Progress Edition 2014

PAY S O N R O U N D U P

PROGRESS EDITION A P R I L 2 0 1 4 | PAY S O N , A R I Z O N A

RimOnCountry the comeback trail

Inside Stories THE ECONOMY University timeline Real estate recovery Economic development New businesses abound Building a tourist economy

COMMUNITIES Payson plans for the future Star Valley building Schools struggle, triumph Community profiles

OUR EDGE: WATER Building Blue Ridge pipeline Sidestepping the shortage Pine and Strawberry boost supply Water rate debate Star Valley selling water

THE THREAT: FIRE Protecting our communities Whispering Pines watching Pine shows the way Payson struggles with code Forest restoration underway Lessons of Yarnell Fire

PAY S O N R O U N D U P

ECONOMY

2 PROGRESS 2014

Rim Country finally rebounding from recession BY

ALEXIS BECHMAN

ROUNDUP STAFF REPORTER

Pete Aleshire/Roundup

The pace of construction and new businesses opening has finally picked up. Above, crews work to build multi-million-dollar all weather bridges on Houston Mesa Road over the Verde River. Below, Payson Mayor Kenny Evans works to promote the region.

New business abounds Business licenses up 80 percent in Payson BY

ALEXIS BECHMAN

ROUNDUP STAFF REPORTER

If it seems like more businesses have opened in Rim Country in recent years, that’s because they have.

The number of new business licenses increased 80 percent from 2011 to 2013, going from just 26 in 2011 to nearly 50 last year.

And the town says it is seeing new interest a wide variety of businesses, including bigbox and chain retailers to the mom and pop shops all the time, although they won’t talk about specifics fearing they might drive them away.

Among the most noticeable new tenants in town last year were BigLots, PetSmart and Big 5 Sporting Goods. Those shops now fill out the Bashas’ shopping center, taking up several large suites that had sat empty for years. BigLots even expanded on its space, pushing out walls to accommodate its selection of discounted goods. PetSmart went with a smaller footprint, opting for a shop about half the size of a traditional store. They still crammed most pet supplies inside and an adoption and grooming center.

In the same shopping center, a Little Caesars Pizza opened its doors.

Also on the food front, Dimi Espresso opened in the Swiss Village Shops, offering

up light lunch and breakfast options and coffee in a relaxed setting with European flair. It is a tribute to owner Tom Plets time in Italy, where he fell in love with people watching and sipping espressos in the many coffee bars. Plets didn’t stop with the outside, he had a mural of the Swiss countryside painted on an outside wall along with a faux cobblestone patio.

The Sweet Shoppe unveiled its tasty creations on Longhorn Road. Owner Monica Vaughn turned a cake-decorating hobby quickly into sweet success with custom creations and a keen eye to detail. Things have gone so well for Vaughn she is planning to expand in 2014 to the Sawmill Crossing.

On the Beeline Highway, Sal and Teresa’s Mexican Restaurant opened with a bang and quickly became a Tuesday favorite, offering a slew of $1 options, including margaritas, tacos and sopapillas.

Also in the Swiss Village Shops, the Thrifty Hippie opened a small shop that combines record sales and sandwiches.

In addition, there was the Art Nook, Serendipity Gifts, Finderz Keeperz, Fletcher’s Express and Bella Vita Salon, among others.

And already in 2014, there is the new 87 Cyclery on Highway 87, offering bicycles, parts and repair.

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Rim Country is finally rebounding from the Great Recession — but slowly.

Business licenses are up and new stores are opening at a consistent clip.

Town officials say they are working to keep the momentum going. The town’s website has been updated recently as well as the tourism site.

Business and recreation go hand in hand in Payson. The area’s draw is the large expanse of forest that surrounds the town in all directions. Popular for mountain biking, hiking, fishing, camping and bird watching, most visitors make a stop in town before heading out into the woods. The trick is getting them to make a purchase and capture their dollars at more than just a gas station before they head to the mountains.

Payson Mayor Kenny Evans said he is working with businesses and the Rim Country Regional Chamber of Commerce to market the area.

Since the town lost economic director Mike Vogel last year, it hasn’t had the budget to hire a replacement. That means town staff and councilors have had to pull double duty, meeting with prospective businesses and showing them the area.

Still, Evans says it is an exciting time to be in Payson.

“There are a lot of things on the horizon.”

Evans won’t divulge all the potential new projects, mostly because business owners and representatives have asked for secrecy until they are under construction. The town has learned this lesson the hard way. Panda Express expressed interest in opening a restaurant here last year, but when word got out the rent at a potential site increased dramatically and Panda Express had second thoughts.

Now, town officials are more careful to keep things under wraps.

Evans said multiple retail and food service businesses are interested in opening along with some light manufacturing facilities and technology-based industries.

Evans said the biggest challenge is getting business owners here. Once they see the community and surrounding beauty, the place “sells itself.”

Higher wage employers need to know that the area has the workforce to staff their facilities, this usually means educated or trained individuals. Evans said the town is working on workforce development training to improve that.

It is a challenge for staff to find the money and time to go out and plant the seed and attract new employers. For that reason “we are working on cultivating the seeds we have,” Evans said.

That means working with existing employers, helping them expand and grow their business and that is “just as important” as bringing in new employers, he said.

Staff offers a program that works with businesses that want to expand and grow.

And the town is working more closely with new businesses. Information on town programs, requirement and utilities are sent out ahead of time so there are no surprises in the middle of building.

“The worst thing is to get them to come and discover there are unexpected costs and go somewhere else,” he said.

Still, not a week goes by that Evans doesn’t get contacted by someone looking at opening a business in the area.

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PAYSON ROUNDUP ECONOMY PROGRESS 2014

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Forest Service brings university land sale back to life Officials predict sale before end of the year and a campus opened by fall of 2016 BY

PETE ALESHIRE

ROUNDUP EDITOR

Granted, the effort to build a university campus in Payson has started to resemble one of those rickety superhero movie franchises, when they keep killing off the hero then bringing him back to life in some implausible fashion in the next installment.

So we know you’ve heard this before: But looks like the Rim Country Educational Alliance is finally on the brink of striking a deal with Arizona State University and starting construction on the first 1,500-student phases of a 6,000-student university early next year.

The first phase of the campus should take 22 months to build, which would start classes in the fall of 2016.

Of course, that doesn’t mean some unexpected super villain won’t pop suddenly out from under a manhole cover, beneath which he’s been lurking in the sewers since the middle of the last episode.

But at least the number of unlikely disasters has shrunk to a seemingly management number.

This month, the Forest Service ended eight months of absurd delay and suspense by sending a scope of work and bid package to half a dozen Forest Service-certified appraisers — right after the Alliance wired $24,000 to pay for the appraiser.

The appraisers will have about two weeks to respond to the bid package and up to 75 days to complete the appraisal.

Regional Forester Calvin Joyner in an email to the Alliance promised to open escrow by September and complete the sale as quickly as possible. In previous estimates, the Forest Service had predicted opening escrow by August.

“I want to assure you that we are supportive of this sale. We believe having an educational institution in Payson best serves the interests of the Forest Service and the community of Payson. I am writing this letter to assure you that I will make the timely completing of this sale a priority for this office and that we will do everything within our ability to move this sale forward expeditiously. It is my intent to schedule the closing of the land sale as quickly as possible

after the purchase agreement has been signed by the parties and all the necessary clearances have occurred. I hope this letter clearly articulates my commitment and desire to complete this sale,” wrote Joyner.

