Creekers now have a golden opportunity
It appears we Creekers will now have a golden opportunity to vote again, since four council seats still remain unfilled. Based on the results of the first tally, it's clear many locals were swayed by the profusion of slick, full-color-glossy campaign mailers we had to pry out of our boxes, all ranting about our past council's "mismanagement, overspending and incompetence."
It's really so easy to criticize, which is pretty much all Spitzer, Durkin and Wright have done for years at council meetings; criticize, point their fingers, hold up photos of sunsets [as if our sunsets will suddenly end if we allow a McDonald's next to the CVS].
What Spitzer, Durkin and Wright haven't done, is state how they plan to solve the problems facing our town. I never saw a hint of a solution to the challenges our town faces on any of their pretty postcards, nor have I ever heard one of them suggest an alternate plan at a council meeting. All they've told us so far is what they're against. They outright oppose any commercial development on our intersection three miles south of town, so maybe we should be asking them, if they're elected, how they plan to raise additional funds for improvements while paying down our debt. Or maybe they do have a plan, but they'd rather not tell us right now - that if they're voted in, you, and I, and the rest of the citizens in this unique historic town we call home, will end up paying. And we'll pay dearly, because other than sales tax, the only other possible means of generating revenue is a property tax.
Sharon McCarthy
Cave Creek
C-YA – Change Your Party Affiliation Day
During a week long event, starting on April Fool's Day, every voter who knows that the party he has affiliated with is doing nothing except destroying this country, for you and your children, will re-from that party and register with the only political party that has been founded and operates on the basis of the United States Constitution, the CONSTITUTION PARTY.
This will not cost you anything and you can always go back to your old party. I can't imagine why, but you could.
Time is growing short and we still need to get as many people on board with this as possible. So if you have been thinking about joining the C-YA , pronounced, "See Ya", it’s not too late. Join the cause. Also, if you know people, regardless what party they are in now, who think this country is headed down the path of destitution and ruin, please contact them and ask them to join the effort.
What will you need to do when you join?
1. Register as a Constitution Party voter in the week of April 1 through April 5
2. Email, Facebook, or any social media method or call family and friends and ask them to do it too
3. Then, ask your friends to tell their friends.
As soon as you visit C-YA, send your friends – www.TPATH.org/CPUSA.html (C-YA Event Page)
Dwight Kehoe
TPATH
What is 'Carefree Truth'?
The simple answer is generally, anything but. I took a particular and personal interest in Linda Bentley's March 6 front page story, 'Carefree election gets testy and personal'. Great job Linda.
Over the past decade I've come to realize that many Carefree residents are essentially uninterested in local politics. They are here to live in peace and they hope that staff, along with elected officials, will run things with integrity. One can certainly hope, but if the past has shown us anything, it has shown that one must diligently search for truth in Carefree.
The Hitchon blog, deceptively titled 'Carefree Truth', is hardly the place to seek it. Councilman Farrar is the latest bite victim of that particular venom. With the quietly cheering support of several elected officials, Hitchon has undermined, ambushed, and distorted the positions of anyone she dislikes. The reward for the transparent, tasteless tactics employed has traditionally been insider access to the official spin de jour. The long list of public targets and associated misinformation dates back for years.
It is unfortunate that Councilman Farrar has achieved the designation of target. He's an intelligent guy, a successful business person, and a genuinely nice person. Is it any wonder why most decent residents avoid local government service? Too bad there aren't more like Mike Farrar and less of Lyn Hitchon. Carefree would be a better place and there might even be room for actual truth in Carefree.
John Traynor
Former/future target
Carefree
Consumers and industry win with Do-Not-Track
We are some of the nation’s most active and respected consumer and privacy organizations. We advocate for a simple Do-Not-Track (DNT) mechanism that allows individuals to decide when, whether, and how they will be tracked online, no matter what kind of technology or device they use.
We strongly support the World Wide Web Consortium's (W3C) ongoing efforts to develop standards for how DNT should work. We call on the participants to agree to a standard based on respect for individuals’ fundamental privacy rights.
We applaud companies, like Microsoft and Mozilla that have recently taken steps to meet the public demand for DNT. Microsoft has taken the boldest action so far by designating DNT “on” by default in Internet Explorer 10. However, at present DNT is neither a law nor a standard. So despite this good work, it's up to those doing the tracking to decide whether or how they will honor consumer preferences.
Some trackers say that they will outright ignore DNT preferences expressed by consumers using browsers that provide DNT “on” by default, such as IE 10, because they say this expresses the browser maker’s choice, not the consumer’s choice. In other words, even if consumers want DNT “on”—and find it convenient that it’s already turned “on”—these trackers will blatantly and willfully ignore it. This stance threatens the promise of DNT as a way to balance our right to privacy with commercial interests.
