CASA GRANDE — I hired on with the Dispatch in the summer of 2010. My job was to write feature stories. I preferred face-to-face interviews.
I would like to say that 2021 started off with a bang but really it is more like a crawl, at least in terms of available homes for sale in the city of Maricopa. Our inventory remains painfully low and homes that do come on the market are gone in a minute. It is very common for sellers to hav…
It is apparent to any citizen who cares about the success of our republic that it is vital to have two strong, competitive national political parties. Having only one party leads to dictatorship and more than two requires coalitions which are temporary and can be counterproductive. Currently…
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Arizona HOAs are nonprofit corporations, established by state statute and respective governing documents. HOAs must comply with various statutory requirements, primarily the Arizona Planned Community Statutes (A.R.S. §33-1801 through A.R.S. §33-1818) and Nonprofit Corporation Act provisions.
I’ve settled on my pandemic wardrobe. It’s not new, actually. It’s pretty much the same wardrobe I selected for retirement.
A fine man has passed. David Snider had many friends and acquaintances and was well known in the city, county and state. You will hear many people say wonderful things about him in the coming days. I was fortunate to have a special friendship with David that I want to share.
Rudy Giuliani started his public career as a real hero. As a U.S. Attorney, he investigated and prosecuted Wall Street executives who were corrupt. These were rich and powerful folks, yet Rudy showed no fear of retribution — justice was more important than personal safety.
I was lucky to land in a job I could handle with some competency. And one I like. Writing for newspapers.
If you drive a vehicle on public streets and roads it is very likely that you have violated traffic rules during the past few weeks. Perhaps you exceeded the speed limit, or failed to signal when changing lanes, or accelerated as you entered an intersection when the light turned yellow. Thes…
After having lived and served in the Casa Grande area for over two decades, I am still learning about the soul of our once small rural district. We don’t yet have the size or populace of the northern or southern Valley communities, although we are growing at an amazing rate. When I came to t…
When the impeachment trial of President Trump in the U.S. Senate ended with his acquittal, Sen. Susan Collins of Maine suggested that the president had now learned a lesson. Indeed, he had, he learned that he was exempt from punishment for any wrongdoing. Many of his actions since that day h…
CASA GRANDE — Here’s a fun fact: Over 80% of the New Year’s resolutions people make will fail by February (cue the “Debbie Downer” music).
It’s tempting these days to believe that once COVID-19 is contained, the U.S. economy will bounce back quickly, replenishing jobs and incomes lost in the pandemic. Yet there is an early warning sign that high-demand jobs may be hard to fill when the labor market fully reopens, even with mill…
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If you just woke up from a yearlong coma, you might ask: What’s with all the masks?
If the 2020 Maricopa Real Estate market could be described with a picture, there would be lots of fireworks and rockets. We started the year in what seemed like a normal start with a lower inventory and the expectation of an increase of inventory as January progressed.
We haven’t had a real Christmas tree for some years. By real, I mean the fir trees you pick up in a repurposed lot.
I have had liberal friends ask me in disbelief why more than 70 million Americans voted for President Trump. To answer that question, I use two analogies. Think about when you were a teenager and a good friend fell in love with somebody who you knew was wrong for your friend. You pointed out…
After more than 36 years of public service in the Arizona Legislature and Pinal County Board of Supervisors and being a lifelong resident of the Copper Corridor, I’ve seen my fair share of economic development proposals for our state. To form an opinion about whether a project makes sense fo…
Dec. 7 was to be my last City Council meeting. I had decided to retire after over 13 years serving on the Casa Grande City Council. I made the decision not to attend that meeting, having come in contact with someone who tested positive for COVID. Although we had been more than 6 feet apart a…
Welcome to lame duck time in our national government. Members of the House and Senate who are retiring or who lost their bid for re-election maintain their seats since the new Congress does not meet until Jan. 3. The lame duck Congress could be providing needed funds for small businesses, th…
We are in the middle of a contentious political competition involving executive orders. President Obama, unable to get his bills through Congress, used executive orders to do so. President Trump reversed many of those orders and it appears that when President-elect Biden is sworn in, he will…
In a shock to those of us who witnessed an extremely unpopular George W. Bush defeat John Kerry by 10%, followed by Barack Obama never getting within 8% of his Republican opponents, Arizona is now blue.
“Who’s in charge of my HOA?” Another loaded question! The answer: it has different levels and combinations of people and paper.
I have written this letter many times and finally have decided the truth needs to be known.
In days of old, we had the traditional Thanksgiving dinners. Mom cooking, Dad orchestrating and kids eating.
The once little town of Maricopa is growing up right in front of our eyes. The railroad overpass has changed the way we all commute around town and new commercial enterprises are springing up all over but so are new residential roof tops.