The Alliance has reopened active negotiations with ASU, said Payson Mayor Kenny Evans. The university has said it now expects to fill up the first, 1,500-student phase of the university much more quickly than it expected, giving the growing demand for university degrees in the state.

A study by the Arizona Board of Regents concluded that Arizona will need to nearly double the number of degrees it can produce from the three universities within the next 10 or 15 years to keep up with population growth and the growing percentage of students who seek a college degree.

Tonto National Forest Supervisor Neil Bosworth has also expressed strong support for the sale of the 253acre parcel on which the Rim Country Educational Alliance wants to build a university.

“There’s been a lot of delays I wouldn’t have expected — but none of these (sales and trades) are easy. I feel we’re in the home stretch here, but it’s been a painfully slow process,” said Bosworth.

The Alliance must still finalize the master plan, including infrastructure, sign development agreements, conclude intergovernmental agreements and lock in the financing.

Rim Country Educational Alliance Chairman Steve Drury said, “I am pleased we are moving forward again.

Tonto Forest Supervisor Neil Bosworth And although a number of significant steps lie ahead before a campus can be opened for business, those steps are softballs compared to the boulders we have had to negotiate around over the past three years.”

Wait for regional office

The latest delay centered on the wait for the regional office in Albuquerque to prepare a Scope of Work for the bid package for an independent appraisal to set a price for a direct sale of the property to the Alliance. Payson first notified the Forest Service it wanted to buy the property in 2007 and Congress earmarked the land for sale 15 years ago. However, the long delay in even putting a value on the land stalled negotiations with Arizona State University

for eight months.

The plan calls for attracting students by providing scholarships and subsidies to reduce their costs compared to other campuses through donations and revenue flowing in from the dorms and various spinoff businesses — including a conference hotel center, an incubation center to turn university research into patentable products and a research industrial park.

Studies suggest that the operations of the campus could pump an added $150 million into Rim Country’s economy as well as jump-starting other spinoff developments. Equally important, the college would produce economic activity in the cold winter months — normally the economic low point of the year for Rim Country.

requirements for a bid from the independent appraisers. Even though the Alliance paid the Forest Service some $15,000 to draw up the Scope of Work, the only Forest Service official able to draw up the 18-page document had other projects clamoring for the attention of the single person in the regional office who could sign off on the specifications for the bid.

But Bosworth said it mostly came down to a shortage of manpower in the regional office. Ironically, the lack of a Forest Service appraiser prompted the Alliance to push for the selection of an independent appraiser, in the apparently mistaken belief that it could quickly get a private appraiser into the field.

Meeting with ASU

Bosworth said the Alliance and the Forest Service have also worked out the details of how to handle an archaeological study of a scattering of artifacts found on the site during the environmental assessment — which itself delayed the project for close to a year.

The earlier environmental assessment of the sale found no significant environmental problems with the land sale, but did find indications of at least temporary use of the site by the Mogollon people some 500 years ago.

Only one site seemed even potentially significant, with pottery shard indications of a perhaps-seasonal occupation in a cluster of boulders on a ridgeline the Alliance has no intention of disturbing in building the campus.

Nonetheless, the discovery of the potential archaeological site caused additional months of delay. The Alliance for a time considered putting up a $500,000 bond to ensure the completion of the work even after it buys the land, although officials say the work needed to confirm no significant sites exist will probably cost closer to $100,000.

The new arrangement involves doing the archaeological work in a month to six weeks prior to the close of escrow.

Normally, it takes a month to close escrow on a private sale. Bosworth said that based on a preliminary report from the archaeological consultants he could transfer title to the Alliance, with the full, written report detailing all the findings coming along after the property changes hands.

The Alliance and ASU have already worked out most of the key points in an agreement. The Alliance plans to use a private developer to build the dorms likely to house two-thirds of the students, with some of that revenue offsetting the Alliance’s other costs. The Alliance has also agreed to not charge ASU rent during the first several years during the operations of the 1,500-student phase one and to provide money to cover the deficit the university predicts it will run initially.

The plan calls for a distinctive campus nestled among groves of centuriesold ponderosa pines with multi-story dorms, classrooms and administrative buildings designed to use as little energy as possible and leave as much of the hilly site undisturbed as possible. The campus will also use solar and possibly geothermal energy to minimize energy use, which will lend itself to studies of “green” design and technology expected to become an academic focus of the university as well. The buildings and dorms will include the latest classroom and Internet technology, thanks to several corporate partnerships. The classrooms and dorms will utilize technologies that can turn walls and countertops into huge computer screens.

Stuck for six months

The project apparently got stuck for six months in the shortage of people in the regional office to draw up the

Questions about archaeological sites

PAYSON ROUNDUP ECONOMY PROGRESS 2014

4

Real estate market on the mend – but still spotty

Pete Aleshire/Roundup

Tonto Creek (above) and the East Verde River (at right) and Rim Country’s outdoor lifestyle and diverse housing stock remain big draws for homebuyers.

Rim Country lifestyle still a selling point BY

MICHELE NELSON

ROUNDUP STAFF REPORTER

Deborah Rose-Ellis, voted best real estate agent in the Rim Country for 2014, said the most heartening thing about the real estate market in the last year — young families can afford to buy houses.

“More young families are moving into the area,” she said.

The Payson’s school enrollment and homeless numbers bear out her observation. Enrollment has increased for the first time in five years and the number of students considered “homeless” because they don’t live in their own house or apartment with a parent have dropped significantly.

She also said houses are staying on the market a shorter time as well.

“The absorption rate is down to four months,” she said.

While the Phoenix market has taken off with prices reaching almost pre-recession highs, Rose-Ellis of the Realty One Group, said the Payson market is showing definite signs of improving.

However, like most relationships, it’s complicated.

“It depends on how well the properties are priced,” she said.

And that opens up a whole can of worms.

The Payson area has homes from doublewide prefabricated homes to mansions locked behind private gates. Buyers just have to decide what will make them happy — and what they can afford.

That diversity makes pricing a home a challenge.

Rose-Ellis said there are a lot of questions to ask — is the home site built? Is it manufactured? Does it have a view? Is the lot

large? Where is it located? Is it a distressed sale?

Communities in Rim Country offer houses with grand views of the Mogollon Rim for under $150,000 — not to mention property next to streams stocked with trout or pools perfect for entertaining grandkids.

Elevations range from the saguaro cactus strewn warmth of Tonto Basin on the banks of Tonto Creek minutes from the shores of Roosevelt Lake, to the ponderosa pine coolness of Whispering Pines near the top of the Rim on the banks of the East Verde River.

The tiny hamlets of Pine and Strawberry have enough snow to keep winter lovers entertained but not exhausted with shoveling.

In summer, the temperatures are the coolest in the area.

Area residents call Payson the big city with enough shopping to fill the larder or decorate the house along with a host of other urban amenities.

Overall, however, Rose-Ellis said the numbers are on an upswing.

She said between 2011 and 2012, the price of houses went up 1 percent. From 2012 to 2013, prices increased by 8.64 percent.

Rose-Ellis said Payson home prices have increased steadily, but still remain a bargain compared to the fully recovered, perhaps starting-to-bubble Phoenix market.

“Our prices as of last year are starting to come back up,” she said, “but we are a whole different market than Phoenix.”

Another good sign — foreclosures are drying up.

“There are sellers out there that can do better than foreclosures,” said Rose-Ellis.

