The Show for May 14, 2026: Sustainable growth for the West Valley, prison oversight and more

The West Valley has been seeing increased growth for a number of years. Business and elected leaders from that part of town will be talking about how to make sure that growth is sustainable. Plus, the effort to get funding for an Arizona prison oversight office.

Transcript

MARK BRODIE: Hi, I’m Mark Brodie, co-host of The Show, an original production from KJZZ. Every weekday, we bring you the latest news and culture from across the state. You can find much more at theshow.kjzz.org. Here’s today’s episode.

Good morning. It’s The Show here on KJZZ 91.5 in Phoenix. I’m Mark Brodie. Coming up, how West Valley leaders see sustainable development in their part of town. And a new book looks to shed new light on a shooting on the Navajo Nation from Arizona’s early days as a state.

But first, a new report from the Arizona Auditor General’s office finds problems with how the state’s universal school voucher program is administered could put taxpayer money at risk. Formally called Empowerment Scholarship Accounts, or ESAs, they allow any student in Arizona to collect money that can be used to pay tuition at a private school or to be used for homeschooling. More than 100,000 students currently use the program.

With me now to talk about what the audit found and how education officials are responding is KJZZ’s Wayne Schutsky from the politics desk. Good morning, Wayne.

WAYNE SCHUTSKY: Good morning.

MARK BRODIE: So what are some of the key takeaways from this report?

WAYNE SCHUTSKY: One of the big ones was that essentially, the Department of Education is not auditing these purchases in a way, in the way that they said they were. A lot of listeners might remember that a while back, there was a huge backlog in getting reimbursements approved for these families. They were waiting months. They were complaining.

So Superintendent Tom Horne decided that he was going to basically approve everything under $2,000 and then go back and do what they called a risk-based audit. So try and pull a sample of what seemed like risky transactions, make sure that they were appropriate after the fact, and pull back that money if they weren’t.

The Auditor General said that the department told them at one point that they were going, anywhere between 25% and 30% of those transactions they were going to audit. But when they actually looked at a five-week period in October last year, they found as few as 6% in a week getting —

MARK BRODIE: Ah. That’s a lot less.

WAYNE SCHUTSKY: And then up to about 25%, 26%, anywhere between those on the given week, so that they weren’t doing it correctly. And they also took issue with a lot of the ways they were identifying what’s a risky transaction. Just a kind of a — auditors telling the department that you’re not doing this quite right.

MARK BRODIE: Well, so I think that’s an important distinction, right? Because the Auditor General’s report didn’t necessarily find that there were problems, there was fraud in how people were spending the money. It seems like it was more telling the Department of Education how you are administering this could lead to that.

WAYNE SCHUTSKY: Yeah. There were definitely some unallowable expenses that were identified, as well as some overpayments, things like that. But it was a relatively small fraction of what the Auditor General looked at.

But yeah, it was more of those processes. It was that we don’t know what we don’t know, and the way you’re auditing isn’t going to identify a lot of these problems. So whether it’s not looking at enough transactions like you said you were or not following up. The audit said there were even times when the department identified at some point a transaction but either took months and months and months to actually follow up and find out whether it was good or didn’t follow up at all.

And they said they ... took a, a random sampling of like 60-plus transactions in over two years since the program went into effect. And of the $250,000 spent on those transactions, they found $83,000 had potential issues. A small amount of those were actual unallowables, but then there was others that potentially could have been unallowable and needed further investigation, didn’t have the right documentation — which is required by the program, say like an invoice for tuition.

So all those things. So 34%. Now, they said that’s not necessarily representative of the whole. They’re not saying there’s a 34% error rate across the entire program. But they said this does prove that maybe these processes aren’t as tight as they should be.

MARK BRODIE: What did Tom Horne, the superintendent of public instruction who runs the Education Department, have to say about this?

WAYNE SCHUTSKY: He more or less said, “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

MARK BRODIE: OK.

WAYNE SCHUTSKY: He said the program’s, program’s being run appropriately, and there was a lengthy response within the Auditor General’s report from the department where ... there’s some barbed responses in there where they kind of said, “We’ve tried to explain this to you, and you just don’t understand what we’re doing.”

They said that 30% of transactions is a fluctuating amount, depending on how much time we have, how many transactions are coming in. That’s a goal, but it can change. So basically, just kind of dismissed it and said that he believes that they’re doing a good job.

