Tucson Speaks Out: July 28

ASDB issue

Missing from the article on the ASDB are:

— How many students were enrolled and how many of these were residential?

— What was the budget expenditure for these categories of students?

Raymond Graap

Northwest side

Rogue AI

As the seeming juggernaut of AI marches into our world at breakneck speed, it was merely a matter of time before we saw this coming. In a chilling episode of reality imitating science fiction, begging for an “I told you so”, an OpenAI autonomous agent has managed to escape the strict control of its overseers and go rogue on the internet.

Like a compulsively obedient servant obsessed with pleasing its master, this agent achieved its assigned objective by managing to muster what we humans might regard as creative strategizing, conjuring unforeseen initiative to thwart the safeguards of its confinement. (Pay close attention to that word “unforeseen”. )

With our entire planetary infrastructure dependent upon the digital paradigm to which we’ve fully and recklessly surrendered, what could possibly go wrong now that we’ve proven that this sort of event was inevitable? Perhaps the fittest epitaph for the human race is expressed in this article’s quote: “It’s quite mind-blowing that all of this happened autonomously!” Fools rush in …

Robert Gavlak

Midtown

Blame guns, not city leadership

Nine people shot in downtown Tucson last weekend. Elsewhere, eight separate mass shootings occurred across the country, nine dead and 60 wounded nationwide. In Tucson, everyone survived.

I get why people are angry and scared. But blaming it on unhoused neighbors and dirty alleyways misses the point. Nobody involved was unhoused. Pointing fingers at people with the least power doesn’t make downtown safer; it distracts from the actual cause: how easy it still is to get a gun, not decisions made at City Hall.

Remember, this was a summer night with students gone, yet by Empire’s own account, officers on patrol heard the shots and responded in under a minute. That’s a well-resourced department!

I appreciate Mayor Romero for advocating for common sense gun laws when yet another tragedy calls for it. Thoughts and prayers clearly aren’t enough.

If we want downtown safer, housing and gun laws are a better place to put our energy than blaming people who had nothing to do with it.

Scott Hancock

Downtown

Bribes and influence

TEP is locked in to everything the town does. It is the first to be put on commissions by Mayor and Council. It gets to set zoning recommendations for data centers thanks to their nomination to a position (Christopher Ortiz y Pino, TEP’s Project Manager for Siting, Outreach and Engagement). It gets a person on the so-called “Commission on Climate, Energy, and Sustainability (CCES).”

How many of us regular folks get a chance to have a say? How many of you have been able to get a response for the city, town manager or mayor? And yet, ‘Mayor and Council’ want you to continue a franchise agreement that YOU are taxed 2.5% monthly for (surcharge in your TEP bill) so it can get $2M plus this 2.5%. And better yet, the joke is on M&C because the $2M doesn’t cover the upcoming rate increase for energy they will be paying for government run facilities.

Reject this corporate influence on your local government.

Carissa Sipp

Midtown

Who are the communists?

I am a Democrat, and I am quite tired of being called a communist by the Republicans. I assume that they have adopted this term in order to strike fear into the hearts of those who might choose to vote for a Democrat, since communism carries a connotation of anti-Americanism. But communism aims to replace private property ownership with public ownership of the major means of production, and the current Republican administration has done just that by purchasing equity ownership is at least 13 different major companies to date.

Specifically, the U.S. now has significant equity stakes in Intel, USA Rare Earth, MP Materials, Korea Zinc, Lithium America, Thicker Pass and GM, Nvidia, AMD, ReElement Technologies, presidential control over strategic decisions in U.S. Steel, has plans to invest millions in the defense industry, and have committed to $17.5 billion in loans to energy companies to construct nuclear reactors.

It seems to me the Republicans are the communists.

Kathryn Pensinger

Foothills

WNBA All-Star weekend

Where is the coverage for the WNBA All-Star Weekend?

Deborah McGeary

Northwest side

Tugo needs to adopt electric bikes

Tugo has issues, and I’m not talking about the broken equipment. Not enough people seem to be using the bike share. I think it’s because when someone uses a Tugo bike, they would find out it’s non-electric, feel cheated, dock it, and never ride again. I’m in my 20s, and while I try to use them once in a while, they are a pain to use. Meanwhile, there are the Lime scooters that are everywhere, electric, and more convenient. But are undocked and are dumped wherever. Yet people would go with them just for the ease of use. Everyone nowadays just expects everything to have a motor. Almost every other city with a bike share has e-bikes with high ridership. So if Tugo adopts e-bikes, we can increase ridership and better compete with private micromobility that answers to shareholders. Perhaps also have Lime use docking stations, which they do in Vancouver.

Ryland Plassmann

Midtown

New definition for spineless

Trump is considering military action against Mali. That would be the eighth, 8th, country he attacked in less than two years. Where in the Hell is Congress? Those supposed representatives were elected to protect the citizens of the USA. So far, their legacy includes the deaths of military members; higher prices for food and gasoline; the disruption of services; attacks on education; withholding of FEMA funds based on voting patterns; the repudiation of vaccines that have been proven to save lives; huge increases in military spending; illegal changes to public buildings and monuments; attacks on the free press; and ignoring Supreme Court rulings. What is wrong with the Republican representatives? Why don't they stand up and honor the oath they took to protect and defend the Constitution? How much longer are they going to allow the United States to run headlong into the arms of Totalitarianism?

Cynthia Schiesel

East side

Pima County Proposition 425

Pima County Proposition 425 is presented as a “no new taxes” measure. In reality, it would raise the county’s expenditure limit—a cap created by Arizona voters in 1980—allowing significantly higher spending from existing revenues.

The county is approaching this limit even as it collects substantial tax revenue. Rather than seeking more spending authority, officials should return excess funds to taxpayers through rate reductions. Rising property taxes already burden longtime homeowners.

Approving the measure would give supervisors greater leeway to increase spending without further voter approval on the cap, potentially paving the way for future tax hikes. Voters should demand fiscal restraint instead of expanding government’s means at residents’ expense.

Pima County must live within its means. Vote carefully on Proposition 425.

Janet Wittenbraker

Midtown

Is this a political joke?

Socialist Mayor (Free Bus Service) Romano and now sadly injured Gabby Gifford come out to push “Gun Control?”

Simple suggestion: Stop the black market of guns coming across from Mexico and the cartels, and stop giving probation to people who have used guns, period.

L.W. Johnson

Foothills