The Daily Agenda: Bring on the nuttiness

Tucson's general election season starts ... A little weirdness goes a long way ... Banned Books Week is here.

What the August primary elections lacked in drama, the November general election is making up for with nuttiness.

There were only two quasi-competitive races in Tucson’s primaries, with all the Democratic incumbents winning easily and the Republican candidates running unopposed.

When the general election campaign kicked off with a candidate forum at the Murphy-Wilmot Library on Saturday, Tucson voters got to see Democratic, Republican, and Libertarian candidates for three city council seats answer questions side by side for the first time.

The forum was full of personal anecdotes, broad statements without examples, and statistics without sources. In other words, politics!

It also had some moments that called for busting out your tinfoil hats.

Everything started off ho-hum.

It was clear that Council members Nikki Lee and Paul Cunningham had a better grip on the issues and knew how to articulate their answers better than the other candidates. Being politicians, they also knew how to talk around questions they couldn’t answer.

They stayed in their lane, explaining how the city is tackling issues like homelessness and gun violence.

Two Republican candidates, Victoria Lem in Ward 1 and Ross Kaplowitch in Ward 4, also focused on traditional GOP issues. They criticized the all-Democratic city council for not doing enough to stop crime and homelessness. They also said the council needed to speed up the permit process for new construction and businesses.

Then, like sunshine through the clouds, it got super weird.

Ernie Shack, the Republican in the Ward 2 race, and Pendleton Spicer, the Libertarian candidate in Ward 2, went off the rails when they were asked about 15-minute cities.

That’s a reference to a part of the city’s climate plan designed to make it so residents can meet their needs, like going to the grocery store, without having to drive longer than 15 minutes.

"Do you know what the 5G towers are for? Surveillance,” Shack said. “Part of that is to surveil, to watch what you're doing, and to institute 15-minute cities. That's the way they would do it."

Shack then expanded on his weird theory.

"Mayor Romero came out with no gas ovens. They want electric. Do you know why they want electric? Because they can restrict you,” Shack said. “They can cut off the energy. They can cease the power. They have control over you."

When Shack’s time was up, Spicer took the lead.

"I will continue what Ernie was saying,” Spicer said. “The whole purpose, ultimately, if you look at the goals of the United Nations, the sustainability goals, eventually they want to control every move we make, every thought we have, every feeling we have, every emotion we make they want to control, eventually. And the 15-minute cities is just a start."

If there was any chance they might actually be elected, their views would be really concerning. But it’s all but certain Cunningham will cruise to another re-election.

It’s worth noting that the confusion about 15-minute cities didn’t come just from Spicer and Pendleton. Kaplowitch also seemed like he misunderstood the concept.

"Why should I be restricted to 15 minutes from my home?" he asked.

And it looks like the 5G nonsense and the hysteria over 15-minutes cities isn’t contained to the council races.

If that’s your cup of tea, then mayoral candidate Janet Wittenbraker is waiting for you with open arms.

The only candidate who didn’t attend the forum was Democrat Lane Santa Cruz, who is running against Lem. Santa Cruz posted on Facebook late last week that they had been hit by a car while walking downtown and were going to have surgery on their Achilles tendon this week.

That about does it for the candidate forum. If you want a more detailed rundown of what was said at the forum, the Tucson Sentinel’s Jim Nintzel hit the main points. You also can watch the 92-minute video of the forum on the Facebook page of the League of Women Voters of Greater Tucson.

Next up is a forum for mayoral candidates on Oct. 7.

We’re hoping the first question is about 5G towers.

Take me out to the ballgame: The Vamos a Tucson Mexican Baseball Fiesta returns Thursday to the Kino Sports Complex for its 12th year, the Tucson Sentinel’s Gene Moreland writes. The four-day event features professional teams from the Mexican Pacific League and the University of Arizona Wildcats. In addition to baseball, attendees can enjoy food, live entertainment, music and double-header games all weekend.

Plan on hold: The Douglas Active Management Area’s management goal is back under review by the Arizona Department and Water Resources after Attorney General Kris Mayes and members of the public expressed concerns about its language, Arizona Public Media’s Summer Horn reports. Criticism of the goal is focused on the word “attempt” in the current draft management goal that says it’s meant “to support the general economy and welfare of water users in the basin by attempting to reduce the rate of aquifer depletion by 2035 and every 10 years thereafter.”

Arts for all: The Marana Town Council has adopted a new public art policy, which includes two new fees and a minor amendment to the general plan, Tucson Local Media’s Veronica Kuffel writes. The rezoning code provides a low-cost alternative for residents and small-scale developers and will also apply to future art installations, allowing for more flexible applications and the ability to rezone without a consultant. The new fees go into effect Nov. 1.

Let freedom read: It’s Banned Books Week and This is Tucson’s Elvia Verdugo highlighted a variety of ways to get involved locally and recognize the importance of talking about book bans and censorship. More than 2,500 book titles were targeted last year, many of which were written by or about members of the LGBTQ community or by and about Black people, Indigenous people and people of color,” according to the American Library Association.

Who’s on your ballot? The 2024 general election is more than a year away, but the Nogales International’s Angela Gervasi is already breaking down the nearly two-dozen Santa Cruz County residents who have already filed statements of interest to run for office. Potential applicants range in background and experience and include a former Nogales mayor and long-serving local school district employee. The official candidacy filing period began March 11 and runs through April 8 of next year.

Making history: The University of Arizona will begin fabrication of the last required piece of primary mirror for the world’s largest telescope, Hannah Hindley writes for UA News. Researchers say the anticipated completion of the Giant Magellan Telescope marks a milestone in space exploration. Each mirror requires 80 crates of glass, each containing about 25 cases that were delivered by four semi-trucks.

1,269: The number of demands the American Library Association’s Office for Intellectual Freedom received in 2022 to censor library books and resources. It’s the highest number of attempted book bans since the ALA began tracking data more than 20 years ago.