MARK BRODIE: Horne has been saying for a while that he would like to be able to do more actual auditing, but he just doesn’t have the staff. Like, the Legislature doesn’t give him enough money to hire the staff. Was that part of the response also?

WAYNE SCHUTSKY: Yeah, that was littered throughout there. They actually tacitly kind of agreed with some stuff that the Auditor General said, which is that you don’t actually have any of these processes written down. So, you don’t have like a guide that just says, “This is how we do this.”

And basically, they said, “Yeah, we don’t have the staff.” This staff has not grown much since the program expanded from around 12,000 students back before universal expansion to today, as you mentioned, 100,000 students. The staff has hardly grown since then.

So a lot of people agree that they don’t have enough staff to do this. And so, he said, “Yeah, things like documentation, we would love to do that, but we’re literally just have to do day’s operations. Like, that’s all we have people for. If we get more people, then we’d love to put people on that.”

MARK BRODIE: What have folks at the state Legislature had to say? Obviously, the Legislature is away from the Capitol for a little bit, but I would imagine that, you know, this is always such a hot button issue among legislators. I’m imagining they had stuff to say about this.

WAYNE SCHUTSKY: Yeah, yeah, we’ve gotten a lot of responses. Democrats — who have obviously been critical of the program wanting to rein it in, saying it’s unaccountable — have said that this justifies a full audit of the program. As I said, the transactions they looked at so far aren’t really representative of the whole, according to the Auditor General’s report.

So now Democrats want a full audit of all program, so we can finally kind of get a concrete idea of exactly how much fraud, mess ups, all this different stuff — how many errors there are in this program that’s using lots of taxpayer money.

And I did get a response from House Speaker Steve Montenegro (R-Goodyear), who didn’t quite go that far, but he did say that, you know, these concerns are serious and that he would like to see them acted upon, the Auditor General’s recommendations, pretty quickly.

MARK BRODIE: So, did the department in its response say that it was going to make any changes or try to tighten anything up that the Auditor General’s office found needed tightening?

WAYNE SCHUTSKY: I mean, not really. In most cases they said, “You’re just pointing out things we’re already doing,” whereas the Auditor General was kind of saying, “Well, these are things you’re saying you’re doing, but in some cases, we didn’t find evidence of that.” Outside of the things like documenting the training process for their employees and the process for auditing stuff, they said, “If we get the staff, we would like to do that.”

MARK BRODIE: Well, so I guess then that leaves the question: Given where we are in the legislative session, does it look like there are any changes coming before next year?

WAYNE SCHUTSKY: I think it’s too soon to tell at this point. Obviously Montenegro’s statement didn’t dismiss this outright, so it’s, it could be part of budget negotiations. Something like a few years ago, they actually included in the state budget a requirement that the department work with the Auditor General’s office to develop their risk-based auditing process. So, it can be a part of the budget.

Notably, what this report pointed out is that the, the department is not complying with that. The Auditor General said, “They haven’t spoken to us. When they developed this after the fact for smaller purchases review, they did not consult us on how they created that.”

MARK BRODIE: Interesting. All right. Lots more to come on this, I suspect. That is Wayne Schutsky from KJZZ’s politics desk. Wayne, thanks as always.

WAYNE SCHUTSKY: Yep, thank you.

MARK BRODIE: Violence erupted among prisoners at the Arizona State Prison Complex-Eyman late last month. Multiple people were injured, and Arizona Correctional Peace Officers Association President Carlos Garcia called it a, quote, "full-blown riot." And earlier this month, report surfaced that as many as 200 prisoners at Perryville, the women’s complex in Arizona, went on a hunger strike for nearly three weeks. It comes as two GOP lawmakers are trying to get some crucial funding for a prison oversight office. Representative Walt Blackman and Senator Shanna Bolick want $1.5 million to fund the newly created Independent Correctional Oversight Office. Lawmakers created the office, and the governor signed it into law a few years ago, but without any funding to make it operational. Bryan Widenhouse also wants that office funded. He’s an advocate for prison reforms as state legislative affairs manager for FAMM, or Families Against Mandatory Minimums. And he knows the issues intimately. He spent more than three decades behind bars. He was sentenced to life without parole at age 17 but was granted parole in 2020 after the Supreme Court outlawed life sentences like that for juveniles. My co-host, Lauren Gilger, spoke with him more about life behind bars and how it led him to his work today.

