Tucson Speaks Out: May 6 letters of the day

We see plenty of racism and racially motivated decisions from our mostly white Republican legislators, in most cases with expectation and no illusions.

When it comes from the Democratic side, in the form of Gov. Katie Hobbs’ veto of the home-cooked food legislation, it is shocking and infuriating. And it is racist, pure and simple.

It strikes at Mexican and Mexican-American women, mostly, who are trying to sustain their families by selling their home-cooked tamales, tortillas and other delights.

I am a Mexican-born U.S. citizen who with my sisters peddled our mother’s home-made tortillas door to door in our South Side neighborhood when we were children. The singular goal was to help our family make ends meet.

For Hobbs to reject that reveals her lack of respect for a culture that was here long before she was and that must still struggle with white dominion.

Shraddha Hilda Oropeza

West side

A possible solution

In 2018 TEP convinced voters that a mandate for renewable energy would raise rates.

Prop. 127 was defeated and rates went up anyway.

Now TEP is back in front of the voters threatening voters that if they go against TEP on 412, a premature renewal of the TEP franchise, rates will go up. Never mind that a rate increase is already in the works or that 412 includes a surcharge to cover undergrounding a line that the people wanting the undergrounding refuse to pay for.

I’m sensing a pattern here.

How’s this for an idea – just have the University of Arizona tap its football/basketball coach buyoff fund to pay for the undergrounding. That fund sure seems to be an endless pot of gold, why not use it for something other than paying a coach to go away?

David Reynolds

East side

Parenthood

According to Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, adoptive parents aren’t real mothers and fathers. I had no idea.

Mary Elizabeth Potts

East side

Five more people dead … Why?

As I am sitting here having just read about the latest Texas shooting, I can’t help thinking about the wrong person with a gun, holding in that person’s hand the prospect of quickly ending someone’s … anyone’s … life. Then I think: Who is this person willing to do this?

Five people dead … why?! Five lives no longer to be lived! Five places at the table of human existence … gone because of one person with a gun! Five individuals joining children in schools, people worshipping, or people simply at the wrong place at the wrong time, five people no longer able to enjoy a freedom to live! Why?!

And then I think this person could be one of the many at the altar of the gun religion. But then I think of how hard we as a nation have worked to provide alternatives to the need to worship in this way. And then I immediately think: What does it take to obtain a realization of America’s tragedy?

For God’s sake, people … think!

Frank Parsons

Northeast side

The law says so

Re: the April 30 article “Vote no on Prop. 412: Accountability, transparency, progress.”

In the author’s highly informed and enlightening opinion he quotes the plain but powerful language of the Arizona Statutes that charges the Arizona Corporation Commission with both protecting ratepayers — and getting out of the way of municipalities trying to do the same.

Let’s hear those words again: “The corporation commission shall have full power to, and shall, prescribe just and reasonable classifications … and make and enforce reasonable rules, regulations, and orders for the convenience, comfort, and safety, and the preservation of the health, of the employees and patrons of such corporations … incorporated cities and towns may be authorized by Law to exercise supervision over public service corporations … .”

Fear of the ACC was a major unstated but well understood reason for the Mayor and Council’s endorsement of the franchise agreement. They were repeatedly advised that the ACC would strike down anything in any form that smacked of climate mitigation.

The City needs to act boldly not fearfully to protect its citizens. The law says so. Vote No 412.

Rick Rappaport

Oro Valley

Minorities commit mass shootings too

In Texas, a Mexican man, reportedly in the country illegally and deported several times, just murdered execution style with head shots, five Honduran nationals, including an eight year old boy.

A transgender female gunned down adults and children at a Christian elementary school in Tennessee. Her manifesto has yet to be released as of my letter. Why?

Six Black teens have been arrested for bullet spraying a party of mostly Blacks in Alabama killing several. There were two mass shootings in California involving Asian males killing 18.

Mass shootings no longer are the purview of white males. I think the cause of this violence is not guns, but people. Lay a firearm on a kitchen counter and command it to commit a mass shooting. It will not! It takes a deprived human being to do that. I would argue that Democrat policies have lead to the demise of morality, respect for life, destruction of the nuclear family, fatherless homes, and lack of personal responsibility. Societal factors causing these mass shootings.

Langhorne Bilby

Marana

Middle class home buyers to shoulder risky home loans

Twenty-seven state Treasurers have sent a letter to the Biden administration opposing a new home mortgage rule that took effect May 1, wherein people with good credit ratings purchasing home mortgages will subsidize those having poor credit ratings. The scheme would mean middle class people, who have kept their financial act together, will pay a higher interest rate amounting to an average of about $60+ a month on a 30 year home mortgage.

I think this is tantamount to a middle class tax hike, on top of already higher mortgage interest rates, high inflation, and high gasoline prices. Does Biden and his leftist activists in the White House NOT remember the housing crisis of 2008?

That too occurred because of banks being pressured by the government and politicians to make risky home loans to people with poor credit, or otherwise be deemed as racists. Congress ended up bailing out those banks with tax payer money. Thankfully it was eventually paid back. Maybe “Joe” does not remember the 2008 housing crisis?

Christy Daniels

Foothills

Step up for cheaper, cleaner energy

Re: the April 30 article “Tucson to study creating city-run electric utility; TEP opposed.”

It’s time for the City to identify the best model for local control of our energy citywide. Community Choice Energy (CCE), already successful in 10 states, is a frontrunner because it delivers cheaper, cleaner energy. It’s compatible with city-owned microgrids, community solar, and new technologies that use free sun and wind for fuel.