Rim Country Real Estate: By the numbers March 2014 List Price avg. $311,458 Median list $225,000 Avg. sales price $240,799 Median sales price $185,000 Time on market

168 days

March 2013 $272,122 $199,999 $179,399 $175,000

% change +14 +13 +34 + 6

190 days

-12

Sold Listings 67 57 +22 Pending sales 74 69 +6 Active listings 748 711 +5 Average sales price increased 49 percent from Jan. 1 to March 31

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PAYSON ROUNDUP ECONOMY PROGRESS 2014

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BUSINESS PROFILES Beeline Chiropractic Little Caesars Pizza offers pizza, breadsticks, wings and sodas.

Famous for its Hot N Ready concept, the business strives to have a large pepperoni pizza available all day every day for $5 with no need to call ahead and no waiting.

Owner Michael Cook, who lives in Globe, purchased the Payson location in April 2013. Since taking over, he has expanded the menu and now offers a Detroit style deep-dish pizza for $8, which is also Hot N Ready from 4 p.m. to 8 p.m. They also offer half a deep dish and a 20 oz. soda lunch combo for $5 and carry a three-meat pizza Hot N Ready from 4 p.m. to 8 p.m. A zesty cheese bread has been added to the menu made with a jalapeño cheese sauce. Dough is made fresh in store everyday and frozen cheese is never used.

The Payson location employs 10 and the general manager moved to Payson from Show Low with his family. Little Caesars sponsors a Little League team, which the manager coaches.

Hours are 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. Sunday through Thursday and 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. Friday and Saturday.

Other locations include Globe, Pinetop, Show Low and Taylor and Cook is actively seeking other possible locations for Little Caesars Pizza.

“Payson will continue to grow and prosper as it is a great community with great people and great weather and we are excited to now be a part of the community,” Cook said.

Crabdree Insurance and Financial Savings, Inc. is an independent insurance agency offering all lines of insurance.

As an independent insurance agency, Crabdree has dozens of insurance companies to shop from, allowing clients to choose a company that best meets their coverage needs and budget.

In February, Crabdree moved into a larger office at 431 S. Beeline Highway and now has an office in Scottsdale too.

The business has been family owned and operated in Payson since 1969 and today employees seven.

“We have grown over the years with Payson and have seen and experienced a lot of good things and great people,” said C. Scott Crabdree, president. “As an independent insurance agency, we have more to offer our clients. I feel that we have the best staff and provide outstanding customer service.”

For more information, call (928) 474-2265.

Payson’s Subway recently went through a major transformation.

After years of occupying a small suite, the popular franchise in the Bashas’ shopping center, had outgrown its digs, with customers sometimes filing out the door in line.

Twenty-two-year owner and operator Kathy James knew something needed to be done.

She rented out the suite next door and had the walls torn down.

From there she had the restaurant expanded, going from 900 square feet to 1,600.

With all the new space, James added more tables and even customer restrooms.

In February, all the work appeared to pay off with the location named Subway of the Month. James said 89 percent of customer feedback is positive and she credits her staff of 11 for offering exceptional customer service.

Subway offers a variety of sandwiches, dessert, salads, monthly specials, breakfast, “flatizzas” and soup.

Subway is open 7 a.m. to 11 p.m. Sunday through Thursday and 7 a.m. to midnight Friday and Saturday.

For more information, call (928) 474-5757.

This past year, attendance at Payson Community Kids (PCK) reached an all-time high with as many as 70 children showing up on Thursdays, nearly double from past years. PCK’s small space could not handle the load, and there was no room to expand the facility. Since PCK’s goal is to take any needy child that arrives at its door, organizers searched for a solution.

“It certainly proves true that when the universe aligns, great things can happen,” said Suzy Tubbs, PCK board president. “Within a matter of weeks, a bigger space with lots of parking became available for lease and three very generous benefactors paved the way to make expansion a reality.”

An anonymous donor provided the funds to pay off the mortgage of the current facility, retiring a significant obligation. Bill and Carole Kushmaul committed to pay the rent on the new space, formerly Payson Christian School, for one year and donate $25,000 for relocation and operation expenses.

“This generosity stabilized PCK and provides the means to help so many more underserved children,” said Perla Guereque, executive assistant.

The new building is located at 213 S. Colcord Road behind the First Southern Baptist Church and includes 5,000 square feet, a fenced and grassed outdoor play area and lots of parking.

May 3 is the grand opening.

The board of directors is considering what to do with the old space, but at this time has no plans to sell it.

“The children love to come to PCK,” Guereque said. “There are times we have to ask them to leave because they do not want to go home. We make sure they get their homework done, they are clothed and their tummies are full.” Perla attended the program when she was 10 years old.

“It gave her the confidence to be better,” Tubbs said. “She is now in college, working for PCK and has a very bright future. I know we can do the same for so many more children.”

Chasin’ A Dream Outfitters is a family owned shop that caters to all archery, guns and ammunition needs. They also offer guide services.

Owner Jeremy Ulmer is a licensed guide in Arizona and offers big game hunts for elk, coues deer, mule deer, antelope, bear, bighorn sheep, javelina and more.

The shop, at 612 S. Beeline Highway, has been in business for four years.

Statewide hunts are offered with permits issued by the USDA Forest Service to operate on the Apache-Sitgreaves, Coconino, Coronado, Kaibab and Tonto National Forests.

“I am a highly qualified guide as well as very experienced and knowledgeable of the areas I hunt,” Ulmer said. “My main concern is quality and productive big game hunting. You will find my hunts are extremely exciting and have an excellent opportunity for success. I make every possible effort to make sure your hunting experience in Arizona is productive and memorable.”

For more information, call (928) 468-6181.

Alliant Gas/Pinnacle Propane covers all Rim Country’s energy needs, acting as the underground piped propane provider for the area.

They also offer bulk delivery to homeowners’ tanks, tank leasing and metered tanks. They refill barbecue cylinders and offer auto gas for propanefueled vehicles at their office at 200 W. Longhorn Road.

Alliant Gas says it strives to be the first name in propane, providing safe, reliable energy to run a business or meet home energy needs.

In 2013, Alliant added a cylinder filling station and this year, added vent-free wall-mounted heaters to their product line.

All of the technicians and delivery drivers are highly trained with ongoing education to ensure safe, reliable propane. Office staff also participates in ongoing safety training. In all, the office employs 20.

“We have seen many people who came back to propane after having tried other ways to heat their home, their water and cook their food,” according to Alliant officials. “People come back to efficient, affordable and comfortable propane.”

Alliant Gas is open 7 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday. For more information, call (928) 474-2294. James Payne is the district manager for Alliant Gas/Pinnacle Propane.

Payson Regional Medical Center (PRMC) opened as a clinic in 1954.

The hospital was founded by the Junior Women’s Club of Payson who recognized the community’s need for a healthcare facility to service the town’s growing population. The original clinic, which operated two days a week, helped to eliminate the need to travel five hours to Phoenix to receive medical care. The Arizona State Board of Health granted the clinic a hospital license in 1959 and Dr. David Gilbert served as Payson Clinic’s first physician.

Today, PRMC is a 44-bed, acute care hospital committed to providing quality, patient-centered care to the Rim Country’s 25,000 plus residents. Comprehensive services include inpatient and outpatient care, diagnostic imaging, emergency medical and surgical care.

PRMC’s more than 110 skilled physicians and allied health practitioners represent a variety of specialty areas to meet the needs of the growing community and to support good health at all stages of life.

PRMC is a Level 1 Birthing Center. In 2013, the hospital received the Arizona Perinatal Trust Recertification for the third year in a row.

This organization certifies that the delivery of babies at our facility is at or above national standards. Procedures at PRMC were showcased to share with other hospitals as best practices.