BRYAN WIDENHOUSE: Obviously, things like hunger strikes and riots do bubble up into the news. But as someone who works at FAMM, we're connected to tens of thousands of families across the country. And so we constantly hear firsthand from them what their loved ones are actually experiencing on the inside, much of what the general public will never hear about.

But across the country, our prison systems are in a bit of a crisis. They're severely understaffed, overcrowded, and there's a lot of issues going on that the public is not widely aware of. And we just feel that there just needs to be a little more attention to what's going on and how we can take corrective measures.

LAUREN GILGER: So, I mean like when you see, you know, news of a hunger strike or a riot breaking out in a prison, like what are prisoners trying to tell us when these things happen?

BRYAN WIDENHOUSE: Right. So, it's very difficult for people who are incarcerated to get the attention of media, of lawmakers, of the public. And probably historically, the, the best way to achieve that is through hunger strikes. It draws the attention because it does trigger certain responses. You know, the, the administration and staff can't ignore it. There's certain things in reporting that has to happen.

You know, it could be their, their rights are being violated or the conditions are abhorrent, it's unsafe, for a variety of reasons. But that is the mechanism to getting their voices out.

LAUREN GILGER: Yeah. So, Bryan, I want to back up for a moment here and talk about your own story and background that led you to this work, right? Like, you were incarcerated for many, many years. You were sent to prison on a life sentence as a, as a teenager, and then let out when the Supreme Court decided that wasn't a policy we would support in this country anymore, right?

BRYAN WIDENHOUSE: That's correct. You know, as a person who was incarcerated with a life sentence, that was it. I was sent to prison there to live the rest of my life and die there. The only way, as many people who are in the system today, the only way that we ever can change our circumstances is through a change in the law or some kind of legislative remedy. In this case, it's a Supreme Court decision.

But that's not — I think we need to have a more open mind to reviewing laws and sentences that have been passed down. You know, we — our country went through a very tough-on-crime era.

And you know, we've learned a lot since those days, both in corrections and in crime. And sometimes, it, it's good to go back and review some of these decisions, some of these laws. And when we've done so, as in the case with juvenile life sentences, right, we've been able to pivot and—and make some changes.

Close to 1,200, I believe, juvenile lifers who have been released, and the recidivism rate is—is minuscule, like 2% maybe.

LAUREN GILGER: Wow. So, I mean, tell us about — I mean, what it was like when you were in prison for so long. I mean, were you part of, a part of a hunger strike at some point? Did you see those happen? Was there a riot when you were in prison? What were the conditions like?

BRYAN WIDENHOUSE: In 31 years, you pretty much seen it all. I have seen some hunger strikes. I have seen some small riots, uprisings, you know, what constitutes a riot. You know, everybody has their own definition, but I've seen it all.

You know, people do — when you're under that kind of suppression and nobody's hearing you or seeing you, people do get desperate. And it's not attention that, "Hey, you know, have pity on me." It's an attention that says, "Hey, please, you know, this is not right. We need some help." You know, it, it's a cry for help in some instances, not every instance, but in some instances, yes, I've seen that, cry for help.

LAUREN GILGER: So, I know you work with various states on advocacy for prison policies. So let's talk a little bit about what's been happening in recent years in Arizona prisons.

Obviously, our prison healthcare system has been under scrutiny in court for a very long time and now is under federal receivership. That is a part of probably what leads to some of the issues in prisoners, if people are sick and can't get the help they need?

BRYAN WIDENHOUSE: Yeah, there are a number of factors. One that's rising a lot in this day and age, especially in Southern prisons, is the, the prison heat during the summers. You know, we don't approach the idea of an ombudsman or oversight from a critical standpoint. We think it's good governance. We think it's uh leads to better efficiency, best practices and gives legislators, the administration, the knowledge and tools that they need to make the best informed decisions.

LAUREN GILGER: Right, and lawmakers here did, you know, pass legislation to create an office of oversight over the Department of Corrections, but it's still un-funded. We've seen advocates, a couple of GOP lawmakers push for putting some money behind that so it can be effective.

But I mean, have you seen success with those in other states?

BRYAN WIDENHOUSE: Very much so. Our organization, FAMM, has supported and worked closely with some ombuds offices in other states who have found that right balance. I think when we think of oversight, most people tend to think of somebody who's just looking over your shoulder trying to hold you accountable and, and see what you're doing wrong.

But there's a proper right balance where it really works and it's a good, you know, mutual beneficial relationship between legislature, the agent— corrections department, and the ombuds, and, and the families who are impacted. And so, some great examples are Indiana, New Jersey, Hawaii, Washington.

