Welcome to the Action Alert & Highlight Newsletter
Covering the Pima County Board of Supervisors!
TUESDAY, June 17, 2025, is the next Pima County Board of Supervisors (BoS) meeting.
We are a nonpartisan group of volunteers who are active in several affiliated Pima County groups whose main focus is to hold local government accountable. This newsletter is to alert you of the upcoming Board Agenda Items and to take ACTION prior to the next meeting’s vote! If you email the BoS and want your comments to be made a part of the public record, you MUST copy the clerk on all your emails.
Action Alert for the upcoming BoS meeting June 17, 2025 for the Pima County BoS Agenda and Addendum(s).
Items #10/11/14: FINAL BUDGET HEARINGS AND TRUTH IN TAXATION HEARINGS
Pursuant to A.R.S. §42-17104 and §42-17107, the Board of Supervisors will conduct a public hearing on proposed expenditures and Pima County’s intent to raise the primary property taxes over last year’s level.
FLOOD CONTROL DISTRICT BOARD
Pursuant to A.R.S. §48-254, conduct a public hearing on proposed expenditures and the District’s intent to raise the secondary property taxes over last year’s level.
LIBRARY DISTRICT BOARD
Pursuant to A.R.S. §48-254, conduct a public hearing on proposed expenditures and the District’s intent to raise the secondary property taxes over last year’s level.
This is an overall property tax increase. For reference:
FY 2021/22 $5.1952
FY 2022/23 $5.0652
FY 2023/24 $5.1048
FY 2024/25 $5.1048
FY 2025/26 $5.2317
This increase could make Pima County the highest in the state. We are already number two and have been for many years.
The rate will be coupled with the assessed value increases and will affect all Pima County residents. Rents will increase and the cost of owning is going up again. Are we getting the best results in the state? Best roads? Best crime prevention? Best water quality? Best sewer management? What are you the most proud of in Pima County? How much money will it take to be the best? Who is looking out for the tax-paying public? These reports show some comparisons in AZ. You can also read the budget proposal here. The combined total recommended County expenditure budget for FY 2025/26 amounts to $1,758,684,871, reflecting an increase of $32,191,612, or 1.9 percent, compared to the current year's Adopted Budget.
Recommendation: The BoS will almost certainly approve this tax increase, but we would still recommend you call or email them and express your thoughts.
Item #24: Contract. Heartfelt Workforce, L.L.C., to provide for organizational EQ Leadership Development Program, Library District Fund, contract amount $65,000.00 (PO2500015718)
This Emotional Intelligence (EI) training will be funded through the Library District, which is a special taxing district that levies a secondary property tax to fund operations at the 27 County library branches. The BoS wants to award this group - “the sole source of Organizational EQ (Emotional Intelligence) Leadership Development Program - $65K for one year, WITH an option to extend four additional 1-year periods for a total of $325,000. Wow. That’s a huge chunk of change for “leadership development” or applying SEL with a small number of library staff. Let’s break it down. The following is the contract for one cohort with a total of two cohorts for 41 team members:
Component 1: Onboarding/EQ Assessments/Books/Materials $4,205
Component 2: Org. EQ Leadership & Development Training $22,332
Component 3: Executive Coaching: 3 sessions each for 3 Deputy Directors
9 Total @ $900.00 per session = $8,100
Component 4: 60-Minute Debrief Included $26,537 per cohort x 2 = $53,074
Total= $87,711
According to this article, the World Economic Forum states that EI is one of the top skills required for the future of work. “Leaders with high EI can anticipate emotional responses, show empathy, and communicate the benefits of AI with transparency.”
If some companies and government entities want employees to become more curious about how to help AI, we can see why since the House passed the “One Big Beautiful Bill Act” which supports AI development and has an AI provision which states that “no state or political subdivision may enforce any law or regulation regulating artificial intelligence models, artificial intelligence systems, or automated decision systems” for ten years.
Recommendation: While we want competent and well-trained staff and leaders (and of course leadership skills and skill-building are important), $325,000 dollars for five years of training for a small group of county staff is undoubtedly outright misuse of our taxpayer dollars. Call, email, or speak at the call to the public to share your thoughts and ask the BoS where their fiscal responsibility is in this decision? Or maybe this fits right in with AI data centers (see item 65 below).
Item #27: Pima County Climate Action Update
Discussion/Direction/Action regarding an update of Pima County’s Climate Action Plan, as requested by the Board of Supervisors.
