Governor, Legislature have too much power
Re: the April 17 column “Governor could ‘pack’ Supreme Court under bill.”
Thanks to Tim Steller for making Arizonans aware of what’s coming next from the governor and Legislature.
Seems all that’s required is to offer a little bribery. Give me two more seats and we’ll restore your funding.
To make the matter worse, Chief Justice Scott Bales thinks if a little horse trading is required, he’s for it.
Seems our governor and Legislature think that stacking the court with Republicans is just a normal way of business for the GOP.
Rep. J.D. Mesnard said “that five people who have that much power is too few people.” I feel the same way, “having one governor and Legislature with that much power is too few.”
Unfortunately, states like Wisconsin, Kansas and Oklahoma are just a few that are trying versions of this. We have three branches of government — let’s keep it that way.
Clyde R. Steele
Oro Valley
Surplus should go to infrastructure, teachers
Our boys in control in Phoenix say the state could end the fiscal year with a $600 million surplus. Wow! Wouldn’t it be novel if this surplus were used to pay some bills? These bills are for basic government functions that have gone begging.
We do not need to use this money to justify tax cuts, nor build more private prisons. We need to pay for crumbling roads and bridges and other deferred infrastructure throughout the state.
How about, for giggles, we give our public school teachers a $15,000 per year raise? Or repair the public schools, or the roads. We could call this “trickle-up” economics.
The “trickle-down” approach has only created offshore bank accounts for the rich.
Linda Butler
Foothills
DUI sentencing is lighter than story says
Your April 17 article, “Mandatory terms serve few, Oro Valley parents of jailed woman say” contains misleading information.
The article states that the standard sentence in Arizona for a third DUI conviction in 84 months is six to 15 years. This is not necessarily true and is highly uncommon.
A third DUI within 84 months (date-of-incident to date-of-incident, not conviction) has a sentence of a minimum of probation to the maximum of 3.75 years.
As a condition of probation, the person must serve four months in the Department of Corrections.
The only way to get a six-to-15-year sentence is to have an aggravated DUI (“aggravated” means “felony”) with at least two historical prior non-dangerous felony offenses.
They don’t have to be DUI offenses. A felony offense with two historical priors is highly uncommon, no matter the crime.
James Nesci
Attorney, East side
Widening Broadway is poor use of tax dollars
Re: the April 20 article “Council votes 5-1 to widen Broadway.”
Five members of Tucson’s City Council voted to commit, at minimum, $74 million tax-derived dollars to unnecessarily widen Broadway by destroying historic homes and properties, much of this in Rincon Heights, where I have lived for 23 years.
Flip from the Broadway headline to page A2, where City Manager Michael Ortega laments the multimillion-dollar budget shortfall which will eliminate jobs and raise taxes. Folks, just do the math.
Thank you, Councilman Steve Kozachik, for casting the lone vote of reason against the madness of expediency.
Unfortunately, Tucson’s taxpayers have lost another round in the “Rob Peter to pay Paul” revenue recycling game.
My faith in municipal government is gone.
Deb Dedon
Downtown
At least we can agree on Wall Street reform
Continuing to analyze the 2016 presidential election, one candidate in particular still perplexes me as he continues to advocate his impending proposals of socialization on our country.
But if truth be told, he and I have actually found common ground on the noteworthy issue of Wall Street reform.
It truly is a prudent proposition that will no doubt mitigate the public consumer’s exposure from the risky and speculative behavior that some of these institutions routinely make at the expense of their depositors.
Sadly, however, segregating a Wall Street bank’s commercial depository operations from its investment banking operations is not enough.
The federal government must at last send a firm and unmistakable signal to the markets that they will no longer interfere in free markets and perpetually rescue institutions.
In other words, in the event of market failures, firms must accept their role as pawns to market corrections.
Diego Rivera
West side
Bring on the truth, even if it’s negative
Feeling like a winner, Hillary Clinton wants Bernie Sanders to play nice and unify the party, to tone down the negativity.
If telling the people the truth is “negative,” I hope Bernie continues to “tell it like it is,” with all the passion his sincerity provides, on the floor of the Democratic convention and beyond.
Gretchen Nielsen
East side
