Tucson Weekly: The Skinny (June 19

Skinny A DOGPATCH KINDA GUY: The coveted Skinny Award for the Bureaucrat With His Head Deepest Up His Ass has to go to Marana Planning Director Jerry Flannery. In a recent article concerning Marana's latest avaricious attempt to annex another 1,260 acres of mostly vacant land, Flannery told The Arizona Daily Star's Tony Davis:
"If being fair means that Marana bends over backwards for developers, I'd rather be fair."
Also:
"If you give someone a fair shake on their development, that's all developers ask for, too. It's not a gimme. We are reasonable to developers. We are reasonable to residents. We take everyone's input into consideration."
Yeah, but when there are no residents, then the annexation goes to benefit only the developers, which has been Marana's pattern for a long time.
The town's latest controversy revolves around a 309-acre parcel at Thornydale and Tangerine roads that the county has already zoned for a shopping center, plus some other land occupied by a water company. Marana wants the water company for "development needs," and--dig this--town officials have already planned for a housing development on the land they've yet to annex!
Arrogant though that is, try Flannery's definition of urban sprawl. While he admits to bending over backwards for all the massive clear cutting of unique desert flora that occurs in his "town," he's either audacious or just plain stupid when he states: "If you want the definition of urban sprawl, look at one-acre or three-acre lots. That's what urban sprawl is."
Got that? A house on three acres, leaving most of the ironwood trees and saguaro cacti, is urban sprawl, and is therefore bad. But a dozen or more cheap stucco boxes that pass for homes on the same miserably bulldozed bare-ass acreage somehow isn't urban sprawl, and is therefore good. Yeah, that Flannery's a brilliant thinker all right.
This latest Marana annexation attempt is powered by two factors:
• Residents of what remains of the far northwest side, those 3,000 or so folks wedged between Marana and Oro Valley, are considering protecting themselves by incorporating a town to be called Tortolita--it's a foregone conclusion they'd stop big-money, stucco-trash development cold.
• Also, the mega developers have noticed the attitude of newly appointed Pima County Supervisor Ray Carroll, when combined with those of currents supes Raul Grijalva and Sharon Bronson, may stop all that rezoning for massive developments out in the boonies. So the developers figure, hey, why mess with the supes when you've got patsies like Flannery in Marana.
COMMIE CONSPIRACY EXPOSED! A few disgruntled supporters of the losers who failed to win the appointment to the late John Even's seat on the Pima County Board of Supervisors are now trying to smear the winner. They're making a big deal out of the fact that Ray Carroll, the pickup-driving Republican who won the seat, employs as his chief aide one Scott Egan.
Local political junkies may recall Egan was an aide to former city councilmen Bruce Wheeler and Mike Haggerty. Seems back in the 1970s a young Egan once registered briefly as a Commie. Several reporters have been nosing around on the subject.
Wow, now there's a scandal for the '90s. Even The Weekly's resident right-winger, Emil Franzi, who still proudly recalls his days as a card-carrying member of the John Birch Society, says, "Yeah? So what? Being a real ex-Commie used to be a badge of honor among a whole lot of righties. And I don't just mean a temporary lark registration--I'm talking about cell meetings and sending money to Gus Hall. If Egan had changed his mind in another era, he might have gotten a spot on the masthead of Bill Buckley's National Review, right between Whittaker Chambers and Frank Meyer. And great big chunks of the current Libertarian Party movement contain a horde of former left-wing nuts who are now Libertarian nuts. The voters, including most conservatives, could care less about what somebody thought 20 years ago."
We expect somebody supporting a candidate running against Carroll next year to attempt to use this ancient factoid against him. And we also expect it to fall flat on its hoary old ass.
BLAND AMBITION: The race to replace retiring City Councilwoman Molly McKasson in Ward 6 promises to be a real donnybrook. Already, five Democrats--Octavio Barceló, Tres English, Leo Pilachowski, Alison Hughes and Carol Zimmerman--are putting together their campaigns for the Democratic primary. All of the Dems have experience in the political arena and many have worked together in the past.
One Republican, Fred Ronstadt, has also thrown his hat into the ring in Ward 6. The son of Tucson Parks and Rec Director Jim Ronstadt, the 34-year-old candidate has powerful family connections in the Naked Pueblo. Look for him to wage a formidable campaign, especially if the Democratic primary turns ugly and the victor emerges bloody and bruised.
Meanwhile, in Ward 3, Councilman Michael Crawford, lap dog of the local power elite, who was appointed to the seat when plumber Tom Saggau flaked out two years ago, is facing two opponents in his Democratic primary. Both are former city employees--Jerry Anderson has worked as an aide to former Mayor Tom Volgy and recently left his job with the city's annexation department, while Alex Kimmelman is a local historian who has worked in the city's planning department.
Republican Dan Copeland is planning to face the winner of the Democratic primary in the general election.
So far, it appears as though Ward 5 Councilman Steve Leal won't face a challenge in either the primary or general election.
The earliest sign of relative strengths of the various campaigns should become clear by the end of June, when the candidates are required to file their first campaign finance reports. Early money will make a big difference in establishing name recognition, especially in the crowded Ward 6 race.
Given the overwhelming voter-registration advantage Democrats have in Tucson--which has allowed them to dominate the council throughout the '90s--we sincerely hope the mainstream media won't ignore the primary election, as they have in the past. But, sluts that they are, we won't be surprised if they do.

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