For a great deep dive on the climate agenda and how it fits into the larger technocratic coup, please treat yourself by reserving some time to watch this documentary:
The Agenda: Their Vision - Your Future (2025) | Full Documentary
Item #32: Budget Remediation Plan Updates
Staff recommends review and action on the remediation plans submitted by departments to carry out their programmatic needs through the remainder of this year, Fiscal Year 2024/25.
The Sheriff’s Department and Public Defense Services are being adjusted because they have exceeded the planned budget, so the money is being moved around. As explained in the linked document: the Sheriff is over budget and going to be over budget on the 2026 budget being approved at the June 17 meeting (note the write-up at the end of the 6/13/25 Tucson Agenda). We know what they need, but the BoS is spending the money on other priorities. It is very irresponsible to plan a budget that does not meet the public need for SAFETY first. The Sheriff’s budget has been wrong for at least the past 3 years; the detention center is part of this budget.
Item #34: Substance Use Prevention and Response Interventions
Staff recommends approval of the use of $8,000,000.00 in opioid settlement funding for the procurement of services and Pima County Health Department staff positions to provide substance use prevention and response interventions in Pima County.
$8 million is an amazing amount of money. Let's hope it gets used wisely and we see fewer fentanyl users on every street corner. Here is the Regional Opioid Settlement Advisory Council Update and Recommendations.
Item #47: Award Amendment of Award: Supplier Contract No. SC2500000005, Amendment No. 1, AZ Wastewater Industries, Inc., to provide for sewer truck parts and services. This amendment increases the annual award amount by $210,000.00 from $237,000.00 to $447,000.00 for a cumulative not-to-exceed contract amount of $447,000.00. The contact increase is needed to cover unexpected major repairs to specialized equipment, which are essential to restore full operational capability for critical sewer and drain cleaning tasks. Funding Source: Fleet Services and Regional Wastewater Reclamation Funds.
The BoS entered into an agreement on 1-10-2025 for $237,000.00 for a job to be done with the option of 4 renewals. Procurement approved the plan and awarded the contract. Now, 5 months later, it is costing $210,000.00 more to do the same job -- almost twice as much. We are being screwed again. After budgeting $3,079,570 in personnel cost for Procurement last year, we still can’t get an effective contract. There have been many of these contract changes over the past year and none of them save the County (and therefore us) any money!
PBW Focus: The Stargate Project Comes to Pima County as Project Blue
Item #65 and Addendum Item #5: Hearing - Comprehensive Plan Amendment and Specific Plan P25SP00002, PIMA COUNTY - S. HARRISON ROAD SPECIFIC PLAN AND COMPREHENSIVE PLAN AMENDMENT
Pima County requests a comprehensive plan amendment and specific plan rezoning for approximately 290.3 acres from the Military Airport (MA) and the Resource Sensitive (RS) to the Planned Development Community (PDC) land use designation and from the RH (AE) (Rural Homestead - Airport Environs) and the RH (Rural Homestead) to the SP (AE) (Specific Plan - Airport Environs) and the SP (Specific Plan) zones. The site is located approximately one-half mile south of I-10 located between S. Harrison Road and S. Houghton Road, addressed as 11295 S. Harrison Road, in Section 11, T16S, R15E in the Southeast Planning Area. On motion, the Planning and Zoning Commission voted 8 - 0 (Commissioners Cook and Lane were absent) to recommend APPROVAL SUBJECT TO STANDARD AND SPECIAL CONDITIONS. Staff recommends APPROVAL SUBJECT TO STANDARD AND SPECIAL CONDITIONS. (District 4)
REAL PROPERTY
Humphrey’s Peak Properties, L.L.C., to provide an Acquisition Agreement for the sale property of designated for economic development purposes located at the Pima County Southeast Employment and Logistics Center (SELC), FNN-Non Departmental General Fund, contract amount $20,875,000.00 (CT2500000038)
Recent updates from County Administrator Jan Lesher:
Project Blue Update 6/10/25
Project Blue Update 6/13/25
First, some background: on the second day of the new Trump administration, the Stargate Project was announced from the Oval Office by President Trump accompanied by Larry Ellison (Oracle), Sam Altman (OpenAI) and Masayoshi Son (Softbank):
President Trump announces ‘Stargate’ venture to invest $500 billion in AI infrastructure.
