Throwing shade

But, like, in a good way … New mine inspector just dropped ... And death is just the beginning.

If you live in one of the poorer parts of Phoenix — as most of us local news reporters do — you may have noticed a lot of new trees in your neighborhood lately.

Since last November, the City of Phoenix has been working on implementing its “Shade Phoenix Plan.” The plan, as you might have guessed by the name, focuses on putting more stuff between you and the sun.

The Phoenix City Council’s Transportation, Infrastructure, and Planning subcommittee is set to receive a progress update on their sun-blocking project at today’s meeting.

And by the city’s calculation, they’re absolutely crushing it.

The plan contains 36 goals, broken down into four main categories: Expanding shade, preserving shade, teaching people about shade and measuring the impact of efforts to expand, preserve and teach people about shade.

That last goal may sound a little obvious or redundant.

But in 2010, the City of Phoenix created a similar tree-planting plan that aimed to shade 25% of the city by 2030. Thirteen years later, the Republic’s Taylor Seely found the city had no idea how many trees it had planted, let alone the impact of all that planting. As far as anyone could tell, the city created zero new shade from the money spent on that project.

"It is incredibly frustrating ... and it has burned me out of local politics," tree advocate Tabitha Myers told the Republic at the time.

So when city officials announced last year that they were dumping another $60 million over five years into expanding shade, they were careful to add some accountability metrics.

Instead of the vague and hard-to-measure goal of shading 25% of the city, for example, the council stuck to more tangible outcomes, like planting 27,000 new trees over five years.

It’s a good sign that just under a year into this program, the city is already looking back on how it’s going. And of the 36 year-one goals, the city has already met 31 goals — the other five are “making progress.”

So far, the city has planted more than 7,200 trees through a variety of programs, mostly aimed at low and middle-income neighborhoods, which usually have less shade than wealthy neighborhoods.

But trees die, so the city calculates that we actually netted about 5,500 new trees in that period — putting the city on track to hit that 27,000 tree goal over five years.

So where are all these new trees going?

• More than 1,200 were planted at schools under the Canopy for Kids project.

• Nearly 2,000 drought-resistant trees were planted in low and middle-income neighborhoods under the Community Canopy program that offers up to two free trees per home (plus a hose and guide to caring for them).

• City parks got another 1,300 trees, though parks also lost somewhere in the neighborhood of 700 trees last year. (The goal is to replace 120% of trees that die per year at city parks.)

• The city also replaced another 2,000 trees that had died on city property.

• And another 3,300 trees have been planted along city streets to shade sidewalks and create “Cool Corridors” (though that figure represents the planting since 2022).

But trees aren’t the only thing that can block the sun.

The city has also added more than 120 new shade structures — including some that aren’t just ugly beige gazebos — and is on track to keep building more shade for pedestrians, public transit users, park visitors and school kids.

So far, the city has built:

• 81 shade structures at bus stops, bringing the total to 3,164 or about 78% of stops

• 47 shade structures at 26 schools

• Shade structures at five city playgrounds, plus two that were refurbished

• Plus, the city is in the process of designing and engineering another 19 shade structures at crosswalks, and is working with artists to create shade with creative themes. It has already put up a few temporary art/shade structures.

But planting trees and hanging shade cloth in the sky is relatively quick and easy compared to creating lasting, city-wide shade. That requires systemic and systematic changes in city policy to encourage people to create their own shade.

That means things like streamlining permits for creating shade structures in the right-of-way — meaning basically anything that sticks into or sits on that public space — and streamlining permits for multifamily and commercial properties that want to add trees.

It also means using the authority the city has in zoning cases to require property owners to add more shade as a stipulation of rezoning. The city used that tool about 40 times last year, per the progress update.

And it means bringing private property owners and businesses into the fold by enforcing codes against dead trees, which is one of the few goals the city acknowledges it didn’t meet this year, along with ideas like creating a Tree Steward Program, setting up a Public Shade Fund and developing consistent tree maintenance protocols.

If the new shade plan is to fare better than the 2010 plan, we’re gonna need a full citywide inventory of how many trees we have, how many we need and a roadmap for getting there.

But so far, the city admits it still doesn’t have that most basic number: how many trees there are to begin with.