LAUREN GILGER: Right now, I mentioned there are some lawmakers who are pushing for some funding for this oversight department, this office of oversight over Department of Corrections.

Where is that process stand now? We're still kind of looking at the budget as up in the air at this moment, but are you hopeful that is something that can get some funding?

BRYAN WIDENHOUSE: We are very hopeful, crossing our fingers here. It's an important issue with us. So, the office was created last year, but it needs funding to begin. And there's a request for $1.5 million, 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.

LAUREN GILGER: Let me ask you lastly, Bryan, about the role you think for-profit companies play in, in corrections, right? Like, so many of our prisons are not state-run. They are run by, you know, for-profit companies that the state contracts with and pays a whole lot of money to to to run these these prisons for them, corrections in general.

Do you think that that has changed the game, changed the conversation in corrections in the time probably that you were incarcerated?

BRYAN WIDENHOUSE: Interesting. You know, as an advocate and as somebody who tries to work with the legislator, the government agencies, the Department of Corrections, I don't ever want to be critical of people or their operations.

But I will say that we do see some disturbing or alarming concerns when it come from some for-profit, some medical issues. You know, from my own personal experiences having been in the system in a state-run system in close proximity to a private system, there's there's huge differences in how they operate and the culture and environment. And I just, without being critical of agencies or the use of them, I would just say there's a lot to to be concerned about there.

LAUREN GILGER: Okay, we'll leave it there. Bryan Widenhouse is state legislative affairs manager for FAMM, Families Against Mandatory Minimums. Bryan, thank you for coming on the show. Thank you for your perspective here, I really appreciate it.

BRYAN WIDENHOUSE: Thank you for having me.

MARK BRODIE: Good morning. It’s The Show on KJZZ 91.5. I’m Mark Brodie. Coming up, we’ll take a look at portraits featuring Black outlaw motorcycle clubs as bastions of freedom.

ALANNA AIRITAM: How could these men back in the late ’50s experience this level of freedom that they’re talking about when, you know, there’s still sundown towns that they’re having to ride through or, you know, use the Green Book?

MARK BRODIE: We’ll hear about a Tucson photographer’s latest project.

But first, a West Valley advocacy group will be hosting an economic development summit today. This year’s gathering put on by Westernmarck will focus on sustainable growth in the West Valley and includes panels featuring business and elected officials. Sintra Hoffman is Westernmarck’s president and CEO. I spoke with her earlier about the summit and asked what sustainable growth in the West Valley means to her.

SINTRA HOFFMAN: I think as everyone knows, the West Valley has really been on fire over the last five or six years. And this is where the growth is happening. So as we start to manage with limited resources, how are we going to really balance all of those needs? We have a lot of uh technology companies coming in and we really are shaping up to be that next Silicon Valley within the greater region and then specifically with some of the investments in the West Valley. So how do we do that in a mindful and balanced and collaborative manner because we’re bringing in these great projects that also require our resources, our natural resources?

MARK BRODIE: So are you thinking then about sort of the standard things that most cities, including others, you know, in the valley think about in terms of land use and infrastructure and water and electricity and things like that?

SINTRA HOFFMAN: Absolutely. And that is the type of discussion that we are going to have. We have two panels put together as well as a TED talk, and that’s what they’re really going to revolve around is what are some of the power and water needs, um how are we going to make sure that we have the the resources that are needed based on the companies that are coming in? So if these companies are coming in requiring resources that maybe require a little bit more dialogue and balanced into how are we going to actually put this together, that’s an important discussion to happen. And there are different ways. Um, for data centers, for example, um that’s all of a sudden become a very dirty word. But um, the reality is we we’re we’re in a tech economy. And so these are some things that, you know, maybe needed, but how do we do it in a balanced and respectful way, respectful to the the communities and the neighborhoods and so on? Because in, you know, 5, 10 years, we have to make sure that our cell phones are still connecting and, you know, we can still dial up to the internet and so on.

MARK BRODIE: All right, so I’m glad you brought up data centers because it sounded like that’s what you were describing before—before you named them. And obviously, the West Valley has kind of been in the headlines recently for proposed projects that a lot of folks in that part of town don’t necessarily want, and, you know, there are communities that are looking to—to bring in data centers. How do you see that particular industry maybe shaping your part of the valley for the next, you know, number of years?