It would appear that a majority of American voters agreed with me and voted to deny President Trump a second term, as well as voting to maintain Republican control in the U.S. Senate. This latter perception is justified by the fact that, generally, Republican candidates for the Senate receiv…
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CASA GRANDE — It’s been a minute since I’ve written my column and that’s because, well, I didn’t have anything to say. Cue the laughter from everyone who knows me personally! But, it’s true. I’ve been doing a lot of observing these last few months and been on a bit of an emotional roller coa…
The K-12 public school system of the greater Casa Grande Valley encompasses the following school districts: Casa Grande Elementary School District; Casa Grande Union High School District; Sacaton Elementary School District; Stanfield Elementary School District; and Toltec Elementary School D…
A wonderful political advertisement went viral as millions watched it online. It was not broadcast in Arizona, since it featured the two candidates for governor of Utah. The two men appeared together on the screen; the Democrat wore a blue tie and the Republican had a red one. Each light-hea…
The Maricopa real estate market is trending upwards in available inventory homes for sale. As of this writing there are 104 active homes on the market. Even though this is still considered a low number of available homes for sale, it is about a 40% increase over last month’s active listings.…
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CASA GRANDE -- I went on a hike last Tuesday. That was a week before Election Day, which — if this column lands in its usual spot — is today.
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Following the death of Justice Ginsburg, there has been much national discussion about the Supreme Court. Several questions remain unanswered; what follows is an attempt to supply answers to those queries.
Picture, if you will, yourself on Nov. 3. Now take a deep breath and calm down. Are you ready to move on? OK, good. It’s election night, and as results come in from across the country, it’s becoming more and more likely that the entire presidential race will come down to who wins Arizona. Fo…
I usually take Maggie for a late-afternoon stroll. In a stroller. She can walk on her own, but she’s taken to the stroller.
Most Americans thought that the 2000 election would be the craziest election of their lifetimes. On Election Night 2000, before retiring for the evening, I checked the election results and Gore was winning. This was disappointing, we lived in Texas and Bush was a fine governor and had my ent…
The Maricopa residential real estate market remains a sellers market as buyer demand has not waned at all despite the current pandemic and the effects that that has had on the overall economy. As of this week, just 88 subdivision homes are available in Maricopa, including new-builds, and yet…
There are some truly frightened people who are concerned about the consequences of President Trump’s latest nominee to the Supreme Court. Abortion, Obamacare and voting rights are often cited as areas of concern with a 6–3 conservative court. Not much attention has been paid to a landmark ci…
COOLIDGE — I first came across Doug Craig while thumbing through the latest issue of Archaeology Southwest. He had written an article on the Grewe site. It was once a Hohokam settlement, dating back to the year 500.
It is safe to say that the state of Arizona continues to be one of the top moving destinations. In fact according to Arizona Business News, Arizona is ranking third in the nation and 63.2% of all Arizona moves were inbound last year. Simply put, more people are moving to Arizona than are mov…
Following the passing of Justice Ginsburg, there was a cacophony of complaints about the hypocrisy of Senate Republicans, due to their apparent flipping on their 2016 stance on appointing a Supreme Court justice in an election year. Sen. John Barrasso (R-WY) sought to explain the difference …
Over the last six months the nation has become more polarized than at any time since the Civil War. There are plenty of political, geographical, ethnic and economic reasons for the divisions that now exist in our country.
During my career as a mathematics teacher, I stressed to my classes the relevance of mathematics in its use for numerical analysis of data. Comparing statistics drawn from the black and white populations of America on median family income, percentage of families who own their home and life e…
More people have taken to reading during the coronavirus lockdown. And many of them prefer real books over the e-editions. In turn, publishers are facing a paper shortage.
It is getting time to cast your vote in the presidential election. As I did in 2016, I am using this column to communicate who is getting my vote and why. There are several people who I would strongly support for president, unfortunately none of them are named Biden or Trump.
As wildfires rage out of control in California, Oregon and Washington, authorities have also been busy trying to put out fires on social media.
This week I can say I have now been on both sides of the virtual learning experience. As a teacher I watch students have breakdowns over their frustrations with technology, learning new content and missing the normal school experience, just to name a few reasons. I am asking them to perform …
When Gabrielle Olivera was 8 years old she met then-NBC anchor Ann Curry outside the Rockefeller Center while visiting New York. This chance meeting was a defining moment and helped inspire the young girl to become a journalist herself one day.
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ARIZONA CITY -- Ron Jolly joined the Loyal Order of Moose Lodge 1038 in the fall of 1985, just a month or so after arriving in Arizona City.
When we talked about the future of transportation just a few decades ago, we imagined driverless cars, cleaner fuels and thousands of technology and manufacturing jobs that would be necessary to make it a reality.
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