TAXING TIMES: Every non-comatose county resident knows Assessor Rick Lyons cranked the value on nearly everyone's property. Lyons has taken an academic tack with his claim that he hasn't necessarily raised taxes because other authorities, from the Board to Supervisors to fire districts, set the tax rates. Now the City of Tucson's budget is out and City Manager Mike "The Spike" Brown is the first bureaucrat to line up for the property tax gang-bang. Brown is proudly declaring the city isn't going to increase its property tax rate of $1.15 per $100 of assessed value. But that really means city homeowners will be coughing up a whole lot more to keep Mike in that fancy car he drives at their expense and cover the costs of Don Diamond's helicopter rides because leaving the rate at the current level will automatically jack up everybody's taxes an average of, oh, 30 percent. We fully expect at least a majority--if not all--of the Tucson City Council to grab the assessment windfall and reply with the same straight face, "We kept the rate the same." Of course, to keep the actual taxes the same, they'd have to lower the rate. FORGIVE THEM THEIR TRESPASSES, TNI: Anybody who's ever worked around a media outlet knows part of the process is living with a series of harmless kooks who'll bend your ear and hand you reams of papers making ludicrous claims about a variety of issues and alleged conspiracies. Dealing with these folks is part of the job--and you just nod and maybe even glance at the stuff you're given. One such local kook is a woman whose material is totally whacked, but, hey, she's exercising her First Amendment rights. Unfortunately, she tried to exercise them recently at Tucson Newspapers Inc., a mega business that wouldn't exist if it weren't for that same First Amendment. Newspaper bigwigs banned the woman from their posh Park Avenue premises because, we're told, Tucson Citizen county beat reporter Jennifer Katelman considered her a nuisance. But the woman persisted, so the TNI brass had her arrested for trespassing. Katelman also took time out of her busy reporting schedule to appear as a witness on the woman's trespassing hearing in city court, a hearing that resulted in the woman being sentenced to three months probation. Now we'd probably give the big, brave folks at TNI this one without comment if it were an isolated incident. Maybe the kooky woman scared Katelman and maybe she honestly believed she was threatened--although we always thought real reporters were made of sterner stuff. But this isn't the only incident. Samuel Winchester Morey, one of the great curmudgeons of this valley, is definitely not a kook. Well, it seems Sam got into it with Katelman, too, and ended up meeting with her boss, Don "Dwindling Readership" Hatfield, local colonial governor for the vast Gannett chain. Morey told Hatfield he planned to contact the Gannett corporate operation if Hatfield and Katelman didn't shape up their news coverage. Hatfield asked if that was a threat, and when Morey replied, "Yes--a threat to contact your bosses," he was ejected from the building and banned from TNI upon pain of the same trespass action that befell the woman. Get real, TNI. We knew you were arrogant and we knew you were inept. Now we know you're craven, too. ONCE IN A WHILE, THEY DO SOMETHING RIGHT: Once in a blue moon the Arizona Legislature doesn't roll over for a special interest. We're glad to report the lawmakers rejected legendary land speculator Don Diamond's shameful request to move the property around his house out of the Amphi School District and into the more posh Catalina Foothills District. Diamond couldn't get the usually developer-butt-kissing Amphi District to go along with this bullshit move, and it turns out he couldn't get the Legislature to go along either. Apparently kissing Diamond's ass is no longer quite as fashionable as it once was. It was Pima County Republican State Rep. Don Schottel, whose district includes the property in question, who finally killed Diamond's ploy. Of course, Schottel has some strange ideas of his own. During debate on that recently vetoed lobbyist reform bill, which would have prevented lawmakers from receiving freebies like Phoenix Suns tickets, Schottel suddenly launched into a sideways attack on the press, complaining about the endorsements newspapers hand out at election time. Schottel, who apparently hasn't won a lot of endorsements himself, suggested that endorsements--and maybe even articles that quoted candidates--should somehow be reported as "in-kind contributions." Forget for a moment Schottel's colossal ignorance of the First Amendment and just ask yourself this question: How much is an endorsement from the Star or Citizen worth, anyway? SHOOTING THE MESSENGER: When he vetoed that lobbyist reform bill that would have prevented him from getting discounts for all those legal bills, Gov. J. Fife Deadbeat III proclaimed, "The public has far less to fear from Lobbyists taking legislators to ballgames than from newspapers and self-annointed morality groups breeding cynicism and contempt toward every person in public office." That's our job, Fife--and thanks for always making it so easy for us. GRIJALVA'S NUMBERS: Pima County Democratic Supervisor Raul Grijalva is facing possible opposition from the cementhead lobby via the pathetic candidacy of Pima County Planning bureaucrat Joe Garcia. Fully aware that interests outside his district were behind Garcia's challenge, Grijalva made a unique move of his own. He hired local political pollster Alexis Thompson to interview 250 high-propensity Democratic voters in Grijalva's own District 5--the voters who'll decide the Democratic nominee in a district where a Republican hasn't got a prayer. But instead of seeing how he'd do against Garcia, Grijalva asked how he'd do against the real players--legendary land speculator Don Diamond, developers Joe Cesare and Bill Estes Jr., and Garcia's leading advocate, Tucson Business Coalition founder Byron Howard. Grijalva garnered between 72 and 80 percent of the pretend vote, while his hypothetical opponents picked up between 2.4 and 4 percent. Grijalva also asked one highly pertinent question, which is worth repeating: "Do you agree or disagree with the following statement: Unrestrained growth is costing us more in taxes and creating problems for existing neighborhoods." The result? Agree: 67.6 percent. Disagree: 23.2 percent. By a 3-to-1 margin, westside and urban Democrats recognize how badly they're getting screwed by the growth lobby. Add that to the generally similar numbers from northside and eastside Republicans and you have a consensus, folks. Now all you need is the right officeholders to implement it. And like the Brits in the Revolutionary War believing there were all those Tories, the cementhead leadership is trying to buy a Democratic primary. They apparently forgot what happened in 1993 when they tried the same game against Councilwoman Molly McKasson, and blew that shot by the same 3-to-1 margin. Bet on Grijalva to kick their ass this time, too.

		© 1995-97 Tucson Weekly . Info Booth