Consumers, businesses, and others make the Internet a useful and welcome place to talk, to share, to learn, and to engage in commerce. When consumers object to online tracking, those objections must be respected. It’s good for consumers and it’s good for business.
Signed,
American Civil Liberties Union
Bob Gellman, Privacy Consultant
Consumer Action
Consumer Federation of America
Electronic Frontier Foundation
National Consumers League
Privacy Rights Clearinghouse
Dear Mayor Schwan and Town Council
Desert Foothills Library Presentation
Thank you for giving Greg Gardner and me the opportunity of speaking at the council meeting on March 5. It was a shame that the PowerPoint presentation did not work but, I hope you got a good impression regarding activity at the library.
I am embarrassed to say that during my presentation I made a mistake regarding the number of library cardholders who are resident in Carefree. The figure of 300 which I gave at the meeting was actually families that donated to the library in 2012. The number of residents who are cardholders is 1,112.
The total number of cardholders is 6,650, which has decreased somewhat since I reported to the State Library and Archive for the year ending June 30, 2012. This decrease is due to our housekeeping with regard to cardholders who haven’t visited the library in two years, rather than lack of attendance at the library. The percentage of the Library’s total cardholders resident in Carefree is therefore just under 17 percent.
Please accept my apologies for this error and I hope the information provides a better understanding of the amount Carefree residents make use of the library.
Yours sincerely
David Court
Executive Director
Desert Foothills Library
Presidential promises?
Dear Arizona taxpayers and health care consumers,
The battle over the Arizona ObamaCare Medicaid expansion may soon come to a climax.
On Wednesday, March 20, at 2 p.m., the Arizona House Appropriations Committee will hear testimony from Gov. Jan Brewer's office, as part of her push to expand Medicaid (AHCCCS) under ObamaCare. There is also a chance that the Medicaid expansion bill could be fast-tracked into the Appropriations Committee in time for Wednesday's hearing.
If so, this committee hearing could be the one of the most important steps in the entire fight, because the Appropriations Committee has the power (and the duty to Arizona taxpayers) to amend the Medicaid expansion bill to include a Prop 108 clause, which would require a two-thirds vote to pass the provider tax increase (mainly, hospital bed taxes) that would fund Arizona's portion of the expansion. (To learn more about how the proposed Medicaid expansion would hurt the very people proponents claims to want to help, visit https://tinyurl.com/gottliebwsj.
First, please contact the Republican members of the House Appropriations Committee and ask them to vote to add a Prop 108 clause to any Medicaid expansion bill. E-mail and phone contacts for the members of the Committee are provided below. Your e-mail note or voice mail message can be as simple as, “Dear Representative X, I trust you will do the right thing, so I thank you in advance for protecting taxpayers by amending any Medicaid expansion bill to include a Prop 108 clause. Sincerely, Joe & Jane Taxpayer.”
Rep. Paul Boyer, [email protected], 602-926-4173
Rep. Tom Forese, [email protected], 602-926-5168
Rep. Rick Gray, [email protected], 602-926-5993
Rep. John Kavanagh, [email protected], 602-926-5170
Rep. Adam Kwasman, [email protected], 602-926-5839
Rep. Justin Olson, [email protected], 602-926-5288
Rep. Michelle Ugenti, [email protected], 602-926-4480
Second, please contact the Republican members of the Senate Appropriations Committee and ask them to vote to add a Prop 108 clause to any Medicaid expansion bill.
Your e-mail note or voice mail message can be as simple as, “Dear Senator X, I trust that you will do the right thing, so I thank you in advance for protecting taxpayers by amending any Medicaid expansion bill to include a Prop 108 clause. Sincerely, Joe & Jane Taxpayer.”
Sen. Chester Crandell, [email protected], 602-926-5409
Sen. Gail Griffin, [email protected], 602-926-5895
Sen. Al Melvin, [email protected], 602-926-4326
Sen. Rick Murphy, [email protected], 602-926-4444
Sen. Don Shooter, [email protected], 602-926-4139
Sen. Kelli Ward, [email protected], 602-926-4138
Please contact your home district Legislators and ask them to protect taxpayers by supporting a Prop 108 clause to the Medicaid expansion.
Learn more about the enormous human and fiscal costs of the proposed ObamaCare Medicaid expansion by going here: http://tinyurl.com/stopunelected.
Please alert your friends and family members!
To learn more about AFP-Arizona's 2013 Legislative Agenda: visit http://americansfor
prosperity.org/arizona/legislativealerts/afp-arizona-2013-legislative-agenda-scoring-rubric/.
