Say hello to our new reporter
Blast from the past ... Do you smell shoe leather? ... And remember Ally Miller?
We’re thrilled to announce we hired Joe Ferguson as our new reporter.
That name should be familiar to political junkies who followed Joe’s reporting on local government and politics at the Arizona Daily Star. For those who weren’t reading the papers before 2020, you’d be hard-pressed to find another reporter in Tucson who knows as much about local politics as Joe does.
He was knocking around Tucson when the likes of Mayor Jonathan Rothschild and Chuck Huckelberry were in charge. He challenged Republicans and Democrats alike, all part of his training under longtime former editor Joe Burchell at the Star.
Back then, whenever there was anything political going on, chances are Joe was either sitting in the front row or badgering the people who wouldn’t let him in.
When he worked with Curt in the Star newsroom, Joe was always digging through troves of data or finding new ways to report on local government shenanigans. He was the guy we all went to when our beats touched on the City of Tucson or Pima County.
Now he can be that guy for all of you!
Joe does what we call shoe-leather reporting. For reporters like him, wearing out the soles of your shoes is a badge of honor. It shows you went out and poked your nose into everything voters might need to know about, whether that’s talking to people on the street, knocking on doors, walking the halls of bureaucracy, or hustling to political events, great and small alike.
We’re gonna need to buy Joe lots of shoes now that he’s running around Tucson. Smash that button and help us get him the footwear he deserves!
In short, Joe’s the guy you want covering City Hall.
That’s not just us saying it, either. He won the Sledgehammer Award from the Arizona Press Club in 2019 for his political news coverage, along with the Freedom of Information Act Award from the Arizona Newspaper Association in 2017 and the First Amendment Award from the Society of Professional Journalists in 2015.
Beyond wearing out his shoes, Joe also has ink in his veins. He’s a sincere advocate of press freedom and doesn’t hesitate to stick his neck out when he sees corporate nonsense – or any other type of nonsense, for that matter – casting a shadow on good journalism.
And he’s the guy who can take the Tucson Agenda to the next level. When we launched the Agenda in 2023, we set out to fill a void we saw in local government coverage. There aren’t nearly enough reporters left in Tucson, let alone the really experienced ones the public needs in order to know what officials are up to.
“Tucson has some incredible reporters and I am humbled to be working alongside them at a time when we need as many journalists as possible dedicated to covering the community,” Joe says.
If you want another reason to celebrate, this is also a rare instance of a reporter finding their way back to the journalism world.
Joe left the Star in 2020 and became a Pima County constable, where he saw up close how hard life can get for county residents. He was out there every day working during the pandemic to stave off evictions during the moratorium and helping families facing homelessness. He went on to work in public outreach at the Pima County Assessor’s Office and as a court administrator in Ajo and Green Valley.
So he’s the rare bird who’s seen how government looks from both inside and out.
And reporters like Joe are needed now more than ever. Tucson only has a handful of reporters who cover local government and politics. And few – if any – of them have the institutional knowledge that Joe has.
If you see him out and about, say hello!
And feel free to hit him up at Joe@tucsonagenda.com.
Hiring a new reporter isn’t the only exciting thing happening in the Agendaverse.
We’re leaning into tech in a big way this year and launching new publications to keep you better informed. Hank and Nicole at our sister newsletter the Arizona Agenda have all the details.
To give you a sense of how Joe reports, we asked him to dig up some of his favorite stories from his glory days at the Star.
Outside groups have spent at least $281K in Democratic primary race for Tucson mayor
19th Century Republican Mark Hanna said it best: “There are two things that are important in politics. The first is money and I can’t remember what the second one is.”
It is easy to fall behind on political messaging during a cycle, even for a reporter - there isn’t a comprehensive list of the mailers, digital ads, and TV commercials running in the weeks before a primary.
Scouring public documents showed how outside groups poured six-figures into the race supporting Regina Romero, which put her over the top in a fairly close Democratic primary against a well-known state senator.
Rep. Raúl Grijalva tapes 9-min ad welcoming his rival, Nick Pierson, to CD3
Watching political ads is usually a bore, but Congressman Raúl Grijalva put together a low-budget YouTube video that turned into a master class in slogging your opponent.
Grijalva simply hopped in his car with a staffer and narrated as he drove through Congressional District 3, pointing out the best places to get authentic Mexican food and famous murals, as well as the family home where he grew up.
He even cracked a few jokes, noting his Republican opponent would probably have loved to see him in the Pima County Jail as he drove by.
Political Notebook: Candidate who shot his mom makes waves at Tucson gun control forum
This is a two-fer.
Bobby Wilson, who was running for a seat in the Arizona House of Representatives, said during a gun-control debate for candidates (including many survivors of the January 2011 shooting) that all you need “is a good guy with a gun." Wilson spent years in jail for shooting and killing his mom in apparent self-defense.
Also in this edition was congressional candidate Yahya Yuksel, who filed paperwork to suppress records about a decade-old rape allegation. This led to the Democratic Party pulling support for the young lawyer, and coming in dead last in the seven-person Democratic primary.
Trump, Sanders campaigns won't pay bills for Tucson security
The size of the rallies and the rhetoric are always what make the headlines, but the city of Tucson took major financial hits by providing security for both candidates - it took extra shoe leather to track down that neither campaign (who were raking in millions of dollars in donations at the time) had any plans to reimburse the city.
Kozachik to city: Clear me in prostitution probe now
With whispers abounding that some local politician was mired in a far-reaching city probe of cops involved with an active prostitution ring, former Tucson City Councilman Steve Kozachik went on the offensive and asked the city attorney to clear him or charge him. An advocate for women who were used by sex traffickers and restoring those women’s rights, Kozachik was quickly cleared.
One clip from Joe’s archive made us chuckle more than most:
This one is several years old, but I got a tip that then-Pima County Supervisor Ally Miller had called 911 because she was mad about a newspaper article in another publication.
It technically wasn’t mine, but I wrote earlier in the week that some of Miller’s neighbors/donors were set to get their streets repaved. There was a map but we didn’t publish it. I did, however, publish the 911 call demanding that the article get taken down. (It wasn’t) You can listen to it here.
On a side note: the Pima County Supervisors opted to take the funds Miller wanted for her supporters and use the money to repave a section in another district near Colossal Cave.
Welcome, Joe! If you really need new shoes as your Agenda intro suggests, talk to new LD17 Rep Kevin Volk. He went through at least 1 pair of shoes while canvassing this past election cycle. It was a running joke at meetings and events. Such a great guy!