SINTRA HOFFMAN: You know, communities go through an evolution process, and when they are still growing or when they’re when they start to grow or when they’re still in that growth mode, data centers and other industrial projects may be um very attractive to them because they’re still, you know, trying to make that name. And as we get more mature and we have um we’re starting to elevate the types of companies that are coming in, we can be a little bit more selective. And I feel that that’s kind of what’s happened in the West Valley and what is going on. What makes it interesting at this time is although, you know, we do feel that we are a community that’s that’s bringing in and attracting that next level type of uh economic development, what’s happening in terms of the types of companies that are coming in, again, they are tech-based, you know. AI is not going anywhere. It’s only getting bigger. And so how do we start to manage uh the need for that type of uh data storage and things like that with maybe a company or a usage that we’re not crazy about? I think there is a way that or there is the need for um for our communities to come together with some of these users, uh with some of these data centers that are coming in, and figure out what is that right balance. Because again, it’s really part of our economic growth.

MARK BRODIE: So you and I have talked in the past about the kinds of industries that you’re looking to bring to the West Valley, and—you mentioned tech just now. We’ve talked in the past about things, for example, like uh infrastructure projects and logistics and manufacturing, things like that. I wonder if those kinds of industries pose any particular either challenges or opportunities specifically in the area of sustainability, like what you’ll be talking about at the summit.

SINTRA HOFFMAN: One area that I think, you know, we’ve all seen no matter what part of the valley you’re in, but we’re definitely seeing this in the West Valley is um more interstate con—congestion, um more traffic on the on the interstates, more traffic on our local roads and things like that. And, you know, again, that’s going to—that’s going to come with, you know, the the movement of or the increase in in people moving to the region, as well as the types of companies that are coming in. Um, you know, freight mobility is really important. That’s how we’re getting things around and, you know, everyone’s ordering from Amazon. Well, guess what? Those things have to come in on our roads. So I think it’s really important to understand that with the—with the economic growth, with the residential growth, we’re also going to be in greater demand for those services. And it is important to invest in our infrastructure. One of the great things, we’re fortunate that the voters of Maricopa County recently passed Proposition 479, and that is a 20-year plan that will help us build additional roadways, freeways, and um transit projects throughout greater Maricopa County. Specifically in the West Valley, there are some key projects that are coming in that will help, you know, manage that that congestion that we’re dealing with right now. So I think infrastructure really is key, and I always say I’m an infrastructure geek. But the reason why is because if we don’t have and we if we don’t have basic infrastructure, great roadways, um great freeways, we’re not going to attract these companies. If you take a look at a map of the investments or the employment throughout the valley, you’ll notice that the the vast majority of them are located along the freeway system. So that is a key thing for us to talk about at this economic development summit.

MARK BRODIE: When you think about sustainability in the West Valley, is there one aspect of it that you are maybe more concerned about than others?

SINTRA HOFFMAN: I think everyone’s concerned about um water. Obviously, that is—we live in a desert, and as we continue to grow, we have to be mindful of how we’re using that um resource. Are we employing um sustainable options to be able to really uh continue the growth and manage our our water portfolio? So I think that would be—water would be the key one that I think is not only on my mind, but the mind of the regions. And—and I think the good thing is that because it’s on our mind, it’s something that we continue to uh galvanize around and work uh towards solutions together.

MARK BRODIE: All right. That is Sintra Hoffman, president and CEO of Westernmarck. Sintra, thanks as always. I appreciate it.

SINTRA HOFFMAN: Thank you.

MARK BRODIE: Good morning. It’s The Show on KJZZ 91.5. I’m Mark Brodie. In 1919, trader Charles Hubble of the Hubble Trading Post family was shot and killed on the Navajo Nation. Two Navajo men were convicted of the murder. They were the sons of a Navajo man known as Gunshooter. But subsequent research, including oral stories, show problems with the case and how it was litated. That research is contained in the new book, "The Sons of Gunshooter: A Navajo Resistance Story. "It has two authors, former journalist Matt Fitzsimons and Dorothy Denetclaw, who is Navajo and is also the granddaughter of Gunshooter and the niece of the men involved in the shooting. I spoke with both of them earlier and asked Matt what drew him to the story.

MATT FITZSIMONS: Sure. I had been looking into the history of the Hubbells, and a lot of people in the Southwest are familiar with Hubbell Trading Post. And the Hubbells were very prominent family of traders, and they've always been characterized as these wonderful, benevolent folks.