As described in the video above, the Stargate Project is a half-trillion dollar project intended to build out massive data centers throughout the country for the benefit of artificial intelligence; one of the proposed uses is to create personalized vaccines. This has occurred hand-in-hand with the ‘Big Beautiful Bill’ clause which strips the rights of states to regulate AI, as well as the deployment of DOGE and now Palantir into the Federal government with the combined aims of collecting and fusing the private and personal data of all citizens into a central database as well as deploying Palantir (think of it as a baby SkyNet) throughout the Federal government with the ultimate purpose of handing government functions and decision-making over to AI. Also, let’s not forget the push by Silicon Valley to rebrand the Smart City concept into ‘Freedom Cities’ and the fact that Arizona seems to figure centrally in the technocratic coup which we are currently witnessing at all levels of government.
With this in mind, let’s take a look at Project Blue, which is promised to bring up to ten (!) new data centers to Pima County, situated on 290 acres of land between Houghton and Harrison. The specific plan outlines the numerous boxes which this project will tick on the Pima Prospers plan, the Agenda 2030-driven planning document for the County. Also mentioned is the 1,950-acre Southeast Employment and Logistics Center which will use the Sonoran Corridor to link 1-19 to I-10 through Sahuarita.
The property buyer, Humphrey’s Peak Properties, LLC, is connected to Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld LLP, the second largest lobbying firm in the US by revenue. The contractor managing the construction, Beale Infrastructure, claims that "our deep experience developing and delivering large scale data centers, infrastructure projects and carbon-free energy led us to found Beale with a clear mission to help solve responsible energy and infrastructure sourcing to drive digital transformation, electrification and AI." Their portfolio currently includes Tucson, Tulsa, and Kansas City but provides no additional information. Interestingly, Beale is only 9 months old, which means they had already anticipated the direction of the current administration when they were created (Beale representatives will be attending this Tuesday’s meeting).
Beale’s parent company, Blue Owl, is an asset manager. They claim that as of April 30, 2025, [their digital] infrastructure strategy has raised $34 billion of capital, investing in over 90 facilities across more than 25 global markets, and they have ties to Oracle and invest in “life sciences”. Here is a huge AI buildout project in Abilene, Texas they are doing connected to the Stargate Project. They are "building the project in record time." The power needed is enough to power all of the single-family homes in Chicago. Here's another data center they are building in Tulsa AFTER the land got rezoned, just like they are doing here.
Some additional things to keep in mind: there are many stories about data centers bringing few jobs to a locale (Lesher promises a whopping 108 once the construction is completed). Note that the city of Mesa is becoming a leader in data centers, which you can read about here, here and here. Can Tucson compete with Mesa? Bear in mind that Mesa gets its water and electricity from the Salt River Project. Related to this, there is a push under the Stargate Project to develop modular nuclear power plants, which in many areas (including ours) are the only way to meet the power demands of data centers for artificial intelligence.
Recommendation: The Stargate Project and its Pima County offshoot, Project Blue, are intended for one thing: developing infrastructure for AI governance so that we can be foisted once and for all into an all-encompassing control grid. Despite all whitewashing to the contrary, the new data centers will not create permanent jobs or improve the economy – they will instead create a huge critical resource drain on the entire region. This project will ultimately put machines before people, period. Contact the BoS and demand that they vote NO on this devastating project.
Contact Information for Pima County Board of Supervisors:
If you choose to email the supervisors and Clerk of the Board (CoB), please do this by the end of the day on Monday before the BoS meeting this Tuesday! Be sure to include your name and date in your emails. It is helpful to provide separate emails for each agenda/addendum item. Copy and paste all of the following addresses at one time into your email address line:
District1@pima.gov, District2@pima.gov, District3@pima.gov, District4@pima.gov, District5@pima.gov, COB_mail@pima.gov
Listed below are each supervisor’s & CoB contact information:
Supervisor Rex Scott, Chair, District 1
(520) 724-2738
District1@pima.gov
Supervisor Matt Heinz, District 2
(520) 724-2702
District2@pima.gov
Supervisor Jennifer Allen, Vice Chair, District 3
(520) 724-8051
District3@pima.gov
Supervisor Steve Christy, District 4
(520) 724-8094
District4@pima.gov
Supervisor Andres Cano, District 5
(520) 724-8126
District5@pima.gov
Clerk of the Board, Pima County
COB_mail@pima.gov