Renamed Linda Ronstadt Music Hall
Tucson’s public spaces have long ignored the rich diversity of our city’s Mexican American heritage. With the dedication of the Linda Ronstadt Music Hall and Alva Torres Plaza, we laud the City of Tucson’s first Latina Mayor, Regina Romero, who in consultation with community leaders, is correcting historical wrongs. What was once taken away from us, we reclaim in perpetuity.
During the 1960s, the area known as “La Calle” or “Tucsonense Downtown”, was a densely-packed neighborhood, home to Mexican American, African American and Asian American families. For ‘urban renewal’ (Sound familiar?), the Pueblo Center Redevelopment Project, approved by Tucson voters, created the Tucson Convention Center. Chicanos/Latinos and native Mexican-American Tucsonans were deprived of land ownership as a way to generational wealth because of this land steal.
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Alongside my fellow Tucsonans, I look forward to visiting the TCC and in particular, stopping by the Alva B. Torres Plaza, making my way down the fountain-laden steps to the Linda Ronstadt Music Hall, to say, ‘Welcome Home’!
Corina Ontiveros
Southwest side
Honoring our nurses
In honor of Nurse’s Week, being celebrated May 6-12, I’d like to thank the Banner-University Medicine nurses and all the other nurses providing care.
I became a nurse because I wanted to affect just one life the way a special nurse affected my life when my 4-month-old son was rushed into emergency surgery in the middle of the night. Prior to this, I was in school for business, having worked in construction all my life.
What I have realized over the past 11 years is that while I hope I am impacting people the way that one nurse impacted me, my patients and staff have given me more than I can ever give them in return.
The pandemic created greater awareness of the art of nursing and the skills needed to provide a variety of highly specialized health services to safeguard the patient’s well-being. Nurses are the foundation of our patients’ trust and we thank you for representing the best of us.
Angela Wright, Chief Nursing Officer, Banner – University Medicine Tucson
Midtown
Women’s rights
I am sorry to think of the new path that is going to affect women. I believe every woman should have the decision to care for their body, life and circumstances that will only affect them and their families. Women do not have safety nets to help women who have been ignored by men and women who think “things can be good.” Not everyone “walks the walk” that many women “walk.” Rose-colored glasses do not reflect the difficult decisions women need to make in their lifetime. An abortion is not an easy decision — a very personal one between their own abilities/options and most of all realities affecting their lives and the livelihood of their circumstances and family situations. I do not want to be a second-class member of the United States of America. I want to be an active participant in my decisions with options for the family they have now. Why take this “option” from us?
Mary Beth Schneider
Northeast side
The answer is at the ballot box
Re: the May 7 article “The abortion ban coming to Arizona will grow tyranny.”
Kudos to David Fitzsimmons for his well-written and insightful op-ed on the tyranny of the coming Republican-backed ban to all abortions in Arizona. He rightfully calls out Republicans for their hypocrisy in demanding their right to govern their bodies as far as not wearing masks during a pandemic, while calling for the ability to govern a woman’s womb. However, he didn’t go far enough. There is an answer and it comes in November. Vote out all Republicans. Then they might wake up to the fact that the vast majority of Americans want safe and legal abortions available in our country and they need to stop trying to control women’s bodies.
So, vote Republicans out — and do it before they apply their same tyrannical actions to the ballot box.
Karen Micallef
Oro Valley
Fairness with abortion ban
Re: the May 7 article “The abortion ban coming to Arizona will grow tyranny.”
Dear Fitz: Thank you for your column on the misogynous tyranny Arizona’s government is laying on women. You said what I’ve been thinking since revelation of Alito’s erroneous dictum. Erroneous because abortions were legal in the U.S. until after the Civil War, unless you were Black. Thus, laws outlawing abortion are racist both historically and economically today. I will add something else others seem unwilling to mention: What about the men? Laws should force vasectomies or castration for repeat offenders, rapists, or incest. Unthinkable? Why? In the 21st century of so-called equality, this is justified. How do women feel when enslaved to have life-threatening, life-changing pregnancies in an already too-crowded world? Physical consequences for men responsible for pregnancy seem only fair. Further, while involuntary mom cares for the child, the male should pay costs to raise it, whether he ever sees it. He pays or we pay. Especially if the next authoritarian step is contraception removal.
Nancy Jacques
Northeast side
U of A still trying to hide
Re: the May 7 article “Faculty want to know risks of severing UAGC contract.”
The latest installment on the the U of A / UA Global Campus adventure demonstrates the total lack of transparency on the part of the university. The Faculty Senate has posed reasonable questions on at least two occasions about the deal for the U of A to buy Ashford and Zovio. The response from the U of A has been, to say the least, condescending. Previously, U of A President Robert Robbins said it might cost a billion dollars to get out of the deal. Now he is quoted as saying it might be north of $100 million. Totally clueless. The U of A spokeswoman, Pam Scott, says the University has not even decided whether it will to conduct a risk assessment of the deal. The U of A and the Board of Regents have fiduciary responsibilities to the taxpayers of Arizona. That means they are obligated to take good care of our tax dollars. Robbins and the ABOR have totally failed. They need to go now.
Bruce Wysocki
Southwest side
Bogus water shortage
There have been numerous articles published in this newspaper, as well as others, about lower Colorado River lake levels and the shortage of water caused by droughts in the Southwest. Take a drive north on I-10 or west on I-8 and you see hundreds of millions of gallons of water pumped out of the ground to evaporate in the sun. There are solutions to our water problems, but as long as our state legislators are bought and paid for by wealthy landowners, there will be no change.
Terry Tjaden
Sahuarita
Remember Putin when you vote
Vladimir Putin, one charismatic but dishonest man, believed and adored by most Russians but recognized abroad for what he is, has created a calamity. It says something about the need for honesty and integrity in our elected officials. Let’s look for that as we vote; let’s look for good people, not just someone who votes for what I want for “me” or someone who always votes my party line. Let’s get someone closer to the middle, who works for everyone, and, above all, has a history of honesty.
Charles See
SaddleBrooke
Can someone explain why
Why is it defined as an “individual’s decision” when a person chooses not to wear a mask when they approach other people they can infect with the COVID-19, yet when a woman chooses not to give birth to the fetus inside her body, it’s a “public” decision? The first is a direct threat to public health, and the second an intimately personal matter.
Jon Sebba
Northwest side
