Tucson needs to cut red tape for businesses, reform its City Charter, simplify its land-use code and annex the Catalina Foothills to bring in more state shared revenue for the area, Mayor Bob Walkup said in his State of the City speech Friday.
Walkup's call for the Foothills and other areas of Pima County to annex into the city comes despite the fact the city laid off its whole annexation staff this week except for its head, Byron Howard.
Walkup told more than 600 people at the Tucson Convention Center that the unincorporated population of Pima County causes state tax dollars to go to Phoenix, Scottsdale and Glendale and helps them keep their property taxes low. Pima County's property taxes are too high and need to be lowered, Walkup said.
"We need our full share of state revenues, and we need it right away," Walkup said to applause.
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Businessman Humberto Lopez, the leader of a recall effort against Walkup, was buoyed by the talk of annexing the Foothills and other business-friendly rhetoric in the speech. Lopez said he will try to drop the recall against Walkup next week.
As for annexation, Lopez said he will "raise money, promote it, do anything" to help the annexation happen. Property owners would have to vote to be annexed into the city after the end of a long process.
Early on, Walkup received applause for a pledge to create more jobs and for a call for the city to institute nonpartisan elections.
He was most forceful when talking about cutting red tape for businesses to help them get up and running, which was the only time he deviated substantially from his written speech.
"Building plans and reviews must be faster. You ought to clap for that," he said, which drew applause from the crowd. "The rules cannot change from one inspector to another. That's another one to clap for."
The crowd did cheer for those remarks, and again after he said the Development Services Department "should help customers through red tape."
Walkup's speech got good reviews from businesspeople. Ray Garfield, founder and co-owner of convention hotel developer Garfield Traub, said he felt the speech was thoughtful and comprehensive.
Jim Kuliesh, executive director of the Alliance of Construction Trades, said he liked the speech as well, especially the lines about creating jobs and reining in city inspectors.
"Inspectors drive us crazy," Kuliesh said, adding he liked Walkup's talk about reforming the land-use code as well. "Let's do it now. We've talked about it for years."
On StarNet: Go to this article at azstarnet.com/news/ local/govt-and-politics to read the full text of Mayor Walkup's speech.
Contact reporter Rob O'Dell at 573-4346 or rodell@azstarnet.com.
