AZ MAYORS GATHER TO ADDRESS ECONOMIC, PUBLIC POLICY ISSUES

posted to AZ Week Notebook by Melanie Huonker

Mayors from across Arizona will gather for the Arizona League of Cities and Towns Annual Conference this week at the JW Marriott Starr Pass Resort. The conference will provide a series of workshops for mayors to address their local economic and job outlook, local budget and services issues, taxes and trust in government.

Gov. Jan Brewer will speak at the conference Thursday, Sept. 1. Following her address, Arizona Week will interview five Arizona mayors in a panel discussion to get their reactions to the governor.

So far, Mayor Byron Jackson of Eloy, Mayor Fernando Shipley of Globe, Mayor Marie Lopez Rogers of Avondale and Mayor Sara Presler of Flagstaff have confirmed their participation in the discussion.

That discussion will air on Friday night's episode of Arizona Week.

GOV. BREWER COMING TO TUCSON; WHAT SHOULD WE ASK HER?

posted to Political Buzz by Michael Chihak

Gov. Jan Brewer has made publicized visits to Tucson a rarity this year.

Granted, it's not her turf. She was outdueled in Pima County voting last year by the non-effervescent Terry Goddard in a predictable, yet closer than expected outcome for the Democratic leaning area. Goddard had 50.1 percent of the votes to Brewer's 47.1 percent.

Still, Tucson is part of Arizona -- those dreamers in the Baja Arizona movement notwithstanding -- and it would be nice to see our governor a bit more often.

Now, the lure of hundreds of officials from Arizona's cities and towns has captured her attention. Brewer has accepted an invitation to speak Thursday at the League of Arizona Cities and Towns annual conference at Tucson's J.W. Marriott resort at Starr Pass.

My colleague Christopher Conover will be there to cover her speech for Arizona Illustrated, and the governor will sit down with me and a video crew for an interview afterward, also for Arizona Illustrated.

We have a healthy list of questions for Brewer, but we can always use more. Submit your questions in the Comments section below, then watch Arizona Illustrated at 6:30 p.m. Friday on PBS-HD-6 for the interview. We will plan to ask some of your questions as well as our own.

FINDING AGREEMENT AMONG THE DISAGREEABLE

posted to AZ Week Notebook by Michael Chihak

From the truth is stranger than fiction department: A half-dozen organizations with widely different and conflicting points of view came together and agreed on something.

Not just anything. Something significant. In this era of I'm right and you're wrong and never the twain shall meet politics, this isn't just any news. This is big news.

As Tucson's Morris K. and Stewart L. Udall Foundation describes it, the groups agreed on a plan to jointly restore forest ecosystems in a method that will reduce wildfire threats and strengthen local economies in four of Arizona’s national forests.

The agreeable groups include the timber industry, environmental organizations, scientists, recreational interests, local governments and officials of the four national forests.

Now here's even bigger news: What they agreed to is working. Parts of the forests that have been restored in the manner prescribed in what is known as the Four Forest Restoration Initiative were the least damaged in this summer's record-setting wildfires in Arizona.

The agreement was reached in February and will be rolled out over the next two decades. At the time, it got some publicity but not the kind of fanfare that would point up the bigger picture of what this means.

That is, how did this agreement come about? Through hard work, listening, open mindedness, willingness to compromise for the sake of true solutions.

The cynic in me wants to say that the key factor was that likely, no elected officials were involved. You know, those folks with one eye on the next election and the other on their intractable dogmas.

Let’s hope enough of them noticed this and took note of what the makings of it were. Perhaps it will lead them come up with all manner of solutions to significant issues that the country faces.

ORDINARY WOMEN AND ONE BAD GIRL

posted to Cue Sheet by James Reel

Since 1971, Aug. 26 has been designated Women's Equality Day. There are so many "special" days that people tend to ignore most of them, so in case you haven't heard of it, this is the day that marks the 1920 passage of the 19th Amendment, which gave women the right to vote in the United States. It's also intended to call attention to women's continuing efforts toward full equality. It's going to be a very long time before there's a 50-50 mix of music by male and female composers on KUAT-FM, mainly because of the problem of history: We draw our music programming from the past 600 years or so, and until the current generation very few women had careers as composers. Still, there are scattered talented figures from the past, and a great many women active today, and we're sampling their work through the day. We'll have miniatures and major works alike from Amy Beach, Jacquelyn Sellers, Valerie Coleman, Marion Bauer, Elinor Remick Warren, Ellen Taaffe Zwilich, Pamela Decker, Jennifer Higdon, Ursula Mamlok, Joan Tower, Victoria Bond, Jocelyn Swigger, Libby Larsen, Roshanne Etezady and Katherine Hoover ... along with the usual material by dead white males.

Aug. 27 is the 125th anniversary of the birth of violist and composer Rebecca Clarke, so on that day we'll play a few of her works to celebrate the occasion, alongside those of her fellow birthday celebrant, Eric Coates.

And I happened to notice that Monday, Aug. 29 is the feast day of the beheading of John the Baptist; note that his "regular" feast day is June 24. So this seemed like a perfect opportunity to ... well, not exactly celebrate, but mark the occasion with as much music as I could find about that instrument of his demise, Salome. Between about 10:20 a.m. and noon on Monday, you'll hear some of Richard Strauss's music for that anti-heroine (including a piano-roll recording of Strauss himself playing the "Dance of the Seven Veils"), plus items by Archibald Joyce, Alexander Glazunov, Paul Bowles and Henry Hadley. And, just so it doesn't all seem too disrespectful, we'll begin with Healey Willan's Missa Brevis No. 11, "Missa Sancti Johannis Baptistae."

INTERVIEW SHEDS MORE LIGHT ON FACTORS IN ANTENORI CONGRESSIONAL DECISION

posted to Political Buzz by Andrea Kelly

Since announcing his Congressional exploratory committee last week, State Sen. Frank Antenori has said he won't be seeking the seat if U.S. Rep. Giffords decides to run again.

In comments today in one of "The Hill" newspaper's blogs, he gives a more detailed explanation about how redistricting could shape his decision.

"The Hill" quotes Antenori: "If the maps are drawn and I end up in a district that has a four- or five-point Democratic registration advantage I'm not going to run. ... But if I'm in a district with Ms. Giffords and it's an eight- or nine-point Republican registration advantage that will be a hard decision."

POST-REVOLUTIONARY MEXICAN ARTS

posted to Cue Sheet by James Reel

My life does not go into suspension when I'm off the air, although occasionally I wish it did. Here's the lowdown on a course I'll be teaching for Arizona Senior Academy over the next five Wednesdays.