And in researching my first book, I came across a lot of references connecting them to some of the worst atrocities of the Long Walk. So I thought, here's, here's kind of an interesting gap between the truth and the myth. And in the course of the research, I came across a, a case involving a shooting where J.L. Hubbell's brother Charlie was shot to death in Arizona in 1919. And Dorothy's uncles were arrested in that case.

And right from the start, what I saw in the accounts that were in the press and in various books didn't sound right to me. And so I reached out and got a hold of Dorothy and and asked her if she was up for reinvestigating the case.

MARK BRODIE: Dorothy, what appealed to you about reinvestigating this case?

DOROTHY DENETCLAW: Hopeful to tell what my father told me in Navajo. He told me stories about everything that happened with his family, and going back to 1840s history. And then he talked to me, and one of it was the Hubbell, where his brothers shot Hubbell.

And I was ready to go and I told, I told Matt everything, and he took it from there.

MARK BRODIE: How closely to what you were able to find through the research, Dorothy, was what your father had told you? Like, had, had he been pretty accurate in the stories that he had told you?

DOROTHY DENETCLAW: I was — I never saw an Anglo, I've never heard an English word while I was a child. All the way up to 9 years old. And he — until I was put in boarding school.

So he told me everything. He didn't go to school, and so every story he told was in Navajo with no paperwork, nothing to back it up. He just told us the story, and that's what I've — I got interested, so I started writing, I started finding out. But I, I didn't have anything to back my story up. No, until I, I told Matt everything.

MARK BRODIE: Matt, what did it mean to you and to the project to have some of these first- or second-person accounts from people who were related to the sort of the, the protagonists of the story?

MATT FITZSIMONS: Oh, Mark, it's crucial. We've been in our book talks, I've been bringing along some books, other books that discuss the case. And going through them and they all tell these wildly inaccurate and wildly different versions of what happened.

And that's the case for a lot of Diné studies. It's only been in the last 30 years that Diné people themselves and Diné scholars are presenting the history. So we're really in the early stages of kind of going back and revisiting a lot of these stories.

And you asked Dorothy how closely the evidence matched up with the account her family gave her. It, it matched up exactly. I'll, I'll give you an example is Dorothy told me that the posse was able to trail her uncles because one of the horses was missing a shoe. And we were able to corroborate that. We were able to find exactly which shoe was missing, it's in the book. So there's no daylight at all between the archival evidence and and what Dorothy's family has been saying for the last 100 years. It's the books written by outsiders and the newspaper articles that were wildly off the mark.

MARK BRODIE: Dorothy, among the stories that your father would tell you, how big of a role did this particular incident play in that? Like, was this a, a big part of family lore for you when you were growing up?

DOROTHY DENETCLAW: Yes, my father told us the Navajo way of life and what, you know, what our forefathers taught. The ethics is what really held the family together. And when this shooting took place, he was already there, there, that played a lot in the why it happened and everything. And my father talked about it, but they just believe in the, in their spiritual beliefs, in their ceremonial ways. And that's what carried them through.

MARK BRODIE: Matt, you mentioned that, you know, a lot of folks in this part of the world have heard of Hubbell Trading Post or maybe heard of, of the family in other ways.

I'm curious, based on your conversations with Dorothy and the other research you've done, how has that sort of changed your perspective on their role in sort of the history of the West and of Arizona and sort of, you know, settling this part of the country, Western settlement of this part of the country?

MATT FITZSIMONS: Well, certainly, I think the Hubbells were more predatory than they've been made out to be.

On the other hand, though, really the, the interesting thing was once I met Dorothy, the, the focus of the book became less about them and much more about her family, you know, her grandfather Gunshooter, in addition to being a very prominent medicine man, was one of the first police officers in Leupp. And as she mentioned, this, the ethics and the principles that got them through the struggles, I think really in a lot of ways, this book became the story of how they preserved that and preserved their lifeways against the onslaught of colonization.

As far as Hubbell Trading Post goes, a lot of people say, "Well, what do you think of Hubbell Trading Post?" You know, the — I think the signage could use some work and, and some recentering on the community. But if you go there, the rangers already center the narrative on on the community. The rangers are all Diné. And you can walk in and see people buying goods, still speaking Diné Bizaad. And the art is beautiful. So I think if you just go to Hubbell Trading Post and you focus on the community and the art, and the incredible culture that's been preserved, it's still a place to go and celebrate.

