The Daily Agenda: A moral action

Supervisors are set to vote on a set of policies addressing poverty … The 13 policies focus on housing, health, education and more … Lukeville port closed indefinitely.

For more than a year, a group of experts has been researching and evaluating policy options and developing a plan to help reduce generational poverty and improve individual and community wealth.

Pima County supervisors will hear from the group during their meeting tomorrow and vote on whether to implement their 13 evidence-based policies in the areas of housing, health, education and more, that these experts believe will help drive change in the community.

The policies are part of Pima County’s Prosperity Initiative and were created by a working group made up of representatives from all five incorporated cities and towns, the Tucson Indian Center, city and county employees, University of Arizona researchers and the county’s internal expert, Bonnie Bazata.

The process also included more than 180 small group meetings with more than 800 participants, including academics, business people, practitioners and people with lived experience.

Presentations were made to city and town councils, as well as 14 city and county advisory committees and commissions, and in October, Bazata hosted an understanding poverty workshop for a group of 100 community members.

If these policies are approved by supervisors, it will be up to each municipality to decide which policies are most applicable to their communities, meaning that Oro Valley and South Tucson don’t have to implement an identical plan.

The policies aim to:

1. Increase the supply of housing by prioritizing practices and investments that create diverse housing types and prices and ensuring affordable housing options are available throughout the county, especially in low-poverty, high-opportunity neighborhoods.

2. Improve quality of life and opportunity in high-poverty neighborhoods by investing in physical and social infrastructure in ways that center the priorities of residents, increasing access to resources, preventing vulnerable residents from being displaced, reducing exposure to violence and building community wealth.

3. Improve housing stability for renters and homeowners, especially in high-poverty, low-opportunity neighborhoods, by preventing evictions and foreclosures, increasing the pool of homeowners, developing more affordable housing and reducing the cost of utilities and weatherization.

4. Provide assistance with healthcare insurance enrollment to protect people against medical debt.

5. Reduce unintended pregnancies by increasing education, access to contraception and the use of long-acting reversible birth control options.

6. Increase access to affordable, high-quality early childcare and education.

7. Increase college and other post-high school education and training opportunities for kids and teens by improving access to children’s college savings accounts and through other evidence-based practices.

8. Identify and prioritize safe, reliable and affordable transportation and mobility options and encourage mixed-use and transit-oriented developments to better connect disadvantaged communities with jobs and other resources and reduce travel times, traffic injuries, transportation costs and pollution.

9. Expand broadband access and services and address barriers so all residents have access, equipment and the skills for digital inclusion and to increase opportunities for economic growth in rural areas.

10. Prioritize workforce development for low-income job seekers with evidence-based case management practices including apprenticeships, on-the-job training and supportive services to prepare participants for jobs with self-sufficient wages and benefits.

11. Improve the quality of jobs for workers and expand employment capacity of employers that already offer quality jobs. Quality jobs are considered those that provide competitive, equitable and self-sustaining wages, family-friendly benefits and practices and consistent scheduling.

12. Improve the financial capabilities of families and small businesses to increase their access to fair credit and gain and protect income and wealth-building assets.

13. Increase small and microbusiness ownership and expansion opportunities, prioritizing entrepreneurs of color, women-owned businesses and businesses operating in high-poverty neighborhoods.

To back up the need for these policies, the working group drafted a 165-page report (included in a 258-page memo about the proposed policies authored by County Administrator Jan Lesher) that explains the type of research and evidence they sought out, guiding principles that informed the research and detailed information for each of the 13 policies.

So how much is all of this going to cost taxpayers? The short answer is, nothing. Lesher’s memo says the policies, if adopted, would send a message to the community, administration and county departments that the board is serious about working towards ending poverty.

The county has already adopted many of these policies to one degree or another, and some can be implemented through low-cost measures, like zoning changes and reallocating housing vouchers to targeted areas and families with children.

It’s up to each individual municipality to decide how much money to invest in programs supporting the initiative, but making decisions that align with the policies themselves doesn’t come at a cost.

The initiative isn’t a short-term fix. Lesher compared it to the Sonoran Desert Conservation Plan, (which we wrote about last week) which took almost two full decades to be fully implemented.

“There is a significant cost to the county and taxpayers now from poverty. Many of the policies have high returns on investment,” Lesher said in the memo. “Adopting these policies is as much a fiscally prudent action as it is a moral action.”

Bad financial planning: Administrators at the University of Arizona’s College of Agriculture, Environment and Life Sciences did what the higher-ups asked, but they still ended up with a deficit that could shrink the college to 40% of its current size over the next few years, the Arizona Daily Star’s Ellie Wolfe reports. UA officials told them to quickly spend their financial reserves for several years, even though the college’s administrators kept saying it would lead the college into a deficit.

Finding a middle ground: Tucsonans should compromise over a proposal to build a walking path between the two Randolph golf courses, adjacent to Reid Park, the Star’s Tim Steller writes. The people who use the current path are tired of dealing with heavy vehicle traffic, but golfers aren’t happy about people walking near the courses, which golfers pay to use. If they need inspiration, officials and residents could look back on recent compromises over the duck pond at Reid Park and baseball fields, Steller writes. 

Fears confirmed: Many of the animals transferred from San Diego to the Humane Society of Southern Arizona likely ended up as snake food, the organization’s investigation found, Arizona Public Media’s Danyelle Khmara reports. The report pointed to a failure of leadership, a lack of communication and due diligence, and a work environment where employees feared losing their jobs if they didn’t take in more animals. The debacle led to the firing of the Humane Society’s CEO and the resignation of the chief program officer. 

Keep it open: Federal officials said Friday that the Lukeville port of entry, where Arizonans cross the border on the way to Puerto Peñasco, would be closed indefinitely so port officers could help process thousands of migrants and asylum seekers who are showing up at Arizona’s border with Mexico. Arizona officials are calling on the federal government to keep the port open, Camryn Sanchez of KJZZ’s Fronteras Desk reports. Gov. Katie Hobbs and Sens. Mark Kelly and Kyrsten Sinema said the closure was “unacceptable” and would damage the economy and tourism. State Sen. TJ Shope and Congressman Juan Ciscomani also are asking for support from the National Guard. 

Reinstated: Two UA professors were reinstated after comments they made during lectures about discussing the Israel-Hamas conflict went viral on social media, the Arizona Republic’s Sarah Lapidus reports. The College of Education professors likened Hamas to an American resistance movement in their “Cultural Pluralism for Young Children” class, which teaches students how to discuss situations that impact children.  

“I’ve said it all along, I feel like we were doing our job as teachers, that we were modeling conversations that are critical to have,” one of the professors, Rebecca Zapien, told Lapidus.

As we told you last week, we’re starting to run letters to the editor as a way to foster a conversation about local government and politics. Today’s our first day! Each Monday, we’ll send out a prompt to help get the ideas flowing. You can write about the prompt, or another local topic that you want to bring up. (You can find the guidelines for writing letters here.)

To kick things off, we’re going with the 2024 elections. Local voters will choose a county attorney, county supervisors, justices of the peace, members of Congress, and a U.S. Senator, among others. Which local election most interests you, and why?

Send your submissions (100 words or less) to curt@tucsonagenda.com. Be sure to put “Letter to the editor” in the subject line.