KJZZ’s Sun Up is a weekday morning podcast giving you the Arizona news you need to start your day. It is the biggest stories of the day from KJZZ News.
Transcript
PHIL LATZMAN: Hey, happy Friday friends, this is KJZZ's Sun Up, your daily news update from here in Phoenix on our state and region. I'm Phil Latzman, your host for this podcast, a daily digest of Arizona news is reported by our KJZZ news team and is supported by listeners like you. We just did our brief new member drive here at KJZZ, where we pay for this podcast and everything you hear on the station. We appreciate those who have supported. If you haven't, please do so. It's not here without you. Go to KJZZ.org. It is Friday. We did it, May the 15th, the ides of May. Let's go forth and towards the weekend starting with the news.
In a new report, the Arizona Auditor General's Office accused the Department of Education of failing to adequately audit transactions in the state school voucher program. Democrats like Representative Nancy Gutierrez says that report is more proof that lawmakers need to add guardrails to prevent prohibited purchases.
NANCY GUTIERREZ: Under the ESA voucher program, it's open season on your taxpayer dollars. And the waste, and the fraud, and the abuse.
PHIL LATZMAN: The Republican State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Horne disagreed with the audit report and says his staff is running the program appropriately and in compliance with state law, but Representative Steve Montenegro, the top Republican in the State House, says the Auditor General's concerns should be addressed.
The US Department of Defense is requesting an unprecedented number of advanced Tomahawk missiles in its proposed budget. As Greg Haney reports, the manufacturer Raytheon produces those at its Tucson facility.
GREG HANEY: Raytheon boasts that the Tomahawk cruise missile can easily hit targets more than a thousand miles away and can change course mid-flight. But that tech means they are slow to build. The proposed DOD budget asks for 785 new missiles compared to only 55 a year ago. That new request would likely take years to produce if approved by Congress and would cost close to $6 billion. Critics have said that the US military has depleted stockpiles of critical munitions like the Tomahawk in its war with Iran. The New York Times reported late last month that the US used over a thousand Tomahawks since the start of the war. Greg Haney, KJZZ News, Phoenix.
PHIL LATZMAN: With Arizona's primary elections just months away, a judge won't pause a ruling with wide-ranging impacts on Maricopa County's elections despite concerns from the Board of Supervisors that it'll cause chaos this year. From the politics desk, Wayne Schutsky reports.
WAYNE SCHUTSKY: Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Scott Blaney already ruled in favor of Recorder Justin Heap in the lawsuit he filed against the Board of Supervisors over control of different parts of the county's elections. But the supervisors asked the judge to stay the ruling, arguing that making drastic changes ahead of the upcoming primary will cause confusion for election workers and voters. Blaney didn't buy that argument, saying the board should have prepared for the possibility that Heap would win the lawsuit in the nine months since he filed the case. Board Chair Kate Brophy McGee criticized the ruling, saying election administration shouldn't be based on speculation. The board plans to appeal. Wayne Schutsky, KJZZ News, Phoenix.
PHIL LATZMAN: Back to more education news now, the Democratic candidates for Arizona's Superintendent of Public Instruction faced off in a primary debate on Wednesday night. As Bridget Dowd reports, both candidates agreed the state's school voucher system needs more oversight and accountability.
BRIDGET DOWD: Teresa Laba Ruiz has more than 30 years of experience as an educator and is the former president of Glendale Community College. She debated Brett Newbie, a behavior analyst from a blue-collar union family. When asked about reform for the state school voucher program, Ruiz had this to say.
TERESA LABA RUIZ: It feels like this whole program is on autopilot and just millions and millions of dollars are being spent unchecked and unchallenged. That needs to end immediately.
BRIDGET DOWD: Newbie said it's important to figure out where those dollars are going but also ensure that students who need special services are taken care of. He spent much of the debate talking about getting more resources to rural schools. Ruiz focused on restoring respect for educators and allowing schools to dictate their needs. Bridget Dowd, KJZZ News, Phoenix.
PHIL LATZMAN: A House committee reviewed President Trump's funding proposal for the Interior Department this week. As Gabriel Pietrorazio reports, a Southern Arizona congresswoman took the opportunity to talk about the recent destruction of a sacred border wall site.
GABRIEL PIETRORAZIO: Interior Secretary Doug Burgum testified that federal officials apologized to the Tohono Oʼodham Nation weeks after a border wall contractor bulldozed Las Playas de Tangleo, a thousand-year-old archaeological site along the U.S.-Mexico boundary.
DOUG BURGUM: This is a super unfortunate thing that happened. There's a series of mistakes that happened along the way but zero intention.
GABRIEL PIETRORAZIO: But Congresswoman Adelita Grijalva stressed words aren't enough.