In 2013, PRMC was re-accredited by the Joint Commission. The Joint Commission is a knowledge-based organization that measures patient safety and quality in patient care. PRMC received a 100% score — the highest of 130 hospitals in our health care system. PRMC’s Laboratory also underwent a survey by the Joint Commission and achieved one of the highest scores in the network as well.

Also in 2013, PRMC was listed in Becker’s Top 100 Hospitals 2013 and Health Grades — Excellence in Critical Care 2013.

Health Grades is an independent organization that reviews standards for patient care nationwide. After comparing PRMC to other hospitals in the nation, we were named in the Top 100 in Critical Care.

Critical care encompasses standards such as hospital acquired infections, length of stay, how quickly patients admitted to our facility get well and many others.

Truven Health analytics is another group that surveys over 3,000 hospitals across the United States. Hospitals in this survey are categorized into five groups contingent on bed size. Nine areas of care are then examined. Distinction is given to the top 20 hospitals in each group. In 2013, PRMC was recognized in the “100 beds or less” category and named in the top 100 of these hospitals.

Finally, PRMC achieved Trauma Level IV designation in 2013 by the Arizona Department of Health Services. In a process that took nearly a year to complete, the team at PRMC worked in concert with many local and state agencies including EMS, first responders, fire departments and city leadership. The designation demonstrates PRMC’s commitment to making sure trauma patients obtain the right level of care as quickly and efficiently as possible.

The physicians in the Emergency Department are expertly qualified for trauma care. All ED doctors are board-certified and are also ATLS (Advanced Trauma Life Support) certified. ATLS is a training program for physicians in the management of acute trauma cases developed by the American College of Surgeons. This certification is widely accepted as the standard of care for initial assessment and treatment in trauma centers.

As a trauma center, PRMC will be able to offer quicker intervention and begin stabilization and lifesaving measures for the communities we serve.

Beeline Chiropractic offers full-spine, hands-on chiropractic health care, including spinal decompression and nutritional support for neuromuscular skeletal conditions that has served Payson since 1982.

Dr. Robert Sanders treats everyone from children and young athletes to seniors.

“My oldest patient just turned 100,” he said.

The facility just about completed new federal qualifications to perform CDL physicals, which it has been offering for the last five years.

Sanders has been practicing for 32 years and says he loves living and practicing in Payson, a beautiful area.

Sanders has two employees at his practice.

Beeline Chiropractic, 414 S. Beeline Highway, Suite 6, is open Tuesday to Friday from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. and Saturday from 9 a.m. to 11 a.m. For more information, call (928) 474-5555.

Payson Care Center offers advancement opportunities and a great place to work.

It’s well known in the healthcare industry that a good CNA is easy to find but finding a great one can be challenging. Many of the Payson Care Center employees who started out as graduates from Gila Community College have now advanced to LPNs, business office managers, Registered Nurses and even Directors of Nursing.

Last year Payson Care Center was proud to promote within or transfer several staff members to other Life Care facilities in Mesa, Scottsdale and Phoenix. With over 28 facilities in Arizona and 220 nationwide, advancement and the opportunity to relocate is a great advantage of working at Payson Care Center.

PCC promotions and transfers in the last year include: Krystal Rodriquez began her career with Payson Care Center in 1998 as a CNA, later worked in medical records, was promoted to the Admissions and Marketing Director and is now Payson Care Center’s Business Office Manager.

Amanda Snow started with Life Care Centers of America in 2005 in Bountiful, Utah, she transferred to Payson in 2011 and is now the Business Office Manager at Life Care of North Scottsdale. The move offered Amanda’s husband the opportunity to attend college in the Valley.

Randy Murphy began working at Payson Payson Care Center in 2005 as a CNA, took on the Staffing Coordinator position and recently transferred to Life Care’s Mi Casa in Mesa, Arizona. Randi grew up in Payson and just felt her family was ready for a change.

Working for Life Care Centers of America offered Randi that opportunity.

Jasmina Brkovic started at Payson Care Center over 9 years ago as an LPN. After receiving her RN, Jasmina was promoted to the Assistant Director of Nursing. Jasmina is currently working on her Masters Degree in Nursing.

Ranay Krahn-Eavenson began working at Payson Care Center 13 years ago as the receptionist. She later received her CNA licensure, then LPN and is currently the Director of Care Plan Coordination.

Alutha Skidmore started at Payson Care Center in 2009. After repeatedly winning CNA of the Year, Alutha was promoted to Central Supply Director. She takes advantage of Payson Care Center’s insurance benefits for herself and her family.

CNAs think Payson Care Center is a great place to work!

Barbara Ernest, CNA at Payson Care Center for 13 years, says, “I love working at Payson Care Center, I love the staff and how professional the company operates. My job is hard work, but I feel that I make a difference in the lives of the people I serve.”

Kevin Beniche, CNA, Transport Driver is in his 4th year working at Payson Care Center. He says, “ I really like the people I work with at Payson Care Center. The nurses, my fellow CNAs and the rest of the team are awesome. I really enjoy spending time with and helping my residents and I feel that as a CNA I have more time to do that.

Payson Care Center has been great to me and I am here to stay.”

Deb McCurdy has worked as a CNA at Payson Care Center for 13 years. She says, “The pay is great; my husband and I have affordable insurance benefits and most of all I love the people I take care of. I am proud when I get the opportunity to improve a resident’s quality of life. And, I love the 4 weeks of paid vacation I get every year!”

Lori Jonas and Destiny Bindgen have served Payson Care Center as a CNAs for over 11 years. When asked why they like working at Payson Care Center they said, “They love their residents.” Both Lori and Destiny also takes advantage of the affordable heath care benefits that Payson Care Center offers.

Jackie Hubbard has worked for Payson Care Center for 18 years.

Jackie started as a CNA, worked in the Therapy Department for six years as a tech and is currently working as a Restorative Nursing Aid. Jackie said Payson Care Center is her family, the walls are her home. She never really intended to stay so long, it just happened.

Jackie has been paying into Payson Care Center’s 401K plan for almost as long as she has been employed and is looking forward to retirement someday. Her employment has provided her with insurance benefits that became a blessing when she was challenged with a serious illness last year.

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The business works with small- to medium-sized businesses, doctors’ offices, attorneys, professional services, residential and takes walk-in customers.

This year, they hired two more technicians, bringing it to seven employees.

The business is family owned by a Persian Gulf War veteran.

Scott Moody is the president.

Smart Systems is open from 8 a.m. to 5 a.m. Monday through Friday at 405 S. Beeline Highway, Suite B. For more information, call (928) 468-7400.

PAYSON ROUNDUP ECONOMY PROGRESS 2014

6

Business picks up in tourism-dependent economy BY

KEITH MORRIS

ROUNDUP SPORTS EDITOR

Rim Country tourism is growing.

Payson Parks, Recreation and Tourism Director Cameron Davis said that much is clear, citing traffic on the town’s website as evidence.

“We went live in March 2008 and the number of unique visitors was 66,372 in 2008,” Davis said. “It jumped to 249,760 in 2012 then more than doubled in one year to 517,350 in 2013.”

And he thinks the number will increase in 2014 thanks to a redesign in December.

“It has nice bright photos, video clips and it’s very interactive,” Davis said. “There are various multi-media facets.”

A national video co-produced by former Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback and current FOX NFL personality Terry Bradshaw featuring Payson went out to 19 major metro markets in 2013 and has received more than 5 million views.