Turnover troubles: Republican state mine inspector Paul Marsh resigned on August 15 to take a job in Texas, and Gov. Katie Hobbs appointed mineral enthusiast Walter Lesley Presmyk to take his place, KJZZ’s Camryn Sanchez reports. And as a reminder of why mine inspection is important, a Bisbee man was rescued from an abandoned mine on Saturday night, per the Republic’s Wren Smetana. Meanwhile, the entrance to Arizona’s Department of Child Safety is a revolving door, and employees say the massive turnover rate hinders their ability to help kids, ABC15’s Dave Biscobing reports.

A rare pair: Some Democratic state representatives feel unsafe around Republican Rep. John Gillette after his online rant about how the Democratic Party “has woken the sleeping giant,” following Charlie Kirk’s assassination. Gillette said they misunderstood him, the Arizona Mirror’s Caitlin Sievers reports. Meanwhile, two of Arizona’s former members of Congress, Gabby Giffords and Jeff Flake, wrote a joint op-ed for USA Today condemning the “extreme voices” calling for war against Democrats, as well as the “radical individuals on the left celebrating the tragedy” of Kirk’s death.

Roll call: The Trump administration confirmed the U.S. Department of Justice is searching states’ voter rolls for noncitizens, Stateline’s Jonathan Shorman reports. At least 10 states are complying, but Arizona Secretary of State Adrian Fontes refused to turn over Arizona’s voter rolls over “serious legal and constitutional concerns.”

Power trip: Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes is challenging APS’ request to hike rates and raise average residential bills by about $20 a month, the Republic’s Stacey Barchenger reports. The utility company argued to the Corporation Commission that it needs more money to operate its grid, but Mayes noted APS made $600 million in net income last year. The Commission won’t decide the case until next year.

“Arizonans are already feeling squeezed by sky-high electric bills and now APS is trying to jack them up even further," Mayes, a former member of the Corporation Commission, said in a statement.

We’re paying them how much?: The Republic dropped its annual salary database of Arizona’s public employees, and state university coaches and medical school leaders are the highest paid. University of Arizona men’s basketball coach Tommy Lloyd tops the list with an annual salary of $4.9 million.

You don’t get to pick who your tax dollars pay, but you can choose to keep local news alive with this button.

In other, other news

Arizonans are taking their names off the organ donor registry in droves after the New York Times exposed the dark side of the organ donation industry (Stephanie Innes / Republic) … The share of Phoenix residents living in poverty dropped to 10.3% last year, down from 12.1% in 2019 (Jessica Boehm / Axios) … Former Republican lawmaker Paul Boyer, who beefed with Turning Point and was eventually forced out of the Legislature by a Turning Point backed candidate, penned an oped calling Kirk “the best of us.” (Republic) … ADOT wants your ideas for creative traffic safety messages (Brian Petersheim Jr. / AZFamily) … And the Mohave County Board of Supervisors wants to use tamper-proof ballot paper, but it didn’t work in tests with the county’s equipment (Bill McMillen / Mohave Valley Daily News).

There are only nine days until most of the new 265 laws approved this year officially go on the books. And as we count down to Arizona’s annual “general effective date,” we’re telling you about a few of the more interesting bills you should be watching out for this year.

We’re doing a series of webinars you can pop into to hear from your colleagues about how Skywolf, our legislative tracking software, can help your legislative workflow.

• If you work for a state agency, join us this Thursday at 10 a.m. to see Skywolf in action and hear from a state agency about how it’s benefiting their public policy work.

• If you’re a lobbyist or policy pro for a nonprofit or advocacy group, join us this Friday at 10 a.m. to hear from a lobbying pro about how they use Skywolf to stay on top of the madness at the Capitol.

• On Thursday, September 25, we’ll show you a workflow designed specifically for policy professionals working at municipalities, and on Friday, September 26, we’ve got a webinar designed specifically for associations.

The future is here, and it’s weird and terrifying.

Beyond the grave, an AI version of Charlie Kirk addressed the congregation at the Turning Point-aligned Dream City Church on Sunday, per the New Times’ Wade Sharp.

“First, I want you to know that I’m fine, not because my body is fine but because my soul is secure in Christ. Death is not the end. It’s a promotion,” whoever programmed the AI Kirk said. “Do not waste one second mourning me. I knew the risks of standing up in this cultural moment and I’d do it all over again.”

It’s kinda neat, we guess, for his followers at the church to get one last word from their surrogate leader.

But the fact that anyone can put words into the mouth of a dead person is somehow both deeply disturbing and very tempting for us to play with.