Backing the Blue?

It requires a little green ... Republican primary voters do love a loser ... And good riddance, Alice Scooper.

If you like blowing down the freeway at 95 mph, we’ve got good news for you! 

You’re far less likely to get pulled over these days thanks to unprecedented vacancies at the Department of Public Safety, the state police force that patrols highways, interdicts dangerous drugs, investigates financial crimes and much more. 

For years, Republicans who craft the state budget have underfunded Arizona’s police force, which is rapidly losing officers and recruits too many of the higher-paying liberal, allegedly anti-police cities that lawmakers spend so much time criticizing.

“It’s definitely noticeable on the freeways — you see speeding is up considerably, deaths and DUIs, too,” Jeff Hawkins, president of the Arizona State Troopers’ Association, told us recently. 

And while leadfooters may delight in the news that they can treat Arizona’s highways like the Autobahn with near impunity, if you do get pulled over, because of the comparatively low pay scale, the DPS trooper standing outside your window is far more likely to be a newbie scraped from the bottom of the barrel of applicants.

And heaven forbid you end up in a state prison, where staffing has long been at crisis levels are facilities are unsafe and unsecure. 

Our art intern, ChatGPT, loves nothing better than pushing the odometer on a dark desert highway.

Even in good budget years, Arizona lawmakers have ignored the needs of public safety. And this year will not be a good one, financially, for the Grand Canyon state. Arizona is dealing with a nearly $2 billion budget shortfall over two years. There’s no money to go around — even for law enforcement. 

But after years of kicking the can down the road, lawmakers can no longer afford to ignore the problem, Hawkins says.

Arizona Department of Public Safety officers are among the lowest-paid cops in the state with one of the least generous benefits packages — and that’s reflected in the department’s vacancy rates, retention rates and morale. The agency is seeing fewer applicants, and more of its officers are getting poached by other police departments. The entire northeast corner of Arizona, for example, only has two criminal detectives when it needs eight or nine, Hawkins said. 

It’s getting to the point where officers are going to have to turn down calls for help, he said. 

“I hate to say it, but at some point, you have to throw a little money at the problem,” Hawkins said. 

Arizona corrections officers don’t fare much better. While state incarceration rates are once again climbing, staffing levels at the Arizona Department of Correction, Rehabilitation and Reentry are so bad that corrections officers say prisons are “on the brink of collapse” and at some prisons, inmates are in charge of policing one another. 

To stem the bleeding and start building up the force, the Arizona State Troopers’ Association says it’ll take at least $20 million in ongoing funding to boost pay by $10,000 to $15,000. That would bring the department closer to the state average, rather than near the bottom of the pack with starting salaries of around $65,000. Longterm, they need things like retention bonuses and a whole new pay structure, Hawkins said. 

Corrections officers want to be allowed back into the state pension system after lawmakers pulled them out back in 2017, as ABC15’s Rachel Luise Just notes, saying it’s a relatively low-cost way to boost recruitment and retention rates above their critically low current levels. And that’s on top of the mandatory costs to fix the state’s unconstitutionally inadequate inmate health care system.  

Given lawmakers’ professed support for police and law enforcement, you’d be forgiven for believing that Arizona’s statewide police force and prison system would have no problem getting money out of the Legislature, at least in good times. 

It’s not for lack of trying, Hawkins said. He has taken lawmakers on tours of decrepit facilities, given lawmakers briefings on DPS’ needs and even hired a public relations firm to help get the word out. Last year, each lawmaker who supported the budget was given up to $30 million to direct to their own priorities — but because it was one-time funding, “they didn’t give us a penny,” Hawkins said. 

Called it: As we predicted on Monday, the MAGA movement’s much-hyped primary challenger to Republican Maricopa County Recorder Stephen Richer is Rep. Justin Heap, a freshman lawmaker and lawyer best known for his objectively funny Twitter feed (assuming he doesn’t block you) and his awkward attempt to extort a lobbyist for a donation during his first month in office. Heap announced his candidacy at a brief press conference at the Capitol yesterday while surrounded by members of the “freedom caucus.” 

Ka-ching!: If she were to win a seat on the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors, resigning Congresswoman Debbie Lesko would more than quadruple her state pension payments for the rest of her life, the Republic’s Laura Gersony reports. Lesko’s pension from her state lawmaking days entitled her to payments of $720, but after four years on the board, those payments would jump to $3,300 monthly. 

High society, low IQ: The wealthy influential family of one of the Gilbert teens who murdered Preston Lord immediately went into coverup mode after the murder, a former employee of the family company told the Republic. Reporters Robert Anglen and Elena Santa Cruz got the latest blockbuster story on the case after the killer’s family’s business partner reached out to the Republic unsolicited to preemptively trash the employee, apparently afraid she might speak out. That really backfired when the Republic called the former employee, who then spilled the beans of her involvement in the coverup, saying she was wracked by guilt. 

“They said they had plenty of money; they would be able to get away with this," Ashley Reynolds, an employee of Relentless Media Agency, said of her former employers Travis Renner and Adam Kifer.

Why rent is still too damn high: Attorney General Kris Mayes is suing a software company and a bunch of landlords who she says engaged in a conspiracy to fix and artificially inflate rent prices for hundreds of thousands of people in Tucson and Phoenix. Mayes says around 70% of apartment units in Phoenix contract with the software company, RealPage, which has continuously pushed “prices beyond competitive levels," per 12News’ Kevin Reagan. 

Whatever it takes: The appointed Sheriff of Maricopa County, longtime Republican Russ Skinner, re-registered as a Democrat in order to be eligible for the appointment to replace Paul Penzone, but he’s staying a Democrat as he runs to keep the job, he announced this week. He told KJZZ’s “The Show” that the office shouldn’t be political anyway. 

“Political party doesn’t change the person,” he told KJZZ’s Lauren Gilger.

Either really fast or really slow: Although he was only appointed to the Legislature this month, Democratic Rep. Jevin Hodge already shepherded a bill out of the state House, a rare feat for any Democrat, let alone a newbie. But Hodge first started pushing the bill — which would create a state award for high school students who complete 200 hours of community service — more than a decade ago when he was still in high school, KJZZ’s Wayne Schutsky reports. It passed the House and Senate in 2012, but Gov. Jan Brewer vetoed it.  

Covering the news that the news covers: The Arizona Mirror is swearing off polling stories and other “junk food” politics coverage that does little to inform the public about the stakes of the races, its editor Jim Small announced. Meanwhile, lawmakers amended a bill to cut a provision that would have made non-disciplinary actions from health boards confidential and exempt from public disclosure after ABC15 reporter Dave Biscobing hammered the bad idea in a series of reports.

The 1% of news fit to print: Paradise Valley is different with all the rich people living there now, a local realtor told the Wall Street Journal, sparking an odd brochure of an article for the town of millionaires. Speaking of the Wall Street Journal and the obnoxious rich, you can read all about what’s in the $2.5 million house of some random Tucson orthodontists.

A government agency allowed constituents to name a thing, with predictable results. 

Thanks to the Department of Transportation’s second-annual name a snowplow contest, Arizona is now the proud owner of snowplows named “Scoopacabra,” “Snowbi-Wan Kenobi” and “Fast and Flurryous,” per KTAR. 

But our favorite part of this story is that 11 of the entries were variations on “Snowbi-Wan Kenobi,” 11 people submitted “Fast and Flurryous,” and two people came up with the pretty unique “Scoopacabra.”