MARK BRODIE: Dorothy, what kinds of things did your father tell you about your uncles, about the people who were involved in the shooting?

DOROTHY DENETCLAW: Well, one of, one of the key things that everybody knows is that the trader that was put there wanted a store of his own, and he was an alcoholic. And so when the two boys came to trade, they were raised being honest, their father was and everything, so they came in and they, they did everything. "We want our change back." The trader didn't give it, and then it ended up in this squabble where he ran to the back and got a gun and shot first. And then the older one reached in and got a gun from the shelf that he was standing at, and he went and shot the trader. He was all, the trader was already drunk.

MARK BRODIE: Dorothy, I'm wondering if some part of working on this project was maybe — and I hope this isn't insulting in any way — but I wonder if it's sort of a spiritual connection for you back to generations of your family who are, I presume, not with us anymore.

DOROTHY DENETCLAW: Yes, yes, yes. We live, I was taught that we live with spirit all around us, in plants. We believe in Mother Nature, Mother Earth and Father Sun. That comes from these medicine men. So, our spiritual connection to Mother Earth is a living — Mother Earth lives. And there's spirits everywhere that lives with us, including our forefathers.

MARK BRODIE: Matt, I'm wondering what you hope people who read this book take away from it, especially sort of going back to what you said earlier about some of the misconceptions that people had about the Hubbells and sort of what they were about.

MATT FITZSIMONS: I think, you know, I think the history is still wonderful if you look at it in the light of all that's still here, you know. The Hubbells are gone, but the artwork is still here, the culture's still here. Dorothy's still speaking her language, you know, her family was able to successfully maintain their lifeways against this 100-year onslaught. And so I think that gives us a lot to celebrate.

MARK BRODIE: Matt Fitzsimons is a former journalist and co-author of the book "The Sons of Gunshooter: A Navajo Resistance Story." Dorothy Denetclaw is also a co-author of the book and is the granddaughter of Gunshooter.

MARK BRODIE: Good morning. It’s The Show on KJZZ 91.5. I’m Mark Brodie. Tucson photographer Alanna Airitam’s latest project features an unlikely subject for art that ends up on gallery walls, members of Black outlaw motorcycle clubs. She’s calling it Black Diamonds and says it celebrates these often stereotyped men as a sort of modern-day nobility. In her portraits, the men are decked out in their best motorcycle club attire and they stand in front of traditional-looking painted backdrops, sometimes in their garages, sometimes in the Tucson desert. And they’re all taken at night. My co-host, Lauren Gilger, spoke with Aritam more about the project and her inspiration for it.

ALANNA AIRITAM: We hear about these clubs like Hell’s Angels or Outlaws, and I was curious because when I see segregated groups—and not that they’re segregated now, but historically, these groups were segregated. And I was really curious, well, like where—where were the Black men, you know? And so then I was introduced to these other clubs like Chosen Few, like East Bay Dragons, you know. These kind of clubs that were historically Black. And why they formed. A lot of these biker clubs were formed after World War II. There was a sort of like a surplus of Harley Davidsons available and they were basically just giving them away. Um, and that’s where a lot of these clubs started to build and form. But the Black men, I kept wondering, like how could they have joined a club during a time like that? You can’t just join the Hell’s Angels when you’re a Black man, right? Um, so I was really curious, it just like piqued my curiosity and I wanted to dig into why these clubs were important. So they had to build their own spaces, they had to build their own communities, they had to build their own sort of protection of safety around them, this community so they could ride across the country safely.

LAUREN GILGER: Hm. And Chosen Few, the Chosen Few Motorcycle Club that you kind of profile many members of here is—is famous for being the first integrated one, right? And this goes back to like the ’60s.

ALANNA AIRITAM: Yeah. Chosen Few started in ’59 and in ’61, they received their first uh non-Black member. Um, so they— they uh— (Laughter) In these motorcycle clubs, you’re given a name, right? And um this guy down the street from the clubhouse walked by and was like, “Hey, I want to—I want to join your club.” They’re like, “OK.” So they named him White Boy Art. And he became the first member—white member of the Chosen Few, and it just integrated from there, which was uh a huge thing at the time because these clubs really went by prison rules, right? Like if somebody got locked up in the system, you needed protection in those spaces. And if you are a Black man in a white club or a white man in a Black club when you’re in the incarcerated system, like you’re not protected. There’s nobody there to protect you. So, that’s why historically they went by these types of rules. Um so for Art to join this—this club, he actually received a—a lot of um a lot of violence and a lot of harassment towards him for being a member of a Black club. And so, was—was given a whole lot more respect for basically having to sort of bravery and—and audacity to—to do such a thing and to—and to protect his brothers like this.