ADELITA GRIJALVA: I mean unfortunately once it's destroyed you can't undo that.
GABRIEL PIETRORAZIO: Now, Grijalva fears another O'odham cultural site of concern, a desert oasis called Quito-Baquito Springs, could be damaged next.
ADELITA GRIJALVA: So will you commit that US Fish and Wildlife Service and National Park Service avoid Quito-Baquito Springs and minimize impact by not using groundwater within five miles and monitor those water levels closely as the border wall is being built?
DOUG BURGUM: Well, I — that's a very specific thing that I won't jump ahead and commit to with—
GABRIEL PIETRORAZIO: Gabriel Pietrorazio, KJZZ News, Phoenix.
PHIL LATZMAN: The Maricopa County Medical Examiner determined that a Haitian man's death while in ICE custody was caused by a severe infection related to dental issues. It comes after the man's family accused immigration agents of failing to provide proper treatment for a toothache. Here is Wayne Schutsky once more.
WAYNE SCHUTSKY: Emmanuel Damas, a 56-year-old asylum seeker, died in a Scottsdale hospital on March 2nd. The Medical Examiner's Office determined the primary cause of death was a severe infection that moved from his mouth to his chest area. Immigration and Customs Enforcement had claimed Damas was transferred to a hospital in February on the same day he complained of shortness of breath. But Damas's family disputed that timeline. They say he first complained of a toothache a week before he was sent to the hospital but only received ibuprofen from detention staff. Representative Yassamin Ansari, who conducted oversight visits to the Florence Detention Center where Damas was held, said other detainees backed up those claims. Wayne Schutsky, KJZZ News, Phoenix.
PHIL LATZMAN: The Tucson Unified School District is set to open classrooms next year for visually impaired students who currently attend the Arizona State School for the Deaf and Blind. As Noor Haghighi reports, community members and local education officials still had unanswered questions after a district board meeting earlier this week.
NOOR HAGHIGHI: Despite hesitation from the community and its own members, TUSD's board ultimately voted to bring services for the blind into TUSD's schools as ASDB's Tucson campus closes. Casey Hassett is deaf-blind. She told the board through an ASL interpreter that she was bullied as a student in general education schools.
CASEY HASSETT: Students deserve to learn in an environment where they feel safe, supported, understood, and have full access to the resources they need to succeed.
NOOR HAGHIGHI: Although the majority of TUSD's board voted in favor of the agreement with ASDB, some board members questioned whether TUSD could replicate specialized services in time for next school year. That's Noor Haghighi reporting from Tucson.
PHIL LATZMAN: Prison reform advocates are pushing for lawmakers to fund an ombudsman that would oversee Arizona's Department of Corrections. Lawmakers did establish an independent correctional oversight office a few years ago but they've yet to allocate any funding to make it operational. Brian Weidenhaus lobbies for prison reform at the state legislature. He told KJZZ's The Show the request is for $1.5 million.
BRIAN WEIDENHAUS: Which is a drop in the bucket compared to the overall DOC budget. We do understand that a budget process is complex and the state has limited resources, but this is very important.
PHIL LATZMAN: Weidenhaus cited concerns over healthcare and heat in prisons. The federal government recently took over the state's corrections healthcare system following a 14-year lawsuit.
A new study finds that climate change has increased the number of fire weather days in our region. Those days occur when a combination of hot, dry, and windy conditions linger for at least two hours. Since 1973 they have risen significantly in many counties across the Mountain West. Caitlin Trudeau is an applied climate scientist with Climate Central.
CAITLIN TRUDEAU: It's important to acknowledge that the fires we're seeing now are very, very different fires. And they are much larger, they burn faster, hotter, they're more destructive, and they're a lot harder for us to get a handle on.
PHIL LATZMAN: The increase in fire weather days is especially dramatic in Arizona, Nevada, and New Mexico. Those days not only heighten the risk for wildfires, they can also lead to power shutoffs and unhealthy air quality alerts.
Basketball, Mercury try to snap a two-game early skid; they'll host the Chicago Sky in Phoenix tonight. The Merc won their opener Saturday in Vegas against the defending champs but they've since dropped games against Golden State and Minnesota. Baseball, after losing two of three in Texas, the D-backs continue their road trip in Denver tonight starting a weekend series with the division rival Rockies. The Diamondbacks come in two games under five hundred, already five back of the Dodgers in the NL West. And in football, the NFL schedule's out. Cardinals will play six of their first nine games on the road. They'll start the season in LA against the Chargers; their home opener in week two against the defending Super Bowl champs and division rival Seattle Seahawks. And that'll do it for this edition of KJZZ's Sun Up, Arizona's morning news podcast on this Friday, May 15. I'm Phil Latzman. Have a wonderful weekend and we're back at you first thing on Monday.
