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
ANNOUNCER: KJZZ’s Sun Up is supported by Banner Health, Arizona’s largest nonprofit healthcare system. Last year, Banner reinvested more than $1.1 billion in community health and charity care. Banner Health, nonprofit for Arizona.bannerhealth.com/nonprofitforAZ.
PHIL LATZMAN: Greetings, Arizona news consumers. 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 brought to you daily as a digest of Arizona news reported by our KJZZ news team, and supported, of course, by you.
It is Tuesday, Aug. 11. Thanks for being here today. Got a little relief from the heat overnight and some rain across the Valley, and hoping for some more. And let’s check the news as we get started.
Well, Corporation Commission candidate, Ralph Heap, is facing another campaign finance complaint. Now he’s accused of failing to disclose who paid to collect thousands of voter signatures he used to qualify for the ballot. From the politics desk, Wayne Schutsky has the latest.
WAYNE SCHUTSKY: A complaint filed by the Arizona Public Integrity Alliance claims that most of Heap’s 15,000 signatures were collected by individuals tied to paid circulation companies. Heap disclosed paying around $7,000 for signature-gathering efforts, but the complaint estimated those signatures should have cost him at least $29,000. Heap’s attorney, Timothy La Sota, denied those allegations and similar claims made in a separate complaint accusing him of failing to disclose who paid for campaign signs. In that case, La Sota says the sign company extended Heap a line of credit. But, according to the Clean Elections Commission, lines of credit should still be disclosed on campaign finance reports. Wayne Schutsky, KJZZ News, Phoenix.
PHIL LATZMAN: Water levels in Lake Mead are now the lowest they have been since the reservoir was filled in the 1930s. The reservoir, which is held back by Hoover Dam, generates hydropower and stores water for cities and farms. Jack Schmidt studies the Colorado River at Utah State University.
JACK SCHMIDT: Right now, the complications are really with reservoir recreation, the marinas, but we’re only 5 feet above genuine conflicts with the production of electricity. It’s not a good situation.
PHIL LATZMAN: The federal government is soon expected to release a new plan that would keep more water in Lake Mead by cutting the amount that flows to Arizona, California, and Nevada.
Over the weekend, a tribe in southern Arizona warned that border wall contractors may soon encroach upon their lands. As Gabriel Pietrorazio reports, the tribe says it’s ready to deal with trespassers.
GABRIEL PIETRORAZIO: According to the Tohono O’odham code, the tribe may impose up to a $5,000 fine for civil trespassing. Tribal police would escort any offender off the reservation. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security is looking to erect a border wall there. The Tohono O’odham Nation has sued, claiming its sovereignty would be violated should the Trump administration be allowed to proceed. While Customs and Border Protection is aware of the tribe’s warning, the federal agency declined to comment due to ongoing litigation. Gabriel Pietrorazio, KJZZ News, Phoenix.
PHIL LATZMAN: Arizona’s Senate leader changed his mind about trying to redraw Arizona’s congressional district lines. Also from the politics team, Camryn Sanchez has more on that.
CAMRYN SANCHEZ: In April, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that sections of the Voting Rights Act are unconstitutional, making it illegal to take race into consideration in redistricting. Following that decision, Arizona Senate President Warren Petersen said he and other GOP legislators plan to file a lawsuit this year to require the commission tasked with drawing Arizona’s lines to redraw them. Petersen said Monday, that’s not the plan anymore.
WARREN PETERSEN: Their sentiment — the current Redistricting Commission — was that the lines would be very similar. So, a lawsuit probably wouldn’t make much sense.
CAMRYN SANCHEZ: Petersen says his change of mind is not because the new districts could be drawn in a way that actually favors Democrats more. Camryn Sanchez, KJZZ News, Phoenix.
PHIL LATZMAN: Proponents of a ballot measure which would ban transgender students from using bathrooms that don’t match their biological sex want the Secretary of State to investigate a website opposing the measure. Supporters of the measure, Prop. 318, have a website called Protect Girl Sports in AZ. A competing website called Protect Girl Sports AZ looks very similar, but tells people to vote no. Representative Alexander Kolodin says opponents have stooped to misleading tactics because their position isn’t popular.
ALEXANDER KOLODIN: What father out there wants their minor child, their minor daughter, in a bathroom with somebody with male anatomy?
PHIL LATZMAN: Prop. 318 supporters argue their opponents’ failure to disclose who’s paying for the website is a violation of Arizona’s campaign finance laws.
