Arizona Capitol Times Your Inside Source for Arizona Government, Politics and Business

Before starting his senior year in high school, Zane Zylstra realized the curriculum did not offer a second-year physics class. So he and his classmates asked school officials to create one — and they did.

The old adage — “If it doesn’t kill you, it will make you stronger” — generally applies to biological organisms. But it could also apply to the financial system in Arizona, which has had 14 bank failures since 2009.

In 2007, Cox Communications began allowing its technicians to take their vehicles home for the night in order to respond to service calls in the morning that were close to where they lived instead of first traveling to the office.

In 2006, Arizona-based Fulton Homes opened Fulton Ranch in Chandler, a 520-acre upscale, master-planned community. That was the height of the residential housing boom and high demand justified the financial risk.

When Dan Danser began working his first case as a court-appointed special advocate two years ago, he thought it would end as it started — a mess.

The federal government and state have provided money to begin updating the aging and often inaccurate Student Accountability Information System, but it still has a way to go.

Although Maricopa County was assigned a grade of “F” for ozone pollution and a grade of “C” for 24-hour particulate pollution in the American Lung Association’s recently released 2012 State of the Air Report, air quality professionals contend that the simple letter grade doesn’t tell the entire story of the Valley’s air, and that progress has been made during recent years in reducing air pollution.

As Californians Rob Owens and Ian Au-Yeung took in an early April spring training game between the San Diego Padres and Milwaukee Brewers at Peoria Sports Complex, they may have felt a bit more crowded by the fans this year at the ballpark.

Theresa Mattern, a Glendale-based Realtor, listed a four bedroom single-family home for a client on a Friday in February for $95,000. Within 72 hours, she had seven offers and it sold for $109,000 cash. “At the end of the weekend it sold for $14,000 over the asking price,” Mattern says.

Six years ago, it was common for buyers to wait in front of new home sales offices to see who would win the privilege of purchasing one of the several lots the builder had selected to release for sale that day.