The June 6-8 Mountain High Games featuring the June 7 Mogollon Monster Mudder 5K Race are being heavily promoted. The website features 30- to 60-minute commercials promoting the community.

The town’s website now features more than 400 pages. One of the most popular items on the site is an events calendar, updated daily.

People can add upcoming events themselves instead of submitting them and having to wait for someone else to enter the event on the calendar.

“That’s one of the great features of the website,” Davis said. “It makes it easier for us to manage the calendar.”

But Davis said he wants to make sure people realize some things don’t belong on the calendar and will be removed if they’re entered on it. “It’s got to be tourism related to go on this site,” he said. “We don’t want a bake sale on there. We approve it all.”

Davis said Payson is one of the top listings when people enter key terms when searching the Web for things to do in Arizona.

“One of the cool things is there are over 2,400 search key terms that place Payson on the No. 1 page on Google,” Davis said. “If you type in Arizona and rodeo and Payson is right there on the first page of results,” Davis said. “And Google has an 83 percent market share. So if you’re not on Google, you’re not anywhere.”

A large majority of the 2013 viewers — 661,000 — were from the Valley. “So, we spend a lot of our advertising dollars targeting the Valley,” Davis said.

Davis, who ran a public relations business for 14 years and specialized in search engine optimization.

He said the town of Payson is featured in more than 400 newspaper, radio, television and Internet media outlets. He said they’ve made huge strides getting Payson mentioned in The Arizona Republic and azcentral.com, where Payson Area Trail System (PATS) hikes are now listed and several area events are featured in the paper.

“We used over 40 different advertising mediums with a potential viewership estimated at over 10 million,” Davis said.

The revenue collected from the tax on hotel and motel rooms brought in more money than ever before in 2013.

Payson took first place in the Fort McDowell Fiesta Bowl Parade float competition, which represented an estimated $500,000 worth of advertising and promotion for the town. “Channels 3, 5, 10 and 12 all did a feature story on Payson and our float,” Davis said.

Pete Aleshire/Roundup

A surge in visits to Payson’s tourism-themed website bodes well for the continued recovery of the Rim Country’s crucial tourism sector. Visits have also risen sharply at Tonto Natural Bridge State Park (left) and the Payson Event Center now has three four major rodeos throughout the year (right). But outdoor recreation in places like Horton Creek (top) remain the region’s big draw.

Davis said data shows that website traffic increases to about 5,000 to 6,000 unique visitors per week leading up to the town’s Fourth of July events. “Fourth of July continues to be our biggest event,” he said. “It brought an estimated 14,000 people to the area last year. This year, because it’s on a Friday, we estimate there will be 20,000 people.”

He said Web traffic, which has traditionally been much lower from October-January and spiked dramatically near big events such as the Fourth of July, is shifting.

“The colder months are starting to climb up with the big spikes,” Davis said. “People are now willing to come up here in October and November, as well as for big events. Before we started promoting the area, they didn’t come to town. From October through January it’s usually slower, but we’re seeing an increase in Web traffic in those months in the last several years.”

One of the biggest attractions of the summer is the Mountain High Games, featuring the Mogollon Monster Mudder 5K Race. A record 579 people competed in last year’s Mountain High Games, with more than 2,500 spectators.

The Event Center last July attracted the U.S. Team Roping Competition for the first time. “They’ve asked to come back this year, probably in October,” Davis said.

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The Event Center hosted the Southwest Indian Rodeo Finals for the third consecutive year and this year will host the Arizona High School Rodeo Finals for the fifth time.

“For the most part the Event Center is booked with events from April though the first of October,” Davis said.

Payson also offers more than 40 youth and adult activities. There’s a senior softball tournament in September that attracted seven to 10 teams and End of Summer Madness in September, which brought 14 teams to the area. “I expect that to go up to 20 this year, hopefully,” Davis said.

The town also developed a new youth volleyball program that was “wildly successful,” providing about 50 girls who didn’t make the junior high team with a chance to play and improve.”

The town also installed a new irrigation system in Rumsey Park’s ball field 1 and built a jetty to reclaim some of the eroded shoreline at Green Valley Park, allowing people a place to sit on a bench or fish from. “That’s helping with shoreline erosion,” Davis said of the project. “It was pretty significant. We received a grant from the water department that will allow us to address much of the shoreline erosion at Green Valley Lake.”

Payson is scheduled to host more than 100 events this year, which Davis said is probably about 20 more than were held five years ago.

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PAY S O N R O U N D U P

WATER

PROGRESS 2014

7

Gush of water from pipeline assures future BY

PETE ALESHIRE

ROUNDUP EDITOR

Pete Aleshire/Roundup

L

Payson made solid progress in the past year in building the Blue Ridge pipeline, including creating the network of connections that will allow 3,000 acre-feet annually to flow from the C.C. Cragin Reservoir into the town’s existing water system. This photo shows the outlet for the pipeline where the Salt River Project currently puts about 11,000 acre-feet of Blue Ridge water each year into the East Verde River near Whispering Pines.

After 20 years of effort, the bulldozers finally started rolling on the project likely to guarantee Rim Country’s future.

No, not the Arizona State University campus — that’s next year, most likely.

We’re talking here about the Blue Ridge pipeline and the promise of ample water for Rim Country as the rest of the state struggles with looming fears of a water shortage in the near future.

A recent state report predicted that within 25 years, Arizona will face a net water shortage of some 900,000 acre-feet annually.

Already, the Central Arizona Project has warned users they may face water rationing due to one of the worst droughts in 1,000 years.

But Payson in 2013 started work on a pipeline that in 2015 or 2016 will more than double its long-term water supply, providing enough water to perhaps triple the population of the town without strain — even in a drought.

The Payson Town Council reacted by starting the process of eliminating most of the restrictions in a water conservation code that was once the toughest in the state.

The town worked for decades in both Congress and with the Salt River Project to secure the rights to 3,000 acre-feet of water annually from the C.C. Cragin Reservoir, formerly known as Blue Ridge, in the state’s most productive and reliable watershed.

The town has already mostly completed the task of re-plumbing its existing water system to get ready for the arrival of the new water.

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8

PAYSON ROUNDUP WATER PROGRESS 2014

Pipeline gives Rim Country the edge on growth From page 7 Currently, the town uses about 1,800 acre-feet of water annually from a complicated network of wells.

The town also owns the Tower Well in Star Valley, which could pump roughly 600 acre-feet annually — bringing the town’s total “safe yield” from rainfall and runoff to about 2,400 acre-feet annually.

However, Payson has agreed to use the Tower Well only in an emergency to avoid affecting the output of nearby wells in Star Valley. Payson also sold several unused wells in the same watershed to Star Valley.

Once the Blue Ridge water arrives, Payson will rely entirely on the 3,000 acre-feet from the pipeline for the nine months a year the pipeline operates.

The residents for years to come will likely use perhaps half of that water while the pipeline’s operating, with the rest going back down into the water table from a network of wells the town has outfitted to inject water when the pipeline’s flowing, and pump out water during the winter months.

So while competing rural communities like

Prescott, Sedona, the Verde Valley, Sierra Vista and others cope with a looming water shortage, Payson has enough water to support all its future growth plans. In fact, Prescott is currently engaged in a running court battle with the Salt River Project and communities like Camp Verde over its plans to increase groundwater pumping in the headwaters watershed of the Verde River. Sierra Vista is facing lawsuits about the impact of growth there on the San Pedro River. And Flagstaff is at least discussing a desperate plan to build a multi-billion-dollar pipeline to avoid running out of water.

