This week brings one of the saddest cover stories that the Tucson Weekly has published in a while.
Our original plan for this week's cover slot was a story by Mari Herreras that highlighted various myths and truths about the Tucson Unified School District's ethnic-studies programs. Then last Thursday, Oct. 27, came the shocking news that TUSD governing board member Judy Burns—one of Mari's sources for the originally scheduled cover story, of course—had died of a heart attack.
I didn't know Judy Burns very well; she interacted more with Tucson Weekly reporters than she did with me. However, these writers—including Mari, Dave Devine, and Chris Limberis—are all people I trust, and over the years, they've had almost unanimous praise for Judy and the work she's done for Tucson's students and teachers.
Judy Burns' death is a big loss for TUSD and the community as a whole. She'll be missed—a painful truth that comes across loud and clear in Mari's story about Burns. Check it out here.
To give Burns' life—especially her service to TUSD—some context, we also decided to reprint a story that the Weekly published back on the eve of Election Day in 2000, when Burns was finally elected to the TUSD board on her fifth try.
That story was written by the aforementioned Chris Limberis, a Weekly writer (and now a member of the Arizona Newspapers Association Hall of Fame) who passed away in 2005. Limbo was a great judge of character—and he was a big fan of Judy Burns. You can read Chris' piece here.
