McCain legislation benefits mining companies, hurts environment

Obama’s Agriculture Secretary Vilsack and Interior Secretary Salazar recently met in Arizona with proponents and opponents of McCain- sponsored copper mine “land swap” legislation. Mine supporters participated in the meetings, as did opponents such as local townspeople, Native Americans and conservationists.

Help, I’m doing a report on Arizona

Dear Editor,

Hello, my name is Vanessa Espinoza. I am a fifth grader at Napa Valley Language Academy in Napa, California.

The reason I am writing to you is that my class is doing state reports and I have chosen your magnificent state, Arizona.

Support for payday lenders grows where money flows

In the March 5 edition of the Arizona Capitol Times, three of the state’s chambers of commerce ran a full-page ad on page 2 supporting the “short-term consumer financing industry,” or in English, the payday lenders.

Day 2: Tracking the special session       

An open letter on health care to Sens. McCain and Kyl

Here we go again. I’ve lost track of what round this is over health care, but it doesn’t change the fact that the federal government cannot “mandate” American citizens to purchase health care coverage.

Tougher penalties needed for pedophiles

I am a local political activist. I brought up the issue of child endangerment to the local press during the school override election for Apache Junction Unified School District. I also raised the issue during city council meetings and in the blogs.

Third parties must print public notices

H2244 was appropriately defeated because, by definition, removing print publication of public notices defeats the very purpose of public publication of the notices. The intention is to provide as broad a public notice to the citizens as is economically and reasonably feasible without preferring, by the method of publication, which group should get the information while intentionally not providing notice to other citizens.

Keep the public noticed

If public notices were not published in newspapers, the community would not know about hearings, requests for proposals, companies that are forming and other actions by government.

Put Arizona prisoners to work on cleaning duty

I toured some our neighborhoods recently, and you know what I saw?

Feral cats everywhere. Does no one in this town care that these animals are potential reservoirs of diseases like rabies that might affect our children?

Western Union settlement a turning point in smuggling war

Our $94 million settlement with Western Union ranks as one of the most important legal agreements in Arizona’s history.