Payson has made substantial progress in the past year on the Blue Ridge pipeline, although hurdles remain.

The town has so far installed a network of new pipes to connect the isolated well-based networks into a single, townwide system. The town even signed long-term contracts with the two country club developments in town to provide ample water to irrigate the golf courses, which previously relied on a supply of reclaimed water that often barely kept

Photos by Pete Aleshire/Roundup

The Blue Ridge Reservoir (top and above) captures runoff from one of the most productive watersheds in the state and will provide Payson with an extra 3,000 acre-feet annually — enough to support a buildout population of 38,000. The East Verde River (in aerial view top right) carries about 11,000 acre-feet from the Blue Ridge to the Salt River Project reservoirs by Phoenix. This year (at right) Payson finally started construction on the pipeline it has labored for 20 years to build.

the grass alive. That has guaranteed the future of the golf course developments, nestled in the forest with views of the dramatic rock formations of Granite Dells.

That same pipeline will ultimately bring water to the 240-acre parcel now owned by the U.S. Forest Service on which the Rim Country Educational Alliance hopes to later this year or early next year start construction on a four-year university campus.

That pipeline will deliver clean but non-drinkable water for parks and athletic fields on the new campus, since the pipe will take the water out of the system before it passes through the $7.5 million treatment and filtration plant the town will build next to Mesa del Caballo.

Prior to locking in the Blue Ridge water, the town struggled to deal with a rapidly declining water table, the same problem facing many other rural communities in Arizona. At one time, Payson was known for having adopted the toughest water conservation measures in the state, but the pipeline has dramatically changed the outlook.

The town imposed an annual restriction on the number of houses it would approve, put in place a $7,500-per-house water impact fee, banned lawns and swimming pools, established a system to stagger watering of landscape plants, required only lowwater-use landscaping and a host of other measures. Those restrictions, coupled with the recession, caused the collapse of new construction.

Payson partnered with the Salt River Project to win congressional approval of the project and then to upgrade and extend the pipeline. Projections suggest that the town now has enough water to support the build-out population of 38,000 envisioned by the general plan. In addition, many water-stressed, unincorporated communities along the way can also buy into the pipeline.

Only Mesa del Caballo has so far exercised the option of buying into the pipeline, through its private water provider, Payson Water Company. The community will pay about $1 million as its share of the existing and planned infrastructure for about 90 acre-feet of water annually. After that, residents will pay about the same water rates as Payson customers. Currently, the community has slightly lower rates than Payson, but suffers water rationing every summer plus water hauling charges that can double or triple normal bills. By the time the community hooks up to the pipeline, residents will likely pay more than twice as much as they do now — but should never again face water shortages.

None of the other communities along the pipeline have so far taken even the first few steps toward qualifying for any of the 500 acre-feet annually reserved for Northern Gila County communities besides Payson.

The rush of new water will allow the town to keep three golf courses in the area lushly watered — since much of that water ends up back in the water table. Payson also wants to turn the normally dry American Gulch into a stream running through the middle of town, another project designed to return the depleted water table to historic levels.

By contrast, towns and cities throughout the rest of Arizona face an uncertain water future. Many climate projections suggest the region faces longer, more severe periods of drought in coming decades.

Payson’s ample water supply should then give it another key advantage over its economic competitors.

The water will flow from the C.C. Cragin Reservoir high atop the Mogollon Rim. An international mining company built the reservoir to store water it could trade with SRP, which eventually acquired ownership of the dam and rights to the 14,000 acre-feet of water in the lake.

Payson lobbied tenaciously for a federal law that gave it rights to the water as well. It finally succeeded in winning water rights, but that meant it had to help overhaul and maintain SRP’s 15-mile-long pipeline from the reservoir to the headwaters of the East Verde River and build its own $32 million, 15mile-long pipeline.

Payson imposed a $7,500 per-house water impact fee to raise money to finance the pipeline project and qualified for federal grants and long-term, lowinterest-rate loans. The town is now in the process of lowering that fee, a potential boon to new development.

Payson landed a $10.5 million federal grant several years ago — half a grant and half a low-interest loan. The town has also been working with the federal Bureau of Reclamation and the federal Water Infrastructure Financing Authority for an additional, 60-year, low-interest loan to complete the pipeline.

So far, the town has concentrated on the in-town

plumbing that will let the water flow into the existing system. That required connecting all the scattered well fields and putting in a line that will run out to the site of the proposed water filtration plant near the Shoofly Ruins out on Houston Mesa Road.

That plant will filter the water from the clear, lowmineral lake atop the Mogollon Rim, to remove sediment, algae and bacteria. The long, narrow reservoir gathers water from one of the most productive watersheds in the state, positioned to capture the snow and rain wrung out of clouds after they force their way up the Rim — the top of which is more than a mile higher than Phoenix.

Ironically, the town will have to then route the filtered reservoir water through holding tanks where town engineers can add minerals. Currently, Payson’s well water is pumped from more than 200feet beneath the surface in a water table composed of ancient crushed and fractured granite. The water absorbs many minerals during its long stay underground. As a result, the water pumped into Payson’s system had a high mineral content — as the frustrated owners of water heaters with calcium encrusted heating coils can attest. The calcium and other minerals also coats the inside of the hundreds of miles of pipes that get the water from wells to home faucets.

The abrupt introduction of the almost mineralfree Blue Ridge water could cause decades of accumulated minerals inside the pipes to dissolve and flow out into the system. That’s exactly what happened when Tucson first put Colorado River water into its system. Homeowners howled and the town had to undertake a series of expensive fixes to ensure the system delivered drinkable water.

Payson hopes to avoid that problem by buffering with minerals the reservoir water before it flows into the network of pipes underground, several of them 40 or 50 years old in many sections of town.

However, as the net result of decades of effort, millions in project costs and the dogged persistence of generations of Payson leaders — residents will reap the benefits starting next year when they become one of the few towns in all of Arizona not worried about the coming water shortage — or even the duration of the current drought.

PAYSON ROUNDUP WATER PROGRESS 2014

9

Water: Rim Country’s secret weapon

Arizona faces looming shortage, but Payson has all the water it needs to secure its future BY

PETE ALESHIRE

ROUNDUP EDITOR

Arizona faces a looming water shortage likely to constrain the growth of Phoenix and blight the prospects of many rural areas.

And that makes Payson’s farsighted move to more than double its water supply with the Blue Ridge pipeline its single greatest guarantee of future growth.

The completion of the Blue Ridge pipeline in 2015 or 2016 should give Payson a virtually drought-proof water supply sufficient to effectively triple its current population.

By contrast, most other regions of the state face increasingly serious water shortages — even the Valley.

The Central Arizona Project (CAP), which delivers Colorado River water to Phoenix and Tucson, highlighted the situation by warning users they face possible water rationing perhaps as early as 2016 or 2017, in the face of the worst drought in perhaps 1,000 years.

Moreover, almost all climate scientists now say the planet is in the midst of a warming trend, probably spurred on by the continued buildup of greenhouse gases from human sources of pollution. Computer models still give conflicting, fine-grained predictions for how that warming trend will affect individual regions. Some of the most widely accepted models point to deeper, longer droughts in the Southwest, shifts in the monsoon patterns that deliver about half of Rim Country’s annual rainfall and much greater instability — pointing to both more drought and more violent, flood-causing storms.

One recent study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences predicted a 20 percent increase in the number and duration of droughts worldwide by the end of this century, given the current warming trend. The area affected by drought will likely expand by an estimated 40 percent, with areas like the Southwest especially vulnerable.

