Lawmakers wrapped up their work at 8:25 p.m. on May 3 after nearly four months in session, having stashed away money for anticipated rainy days ahead, approved a sweeping measure that allows state workers to be more easily fired and fought on the unending battlefronts of abortion, taxation and border security.

And like the year before, lawmakers with conservative leanings shaped the agenda at the Capitol.

Investigators said Thursday they found a half dozen grenades among the military munitions in a suburban Phoenix home where a former Marine with ties to neo-Nazi groups shot four people and then took his own life.

A housing advocacy organization is planning to sue the state over a budget sweep of $50 million intended to help alleviate the effects of the foreclosure crisis.

Arizona lawmakers advanced tax cut legislation Thursday as they pushed to end their regular session, despite complaints that they courted danger by moving forward with proposals put on their desks just hours earlier.

Arizona lawmakers have rejected a revived proposal to allow Mohave County officials to abolish the police department in a northern Arizona community with a polygamist enclave.

A last-minute push to create the legal framework to reimburse recalled politicians for their campaign expenses died on the last day of session, after allies of former Sen. Russell Pearce failed to consolidate support behind the legislation.

The proposal could have paved the way for Pearce to get a reimbursement of more than $260,000 — the amount his campaign spent defending him last year, when he was ousted from the Senate in a recall election.

Gallardo yesterday led the Latino charge against the two recent FAIR Trust lawsuits against the IRC’s maps. With an eye directed primarily at the legislative map, he, Lopez and Quezada teamed up with Mary Rose Wilcox and attorney Danny Ortega to denounce the lawsuits as a dishonest and racist Republican attempt to maintain control of the Legislature.

WASHINGTON – It’s been more than a year since Arizona voters banned preferential treatment in state services based on race, ethnicity and gender – but little has changed on the state’s university campuses in that time.

Undergraduate enrollment officials say they never considered race in the first place – others say the schools were never selective enough for race to make a difference – and that minority enrollment has actually increased slightly.

Arizona has seen its revenue from tribal casinos rise for the seventh consecutive quarter.

The Arizona Department of Gaming reported Wednesday that tribes’ payments to the state will be about $24.3 million for the quarter that ended March 31.

Many considered Jason Todd Ready to be the most high-profile neo-Nazi in Arizona. He led groups of heavily armed civilians into the desert to look for illegal immigrants as he repeatedly tried to win public office.