arizona will be on the hook for billions of dollars of lost money.  Public safety workers hired prior to 2012 will be hurt the most.  As soon as this system begins to collapse the municipalities will all push back and will have no choice because of the strained budget.  We have got to demand that a full investigation is done to recover the funds that were gambled away.  Our public safety workers deserve better.  They should not be risking their lives every day only to find out their pension will not be there one day.
Should the special interest groups be able to buy city council candidates so they vote to raise our taxes?

To “fix” this issue the current leadership has decided they will buy the City Council and raise taxes by 23%.  This is typical of any politician.  If you can’t fix it let’s just keep taxing people until they can no longer afford to live.  If we do not demand accountability then what stops this reckless investing from bankrupting the system a second time?
This is apparent in the public safety “question 1” which is being proposed in November to raise sales tax 23% from 1.75% today to 2.15% if it passes(more info). What system is allowed to risk billions of dollars of assets and if it is all lost allows for taxpayers to keep replenishing it?
There is no responsibility and accountability here and PSPRS might as well keep investing in the riskiest of assets.  If they do well they make a great return.  If they don’t the taxpayer simply pays for the losses.  
This is why the public safety management fundraises and spends thousands of dollars buying city council members every election, this is an example of special interest groups on a local level buying candidates who support raising our taxes for their own special interests.  
This is what is wrong with our government today.

For more information and details
Go to this >> http://www.jeremywhittaker.com/direct/23-tax-increase/?gclid=COXVhvL4g9ACFUxsfgod1LYLSg

Work-In-Progress: Historic Adaptive Re-Use of The Alhambra Hotel > Regenerating The New Urban DTMesa

Community Development Partners and Venue Builders are collaborating to turn what was once one of the best hotels downtown into student housing for Benedictine University, The $3,287,381 project is moving ahead quickly on the east side of MacDonald Street between Main Street and First Avenue, where owner Bill Wahl at Mesa Typewriter Exchange [in business for over 60 years] used to think nothing was ever going to happen . . . until a new generation of developers with new thinking took an interest in Mesa.
It's a good example of small and incremental investments in urban planning/development keeping what's unique in the city's history, while responding to shifting demographics to meet a need to provide housing for students enrolled at BenU, 19 of whom currently in hotel contract-housing. In January at the beginning of the next term, accommodations for 30 students will be ready for move-in, according to Christian Hume of Venue Projects on a recent on-site visit.

The development team has worked closely with the State Office of Historic Preservation, learning that the original building footprint was what you see spanning the left three window-areas upstairs and ground floor.
Decking and railing was recently started last week for the 2nd floor balcony, providing a nice view of Mesa's skyline.
Brickwork got a lot of attention and work, sand-blasting and repair on all four sides, with plans for stucco in certain areas.

According to Christian, the crew was surprised to discover that there are five  buildings on the property, with extensions added over the years.
As you can see in the foreground to the left, the post-and-lintel construction inside the entryway to the right is part of the original building. The archway farther inside is from another era.
Note the original high ceilings and new framing for walls.





2 more shots looking down the long east-west corridors on the first and second floors

Group from BenU on a site visit last week.
Note original ceiling details and hall entrance

Student rooms under construction on 2nd floor - railing marks stairway entry from groundfloor

View from south side into patio area

You Don't Get News Like This Anymore: Thanks for Over 64,000 Views, Dear Readers

What else can your MesaZona blogger say? . . . your interest is appreciated
Truth be told : This blog site is blessed to attract viewers here in The New Urban Downtown Mesa.
It is both thrilling and exciting to publish news, information and opinion online.

Mission: To make you think [whatever it takes]

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