Lake Powell has already declined to the lowest levels recorded since the 1960s as it was filling. This will force the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation to cut releases this year to about 7.5 million acre-feet, the lowest amount since Lake Powell came online.

Despite the curtailment, the Bureau of Reclamation predicts that Lake Mead will drop by another eight feet in 2014.

Mead has already dropped to about half its capacity.

If the surface elevation in Lake Mead falls below 1,000 feet, lake levels will be below the intake tunnel for the water going to Nevada. The surface currently stands at 1,112 feet.

Some 40 million people in seven states now rely on water in the chain of reservoirs on the 1,450-mile-long Colorado River, with three-quarters of it going to farms that produce 15 percent of the nation’s food supply.

Unfortunately, the federal government divided up the flow the river based on average flows in the early 20th century, which proved to be one of the wettest periods in centuries. That resulted in agreements that doled out more water than the river actually produces. And that was even before the warming trend set in.

Several studies suggest that the average flow of the Colorado River will likely drop by 5 to 35 percent on average by 2050 even if average rainfall doesn’t change as temperatures rise.

Arizona stands near the end of the

line when it comes to dividing up the over-subscribed Colorado River, including the water flowing each year through the Central Arizona Project.

The CAP operates a $5 billion, 336mile-long pipeline that brings 1.5 million acre-feet of water annually from the Colorado River to Phoenix and Tucson — enough to irrigate a million acres and essential to the domestic water supply of both Phoenix and Tucson.

However, half of the CAP water now goes to various Indian tribes to settle longstanding water claims. As a result of the steady dwindling of the Colorado River reservoirs in the face of the drought, all the non-Indian agricultural water users may get cut off in the next year or two until the reservoirs once again rise. Many of those farms will likely return to using groundwater, which could mean the Valley will again draw down its underground water supplies.

Last year, a hearing of the House Agriculture and Water Committee chaired by State Rep. Brenda Barton (R-Payson) held in Payson highlighted the statewide problem — which served to emphasize Rim Country’s enormous advantage when it comes to securing an adequate water supply.

“We will have to make some hard decisions,” Barton said. “We know that this is going to take a long time, but we want to have some short-term solutions to bridge from now to when we have the big projects completed.”

Barton made an effort this year to convince the Legislature to set aside some $25 million to help towns like Payson pay for water infrastructure needs with state and federal long-term, low-interest loans. The Legislature stripped out the funding, but Barton hopes that the provisions in the bill that allow Arizona cities to enter into 50year contracts with the federal Water Infrastructure Authority will survive, which could be a boon for Payson when it comes to lining up the roughly $30 million in financing for the completion of the Blue Ridge pipeline.

She said Payson remains a model for the rest of the state. Local officials worked for 20 years to obtain rights to 3,000 acre-feet of water from the Blue Ridge Reservoir, enough to double the town’s long-term water supply. Payson then negotiated an agreement with the Salt River Project that controls rights to all the surface water in the Tonto National Forest and lined up federal grants and financing to build the pipeline.

“The Blue Ridge agreement is very good for Payson and the Payson community,” said Barton. “We really should be celebrating. It’s fabulous. That’s why I’m saying, it takes a long time to put these agreements together.”

A report by the Arizona Water Resources Development Commission says that in coming decades the state’s annual water use will grow from about 7 million acre-feet to about 11 million acre-feet. An estimated 1.2 billion acrefeet remains stored in underground water tables, however, much of that water is too deep and too far from the areas that need it to solve the problem.

A recent study by the U.S. Geological Survey concluded that the flow of the Verde River will decrease by 8,600 acrefeet annually in the course of the next century, mostly because of groundwater pumping. As a result, the river could go dry intermittently — as well as many of

Pete Aleshire/Roundup

The Mogollon Rim (top) catches storms, which feed runoff into a host of streams including the East Verde (above) and Horton Creek (below). As a result, the Rim Country has more groundwater than most rural areas in the state as well as water from the Blue Ridge Reservoir (opposite page). the groundwater wells in the area.

Cities in the Verde Valley and the Salt River Project are in a protracted legal struggle with Prescott and Chino Valley, arguing that growth in those areas threatens to dry up the Verde River.

Additional studies have predicted even worse problems on the Colorado River in coming decades.

The various water districts and states entitled to a share of the river currently use about a million acre-feet more than the river has provided in recent years. Projections suggest the shortfall could rise to a disastrous 8 million acre-feet in coming decades — which could cut off the spigot for Arizona, which stands in line between California. Such a cutoff could cause a major water crisis in Phoenix and Tucson, both of which now rely on water from the Central Arizona Project.

A recent study published in Nature Climate Change predicted a 10 percent decline in average flows in the Colorado River by 2040, given a projected 1- to 2degree Celsius increase in average temperatures. The warming trend could actually increase rainfall by putting more energy and more moisture into the air. However, any increase in rainfall would be negated by an increase in evaporation. As a result, the climate models suggest that the snowpack and therefore the spring runoff would decrease by about 20 percent on the Colorado River watershed.

The projected shortfall has triggered intense study and speculation about how to close the growing gap between demand and supply on the Colorado River.

One proposal would essentially drain Lake Powell, concentrating the water in Lake Mead, which is now often half empty. That would reduce evaporation by about 300,000 acre-feet a year — about equal to the state of Nevada’s claim on the Colorado River.

Presumably, the Bureau of Reclamation could still use Lake Powell to capture extra water in the increasingly rare wet years.

Water conservation can also stretch the dwindling supplies. Phoenix has reduced its per capita average water use from about 250 gallons per day to about 108 gallons per day in recent years. That’s still above Payson’s average of about 79 gallons a day, but a dramatic improvement. The average Los Angeles resident uses about 123 gallons per day.

The Water Resources Development Commission also recommended the

state sharply increase its use of reclaimed water for irrigation. The study projected the potential supply of useable reclaimed water statewide at about 750,000 acre-feet in 2035 rising to about 1.3 million acre-feet in 2110.

Again, the use of reclaimed water falls far short of providing the 3 million to 4 million acre-feet of additional water supply needed to sustain future growth.

The commission concluded, “It is now known that portions of the state have sufficient supplies developed to meet future needs, while other areas within the state will require development of additional supplies for the future.”

The scramble for water may set off regional and local water wars, as the Verde Valley and Prescott can already attest. Those small rural areas may also find themselves overshadowed by the thirst of Phoenix, with the Salt River Project as the Valley’s enforcer.

Rep. Barton said the fate of the

Owens Valley in California when matched against the water greed of distant Los Angeles provides a cautionary tale. Los Angeles water providers secretly bought up farmland in the fertile Owens Valley, watered by runoff from the eastern slopes of the Sierras.

All they wanted was the water rights that went with the land. The Los Angeles water interests then piped the water to LA, turning the Owens Valley into a high, windswept desert.

But the crisis could ultimately rebound to the advantage of Rim Country, thanks to the Blue Ridge pipeline.

The assurance of an ample water supply should give Payson a crucial edge as the economy recovers and the building recovery so far limited to Maricopa County spreads to other areas — with most of the competing rural areas dealing with deep uncertainty when it comes to their water futures.

PAYSON ROUNDUP WATER PROGRESS 2014

10

Star Valley continues improvements to its water system BY

TERESA MCQUERREY

ROUNDUP STAFF REPORTER

Star Valley is only 8 years old, but not so long ago its leaders unofficially adopted a guiding principle — stay in the black and keep a healthy financial reserve. For the last couple of years the Star Valley Town Council has instructed its small, efficient staff to make sure there is at least $2.6 million in the coffers at the end of the fiscal year.