Of course, TEP is opposed to any change. With no competition, why would TEP lower rates? Or protect customers from skyrocketing gas prices, up 300% since 2019? TEP has no incentive to transition rapidly to cheaper, renewable energy. It passes all costs onto customers. Its profits are guaranteed-and we pay the price.

This year, TEP has two more rate hikes in the works. It’s time for the City to seriously negotiate with TEP for a better deal, and lobby at the state level for local control of our energy.

Judith Anderson

Midtown

Our Supremes are winking at us

If Justice is blind, why do our Supreme Court justices wink at us over their absence of integrity, ethics, and moral principles? Have they no shame?

Jerry Wilkerson

SaddleBrooke

Vote NO on Prop. 412 — don’t be deceived!

We The People should not be forced to pay higher electric bills to finance the Mayor’s pet projects, nor to subsidize homeowners in one of the wealthiest neighborhoods because they don’t wish to be “burdened” by seeing overhead power lines.

If the Mayor thinks these “green initiatives” are supported by the People, then they should be presented on their own merits in a separate proposition. Similarly, if the Sam Hughes neighborhood association wants to have the power lines in Sam Hughes Neighborhood buried, then they should shoulder the cost — not the entire population of TEP customers.

Both the short title, and the brief description of what Prop. 412 entails are carefully worded to deceive voters into thinking this is just a routine renewal of the existing TEP franchise agreement. In reality, Prop. 412 creates a brand new franchise agreement which will result in higher costs for EVERYONE — including those who can least afford it!

Please join me in voting NO on Proposition 412.

William Cohen

Midtown

GOP politically exploits mass shootings

The GOP exploits terrible mass shootings to stoke fear and racism to get their base voters out at election time. Gun violence has been used for nearly three centuries to enforce black chattel slave laws and Jim Crow segregation laws. Historically, Southern whites had a deep morbid fear of Black slave revolts.

Nowadays, gun violence impacts disproportionately minority Hispanic and Black residents. Morbid white conservative fears of minority gun violence spilling into their home areas keeps NRA-Republicans elected. The higher the minority gun death rate, the more fearful white people vote Republican. So why should any Republicans try to end mass shootings when they benefit politically from them?

Texas GOP Gov. Greg Abbott demonized an entire family of massacred Hondurans, calling them “illegal immigrants.” Greg Abbott is playing the fear and racial card to get out the white conservative voters at election time. Gun sales set new records too. Democrats rational legal arguments for gun safety laws do poorly against the irrational racial fear arguments of bullying NRA-Republicans.

Kyle Stoutenburg

Sierra Vista

Ciscomani and the debt ceiling

Will newly elected Congressman Ciscomani stand up for the people he represents and vote to pass a clean debt ceiling bill in order to pay the debts our nation has already incurred or will he march in lockstep with his party which threatens to bring our economy to a halt for political gain?

The congressman claims to be working for all the people of southern Arizona but if he fails to act, and act now, his first term will be forever linked to the destruction of our economy. He will hurt veterans and seniors, the poor and the sick.

Is standing up with Kevin McCarthy’s attempt at blackmail worth what that will do to so many of his constituents? The congressman needs to show his independence and vote to make sure our country pays it’s debts. If not, he surely does not deserve a second term.

Rick Unklesbay

Midtown

Athletes who happen to be transgender children

Perhaps if schools and the mindset of adults could permit children to play games with the main emphasis being to have fun … rather than the main emphasis being to win at any cost … then perhaps having transgender children participate with other athletes wouldn’t be a problem.

Sue Thompson

SaddleBrooke

Ciscomani’s true colors

Congressman Juan Ciscomani’s newsletters always start with him saying he is “fighting hard for” all of us Arizona families. But his vote for the GOP budget betrays that. He voted to not exempt the Veterans Administration and other health programs from massive budget cuts. He voted for poor childless adults aged 50 to 56 to be forced to find a job or training program or lose their Medicaid and SNAP food aid.

Many of his constituents, especially in the rural areas and those with health problems, will be unable to find a close job or training program or even a way to get there. He voted to support the coal and gas companies and cancel the money Congress had voted to encourage people to use solar power and buy electric cars. He voted to cancel the $400 billion student loan relief. He voted the to cancel the new IRS staff and computers. His vote showed whom he is really “fighting hard for.”

John Higgins

Southeast side

Pres. Joe Biden caused historic border disaster

Within days of becoming President, Joe Biden signed executive orders reversing President Donald Trump’s border policies, with the exception of Title 42. That included reversing Remain in Mexico, halting further construction of the border wall, ending asylum agreements with Central American countries, ending pressure on Mexico to secure its southern border with Guatemala, etc.

The result, about 5 million have entered illegally or circumvented Border Patrol apprehension. Hundreds of thousands of unaccompanied children have entered. In February, Tucson Border Patrol Chief John Modlin testified before Congress that in FY 2022, there was a 257% increase in encounters in the Tucson Sector, that the cartels control human smuggling, that many migrants apprehended thought the border under Biden was open, and that many are previously deported felons.

Title 42 is expiring and in preparation, Biden has announced tougher policies. Too little too late! The AZ Daily Star has had little criticism of Biden’s border policies compared to their previous almost weekly articles by Tim Steller and Curt Prendergast attacking Trump’s policies. Google them.

Janice DeAngelo

Tubac