LAUREN GILGER: Yeah. Okay, so this is radio, so I’ll ask you to describe these—these photographs that you have taken for us a little bit. They’re—they’re really striking, they look almost like paintings to me. And they evoke sort of old-fashioned, maybe 1800s era paintings of, you know, noblemen. Like, you’ve got these men posing in their kind of official attire in various landscapes or with backdrops pinned up behind them. Describe these for us.

ALANNA AIRITAM: Sure. So, you know, I’m making decisions for these portraits that really work with the narrative of the story that I’m trying to share with the audience. And so, you know, sitting in the garages and listening to these stories, the—the idea of freedom just kept coming up over and over and over again. And, you know, again, this sort of piqued my curiosity around like how could these men back in the late ’50s experience this level of freedom that they’re talking about when, you know, there’s still sundown towns that they’re having to ride through or, you know, use the Green Book and, you know, it’s police brutality everywhere that you go? Like how could they possibly have had that freedom? So this idea of freedom was really very prevalent. And as I was thinking about that and thinking about these men riding across the country in this sort of conquerable landscape, it really brought me back to this like, you know, Hudson River school painting type—type style, you know, and this—this Americana, this open land, right? And so I wanted to sort of bring this in, this idea of freedom. And so I have these backdrops that are reminiscent of those types of paintings. And they are backdrops, like they look like backdrops in the scene. They’re crumpled, they’re sort of um, some of them are held up by clamps, some of them are—

LAUREN GILGER: You can see the edges, yeah.

ALANNA AIRITAM: —you can see the edges. I mean, there’s some of the brothers are actually literally holding up this idea of freedom behind them. And this specter of freedom sort of follows these men in through their landscapes, through their towns, through their garages, through their clubhouses. Like this idea of freedom is always there behind them. Um so I wanted to also bring in a sense of uh nobility and respect to these men to sort of try to break the stereotype. You know, I’ve—I’ve been really fortunate to have the access that I have into these spaces because no—nobody gets this kind of access. Um, Hunter S. Thompson kind of ruined it for— for everybody. (Laughter) With the Hell’s Angels. And so, you know, I take this very seriously. And the men that I’ve met are so incredible, like the warmest, most welcoming group of people. They run the gamut, some of them are rocket scientists, some of them are, you know, museum directors, like there’s—there’s all kinds of men involved in in this group. And, um, and I just really wanted to show them as dignified human beings and not this scary stereotype that we that we put on them.

LAUREN GILGER: Yeah, 100%. What do they think about these? Like, the— some of these men who you have photographed in these ways, like what were their reactions when they saw them?

ALANNA AIRITAM: You know, I had a show uh, the first time I showed this work was at uh Etherton Gallery in Tucson and, and I was so excited that uh many of the men were able to come to the show. And because I don’t really think that they understood what I was doing as I was making these—these images. I mean, everybody understood they were making a photo with me, but I don’t think they understood what was happening to this work, what this work was about. And, and a lot of these men haven’t, you know, spent a lot of time in these art spaces, you know. They—they don’t necessarily frequent the museums or the art galleries, right? And so that evening, during the opening, it was incredible to see their faces see themselves in this way on this wall, you know, in the white box with the frame and the light and all the people. I think it was like they saw themselves very differently than I think that they had seen themselves before.

LAUREN GILGER: Yeah. Well, it’s fascinating. What a—what a gratifying moment, I’m sure, for you.

ALANNA AIRITAM: Yeah.

LAUREN GILGER: All right, we’ll have to leave it there. That is Alanna Airitam, a photographer and artist based in Tucson, joining us to talk about her work, Black Diamonds. Alanna, thank you so much for coming back on the show. Thank you very much, I appreciate you taking the time.

ALANNA AIRITAM: Thanks, Lauren, I really enjoyed it. Thanks.

MARK BRODIE: Thanks for listening to The Show’s podcast. The Show is produced by Sativa Peterson, Nick Sanchez, Amber Victoria Singer, Athena Ankrah and Ayana Hamilton. The Show was created by Jon Hoban, our executive producer is Amy Silverman. You can find much more of the show and sign up for our newsletter at theshow.kjzz.org. You can also find us on Instagram at @kjzztheshow.