A state’s 100th birthday only happens once, and the current budget crisis shouldn’t stop Arizona from ringing it in right, Gov. Jan Brewer said Feb. 17.

An effort to finance a new Spring Training stadium in Mesa for the Chicago Cubs through surcharges on rental cars and baseball tickets cleared its first hurdle today and won approval from a House panel, despite opposition from every other baseball team in the Cactus League and Major League Baseball Commissioner Bud Selig.

Democrats and Republicans already are scoping out sites for their 2012 national conventions, and this time around Phoenix is on both parties’ short lists.

Don’t blink while driving through Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport. You’ll miss your terminal and spend another 10 minutes looping around on a motorway modeled on one of those circles in hell.

But the future holds hope – at a cost of nearly $1.6 billion. It’s the automated people-mover, officially known as the PHX Sky Train.

The Arizona State Fair will still feature a petting zoo, livestock competitions, a pig race and a 1,000-pound swine named Harvey even though a few fairs elsewhere have cut back on contact with animals due to concerns about the H1N1 virus.

FLAGSTAFF – An administrative judge recommended Sept. 22 that Flagstaff be allowed to proceed with a plan to prevent train engineers from blasting their horns in town.

The Arizona Corporation Commission, which stepped in earlier this year to say the city needed its approval, tentatively is scheduled to consider the recommendation at its Oct. 8 meeting.

You don’t have to work at a resort or sell souvenirs to be hurt by the downturn in Arizona’s tourism industry, a group of Valley leaders said Sept. 22.

“Do you know a teacher, a police officer, a firefighter, a librarian?” Phoenix Mayor Phil Gordon said. “They’re all dependent on tourism because of the sales and property tax it provides.”

Interstate 11 could someday be a major thoroughfare linking Phoenix and Las Vegas.

I-11 would consist of 225 miles of improved U.S. 93 with about 150 miles of new freeway around the Phoenix area.

SEDONA – Next to a sign promising red rock views from every room of an inn – walk-ins welcome – and down the street from a trolley service billing itself as “the best first thing to do in Sedona,” Damon Anderson, six-shooter on his hip, marshal badge on his vest, twirls a lasso to lure tourists into Red Rock Western Jeep Tours.

FLAGSTAFF – There is an epidemic in an old gold mining town in western Arizona: The wild burros that roam the town’s single street are overweight, with rolls of fat on their necks and big, full bellies. But don’t blame them. They’ll eat anything.