For Liberty, Tom
Tom Jenney, Arizona Director
Americans for Prosperity
www.aztaxpayers.org
[email protected]
Welcome New CCMEA Members
The Cave Creek Merchants & Events Association is excited to welcome the newest members to join this growing association:
Big Bronco
Big Earl’s Greasy Eats
Cartwright’s Sonoran Ranch
House
Cave Creek Museum
Hawgs & Horses/Buffalo Express
Pink Cadillac Boutique
Rancho Mañana Golf Club
Tonto Bar & Grill
Triple R Horse Rescue
Watson’s Hat Shop
Wild West Pawn
We are excited to have you onboard!
CCMEA Board of Directors
An honest question
I would like Gabby Gifford to answer the following question:
When you decided to have a political meeting for your constituents in a Safeway parking lot, why did you not request a police presence or hire a security guard??? Also, do you feel any guilt knowing that all or most of those people would still be alive but for a carelessness on your part?
Rose M. Sampieri
Scottsdale
Light Rail ridership up, fares up; taxpayers still lose
Even though Light Rail ridership is up and even though the fares recently went up to $2, the taxpayers are still getting soaked. This is because the total cost of building and operating the light rail adds up to about $13 per passenger. That means the recent fare increase will only reduce the taxpayer subsidy from $11.25 to $11. What a great deal.
For those of you who have difficulty with higher math, this means taxpayers would come out ahead if we took our losses now and shut down the line. We should rather be making the Valley of the Sun the most auto friendly city in the world.
Roy Miller
Phoenix
Imagine getting your whole paycheck
Everyone; just imagine getting your whole paycheck [no federal income or FICA deductions] every pay period; and, you decide how much federal tax you pay and when? FairTax does this for all of us. It’s much simpler and fairer than the 77,000 page federal income tax code it replaces. FairTax eliminates the IRS. Today, let’s take a first look:
The FairTax proposal in Congress now, HR 25, is a serious, thoughtful plan to replace: 1) federal income, 2) payroll, 3) personal, 4) gift, 5) estate,
6) capital gains, 7) alternative minimum, 8) Social Security/Medicare, 9) self-employment, and
10) corporate taxes. Yes, REPLACES them all.
Advantage number 1: Americans take home their whole paychecks.
Not only will more of us have jobs, but we will also take home 100 percent of our paychecks (less state income tax). No federal income or payroll taxes are withheld from paychecks, pensions, or Social Security checks.
Next month: How the prebate completely un-taxes the poor’s [and everyone else’s] spending up to the poverty level.
Sneak a peek: Two page FairTax overview, link here: fairtax.org/PDF/FairTaxThumbnailSketch.pdf.
Ward Atcher
Decatur, Alabama
An e-mail Dale Frost, one of the Governor’s policy advisors, received from Superintendent Calvin Baker of the Vail School District in southern Arizona
Dale,
In the comparison of "have" and "have not" districts, Vail is generally regarded as a "have" district.
Yet, the reality is that according to the recently released Arizona Auditor General Reports, our per pupil funding is about $1,100 below the State average, $500 below "peer" districts and $1,600 below our largest neighboring district. For a classroom of 30 students, that $1,600 deficit translates into almost $50,000 per classroom.
I came to Vail from a district that serves low income, Native American Students. I understand and appreciate the difficulties of educating "disadvantaged" students and do not begrudge those districts receiving a higher level of funding.
However, some reward for results is also justified.
Per pupil funding has a significant impact on a system's capacity to compensate teachers. As such, the average teacher salary in Vail is about $8,000 per year less than the State average.
Vail is often labeled as the #1 district in the State. Our teachers - getting the best results - are receiving some of the lowest pay. (Incidentally, Vail does have four Title I Schools - all with "A" ratings.)
Arizona has employed multiple measures to incentivize individual employee performance (301 funding, performance clauses in superintendent contracts, new evaluation systems, etc.).
However, other than grades, there really are no incentives for the school systems themselves. In my judgment, incentives for systems hold just as good - if not better - potential for improving results.
We have a unique perspective on school improvement efforts across the entire State. Our Beyond Textbooks Program serves 68 school districts and charters. We have eight staff members who work full time trying to improve student achievement in every county in Arizona.
From that experience I can confidently state that the most effective change occurs when the system changes. There is limited value in simply changing the practices of individual educators in a setting that is comfortable with the status quo.
We discussed SB 1444 at our Governing Board meeting last night. While no vote was taken, I can confidently state that a majority of board members in Vail support the Governor's efforts.
Let me know if there is anything I can do to support the Governor's Bill.
Calvin Baker, Superintendent
Vail School District
P.S. I will be sending this message to legislators who serve the Vail Community and the chairs of the education committees.
