Tucson Weekly: The Skinny (November 6

Skinny CREEPSHOW: So there The Skinny was, over at the UA on Halloween Day, feeling gleefully devilish as we watched the regents hammer the nails in the coffin of the living dead--Arizona International Campus--and then spookily reincarnate it as the all-new Arizona International College, a subsidiary college of the UA.
The master magician who gets credit, new UA President Peter Likins, brought off the sleight-of- hand with impressive finesse, putting an end to years' worth of local turmoil over AIC within weeks of arriving in town. He told the board that the new plan will "incubate" the little-school-that-couldn't over at the Main Campus, where AIC's students will be able to partake of the university's library, classes, residence halls and other resources. Where, also, the school's knuckleheaded administrators finally will have to follow time-honored university procedures on academic freedom and due process, on hiring and firing and curriculum.
President Rudy Campbell played the wise seer, summing up the long disaster of AIC thusly, "We started (the school) too early, in the wrong place, for the wrong reasons." Bingo, Rudy. The original idealistic proposal for an experimental college was transformed into some very scary things--to wit, an exercise in real-estate adventurism by some money-minded regents and local developers and an exercise in megalomania for its self-promoting, power-grabbing provost, Celestino Fernández. Then there was the idea that we should run a college like a business, dammit, and fire anybody uppity enough to talk back to the boss.
Regent John Munger, one of the leading advocates of AIC, angrily said he "took umbrage" at Campbell's remarks. Notwithstanding AIC's documented mismanagement, he blamed all the school's troubles on the stingy Legislature. Singularly ungracious in defeat, he said he was "real tired of having this campus be the whipping boy for those who don't understand the difficulties of administrators and regents."
And what of the story's Wicked Witch, our own Cel? Well, at least he quit, but we can hardly credit his assertion that Likins wanted him to stay on. After all, he resigned when Likins offered him a position at a lower rank, the day after Likins overruled him by reinstating the professor he fired. Fernández watched the proceedings on Halloween with his usual polished public demeanor, but he apparently does not intend to go quietly. He keeps tooting his own horn in the Wildcat, most recently taking credit for the Likins plan to move AIC to the main campus. As if. Personally, The Skinny wishes we could just pour a bucket of water on his head and make him melt away, slowing dissolving him all the way down to his Cheshire cat grin. No such luck, but there is this: Assuming he goes back to teaching in the UA sociology department, which we sincerely doubt, we wish old Cel an early morning lecture class, hundreds of freshmen to teach, and no grad student to help him grade the papers.
JUDGE NOT: Tucson attorney and former member of the State Transportation Board Andy Federhar would like to be a federal judge. U.S. District Court Judge William Browning is planning to move to "senior" status next year, leaving a vacancy on the federal bench.
Federhar, a Democrat, could have some explaining to do about his role on the Arizona Department of Transportation Board. Seems he represented the Southern Pacific Railroad at the same time he was on the Board and pushing hard for approval of that well-know road to nowhere, the Aviation Highway. Some insiders believe Federhar's support for Aviation stemmed from the large diesel fuel spills and other contaminants that had accumulated over the years beneath a portion of that road. Because of the road project, they allege, Southern Pacific didn't have to clean up the mess--it suddenly became government's burden. And never mind that Federhar would appear to have a massive conflict of interest in that situation--because Arizona law makes it just about impossible for a lawyer to have one of those.
Should Federhar succeed in making President Bill Clinton's short list for judicial appointment, expect the Senate Judiciary Committee to query him on this subject.
CORBETT CALLING IT QUITS? Former Tucson mayor, former city councilman, former state representative, and for the last 20 years the Pima County Superior Court clerk, James Nielsen Corbett. Jr. is stepping down in 1998 after one of the longest political careers in Arizona history.
Coy to the end, politician supremo, Corbett says he "hasn't really made up his mind." Translation: He's out of there in January of 1999.
But we can take a hint--Corbett has nice things to say about former GOP State Senator Patti Noland, who's circulating petitions for the office. Noland is no dummy--she's running because she knows Corbett isn't.
THE BUZZ ON BEE: GOP state Sen. Keith Bee is folding the tent on his short-lived campaign for the Pima County Board of Supervisors District 4 seat currently held by Republican Ray Carroll.
Bee, who has aspirations for a political future in Washington, was told by the GOP top dogs to forget about the District 4 seat if he knew what was good for him. The party establishment is supporting TUSD Board member Brenda Even, whose husband John died a few months after he won the seat in 1996. Although Brenda Even fought for the appointment to her late husband's seat, the supervisors appointed Carroll instead.
Even has spent the ensuing months oiling the party machinery and lining up the support of the Growth Lobby, which is eager to dump Carroll after his votes on several key rezonings and his opposition to ASARCO's proposed copper mine in the scenic Santa Rita Mountains. They've already raised a ton of money for the Widow Even and didn't want a three-way race against Carroll.
Unfortunately for them, though, that's just what they're likely to get. We hear Republican Ken Marcus, an accountant who was also in the running for the supe seat during the appointment process earlier this year, is planning on filing the paperwork to become a candidate next week.
We're also told other candidates are sniffing out the race--which is shaping up to be one of the liveliest on the 1998 ballot.
SNAP JUDGMENT: Last week KOLD-TV, Channel 13, spent a segment on its 5 p.m. news interviewing--ready for this--the Snapple Girl.
Seems a mouthpiece for the over-hyped beverage brand was in town and KOLD's ace news team thought it was worth some of their limited news time. It was a really slow news day, what with all that boring stuff on the ballot, you understand.
They not only interviewed her, but cheerfully chatted about the quality of Snapple after she left. They were asking other news team members to try it and report how it tastes. Sure hope their sales department sent the Snapple folks a bill.

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