A new study has identified what researchers have dubbed "snow-eater heat waves." The early-season weather patterns are making water supplies less predictable. The Mountain West News Bureau’s Kaleb Roedel reports.
KALEB ROEDEL: During unusually hot spring days, a big dome of high pressure sits over the mountains, and temperatures don’t dip below freezing, even overnight. Normally, spring snow melts a little during the day and refreezes at night, but when it doesn’t refreeze, the whole snowpack heats up and melts fast, sometimes at nearly double the normal rate. Dan McEvoy, with the nonprofit Desert Research Institute, helped lead the study. He says that surge of water can catch reservoir operators off guard.
DAN MCEVOY: Is there room in the reservoir, you know, they’re used to it more slowly coming down the system, and then that rapid melt is going to have a much higher potential to cause flooding if there’s enough snow left.
KALEB ROEDEL: And McEvoy says these heat waves are showing up more often and earlier in the spring because of climate change. For the Mountain West News Bureau, I’m Kaleb Roedel.
PHIL LATZMAN: The Interior Department is reviewing federal wilderness policies across millions of acres of public lands, saying it could expand recreation access. As Rachel Cohen reports, conservation groups are having some concerns.
RACHEL COHEN: The policies oversee designated wilderness, some of the most protected public lands, where motorized vehicles and equipment are generally banned. They also cover wilderness study areas, places that could, one day, receive wilderness designation from Congress. Michael Carroll is with the advocacy group the Wilderness Society. He says the review is broad and could change how these lands are managed.
MICHAEL CARROLL: Our deep concern is that they’re going to basically change those regulations to allow more development, more road building, more access to these wild places.
RACHEL COHEN: But some recreation groups say lands without an official wilderness designation are just locked up while awaiting Congress. They want more access for things like off-road vehicles. For the Mountain West News Bureau, I’m Rachel Cohen.
PHIL LATZMAN: Police in Apache Junction say one of their officers improperly used controversial technology called license plate readers, and is now off the force. Matthew Casey has details.
MATTHEW CASEY: First, Apache Junction police dispatchers reported to their supervisor that an officer asked them to run a family member’s license plate. Then, department leaders heard from another agency that he used license plate readers to find the family member. Police Chief Michael Pooley says there was an internal review, and the officer recently turned in his badge.
MICHAEL POOLEY: But had he not resigned, he would have been terminated. We understand what’s going on out there with this type of technology. We understand our officers, our profession is held to a very high standard.
MATTHEW CASEY: Pooley says Apache Junction police will continue using the roughly three dozen license plate readers around town. His decision comes after Chandler police and the Pinal County Sheriff’s Office recently announced plans to get rid of the cameras. Matthew Casey, KJZZ News, Phoenix.
PHIL LATZMAN: Looking south, in Hermosillo, officials have been turning to native trees to mitigate the city’s urban heat problem. As part of a nationwide effort across Mexico over the weekend, the state of Sonora added more plants to the fold. From the Fronteras Desk in Mexico, Nina Kravinsky has details.
NINA KRAVINSKY: The state of Sonora said it added 1,000 native plants on Sunday to a more than 400-acre natural area it’s hoping to restore into a “green lung” for the capital of Hermosillo. State officials said they will put in up to 13,000 native plants at the Cerro de la Cementera, which the state says will eventually be outfitted with walking and biking trails and recreational areas. The Hermosillo tree-planting day coincided with reforestation day events in states across Mexico. The goal of the national reforestation project, headed by Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum, is to plant 6.6 million trees and plants throughout the country. Nina Kravinsky, KJZZ News, Hermosillo.
PHIL LATZMAN: And in sports, Nolan Arenado hit a grand slam in the first inning against his former team as the Diamondbacks jumped on the Rockies early and shut them out 9-0 last night in Phoenix. Arizona moves eight games above .500 for the first time this year, and they remain in a tie with the Phillies for those final two National League wild card spots. The D-Backs try again tonight, second of three against Colorado at Chase Field.
Basketball, the Mercury try to snap a three-game losing streak. They return home from a road trip to host the LA Sparks. It’s their first meeting since the blockbuster trade that sent Kelsey Plum to Phoenix earlier this month, but she’ll miss the game with a leg injury.
And that’ll do it for this edition of KJZZ’s Sun Up, Arizona’s morning news podcast. On this Tuesday, Aug. 11, I’m Phil Latzman. Thanks for listening. Enjoy the rest of your day, and we will do it all again tomorrow. Talk to you then.