Part and parcel of living by that guiding principle, the town government has worked diligently to leverage municipal funds to secure important grants used to pursue improvements to its water department and the small community’s many roads.

The town bought the water system within its boundaries from Brooke Utilities in the spring of 2012. The conservative financial planning of the council and staff made it possible to buy the water company outright for $850,000. Not needing a loan to buy the company means the water department and town are not encumbered by any debt for the utility.

Something Star Valley Town Manager Tim Grier

said is very rare for a municipality.

He added the fact the town government has tried to stay clear of accruing debt is why it is so financially successful.

Most of the repairs and upgrades to the water system were made with about $450,000 in grant funds, primarily from the town’s successful application for Community Development Block Grant money.

Another grant, from the Water Infrastructure Finance Authority (WIFA) made it possible for the town to contract for a water master plan. The plan is still being refined, but with the ongoing work on the water system, the town has already dealt with some of the issues identified in the early drafts, Grier said.

The system has 363 hookups, serving slightly less than 1,000 residents (using the standard of 2.5 persons per household).

Recently, the town Finance Administrator Chancy Nutt outlined the water department’s current financial status and the repairs and improve-

ments accomplished so far and planned for the future.

Nutt reported that in the first six month of FY 1314, the department has installed a critical pressure reduction valve, changed out 30 meters — Grier said the new meters replaced old ones that were primarily too scratched up to take accurate readings. She said the department has also placed new holding tanks and storage facilities at the system’s Milky Way and Quail Hollow well sites.

In addition to this work, the department has developed a well monitoring program; created an intergovernmental agreement with the Town of Payson for a back-up water supply and emergency response service; rebuilt the plumbing of The Knolls well site (this is the “power horse” well of the system, Grier said) and replaced the pump and chlorinator at the site; replaced the pump and chlorinator at the Star Valley Number 2 Well; made improvements and done maintenance to property at the Quail Valley well site; created a new water customer service program; and continued to research grant

options and make applications.

Nutt reported that the department’s revenues for FY 13-14 are expected to be $162,000 and its expenses are projected to be $150,500.

The next big water department project started in early April — bringing the main line from The Knolls well site to the town hall, which will also serve the town’s new park site. Grier said the owners of the Lazy D Ranch Apartments & RV Resort, which neighbors the town hall to the west and south, are considering hooking up to the system when the line is in.

“That would be our first commercial hookup,” the manager said.

Grier said the council has decided to take the financial focus off the water department in the upcoming fiscal year — beyond regular maintenance and any emergencies that may arise — and concentrate efforts on further improvements to the town’s road system.

“We think the water system is where it needs to be for now,” Grier said.

Pine water district seeks a fresh start After years of turmoil, the Pine Strawberry Water Improvement District seems poised to make a fresh star.

The water district capped years of controversy by borrowing the money to buy out Brooke Utilities, which had refused to provide a reliable water supply for a decade — despite a building moratorium that blighted the community’s future.

But the buyout ushered in a new period of conflict, as residents faced the unpleasant necessity of higher water rates to repair a deteriorating system and develop additional water supplies.

The first water board managed to significantly increase the water supply with new wells and contracts with existing well owners. But the rise in rates, problems with administration and a history of suspicion and conflict spawned fresh conflicts.

Five members of the board resigned as a group last year, with community members gathering signatures to recall four of them.

The resignation dissolved the board and threw management of the water district into the laps of the Gila County Board of Supervisors.

The supervisors left management of the district to the alreadyhired consulting company, called elections to select a new board in May and ordered an audit. They also appointed a citizens committee to review the budget, which included all of the eight people who filed to run for the seven open seats on the board.

The move seemed to dissolve the bitterness and hostility that had long bedeviled the water district. The citizens committee has met several times and worked harmoniously from the budget blueprint left behind by the previous board. The committee so far has recommended some changes, including a scaled back rate increase and much lower charges to reconnect meters.

The calmer atmosphere, seeming lack of bitter contention among the candidates and smooth progress of the budget committee seems to bode well for the district — and the community.

Roundup file photo

The Pine Strawberry Water Improvement District has eliminated water shortages and repealed a decade-old building moratorium.

Now, it seems to have made progress toward healing community divisions that caused bitter and confusing meetings like this one.

It is the mission of Time Out, Inc., to help individuals break the cycle of domestic violence.

Time Out sincerely thanks the community for our Best of Rim Country Awards.

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87

PAYSON ROUNDUP WATER PROGRESS 2014

11

‘Whiskey’s for drinkin’, water’s for fighting’ BY

MICHELE NELSON

ROUNDUP STAFF REPORTER

The famous quote (not by Twain, by the way) describes the past year for the Payson Water Company (aka JW Water Holdings, aka Pivotal Utilities Management LLC http://www.pivotalcom panies.net).

The company has roiled with controversy because of fallout from policies of former owner Robert Hardcastle of Brooke Utilities.

Ten months into the purchase of the water company that serves Whispering Pines, Mead Ranch, Mesa del Caballo, East Verde Estates, parts of Tonto Basin, Gisela and Deer Creek, the Payson Water Company finds itself embroiled in a complicated rate case hearing hosted by the Arizona Corporation Commission (ACC).

Hardcastle neglected to raise rates for a decade as the water systems he owned fell into disrepair.

The new Payson Water Company (PWC), run by Jason Williamson, hopes to re-capitalize the company by raising rates for the average user by about 60 percent. Water users in communities that traditionally use far more water could end up paying on average an extra 138 percent. Some of the highest volume users could see their rates triple. Numerous citizens from the communities PWC serves have intervened in the rate case, extending out the hearing.

The ACC may have a finding in the rate case by the end of summer.

Yet, Payson Water Company, under Williamson, has also solved one the great water problems of the Rim Country — Mesa del Caballo.

The first step came with correctly labeling all wells that PWC uses to provide water to approximately 400 residents of the community.

Reports from the Arizona Department of Water Quality (ADEQ) and Arizona Department of Water Resources (ADWR) proved the former owner of PWC (Robert Hardcastle) mislabeled wells. The mislabeling saved him money on safety testing, but it exposed

the Mesa del community to potential health hazards if the wells had contained bacteria or heavy metals.

Williamson has corrected the problem and now tests the wells and reports their production accurately, but he faced a public relations debacle in the process.

The next problem solved was water supply.

Since 2011, residents of the community located off of Houston Mesa Road saw an increase in their water bills anywhere from 62 percent to 150 percent of normal during the dry summer months of May though October because of Brooke Utilities hauling water in by truck.

Studies provided by Brooke Utilities showed that well production during the summer could not keep up with demand, nor were there enough storage tanks to serve increased usage.

Brooke had also hauled water into the PineStrawberry water system for years. Residents there not only saw their bills skyrocket, they had to live under a building moratorium due to a lack of water.

Unlike Mesa del, the residents of Pine and Strawberry bought their water system. They have drilled new deep wells, elected a board, and hired a management company that has enabled the community to lift the building moratorium and keep the water flowing.

But trouble has not escaped the two mountain communities, however.

During the past year, a majority of the Pine Strawberry Water Improvement District board resigned before a recall election. The interim board made up of the Gila County Board of Supervisors, has called for a special election in May. Meanwhile, PWC had started work on a pipeline to connect Mesa del to the pipeline the town of Payson will use to deliver C.C. Cragin Reservoir water. This summer of 2014 will be the first time Mesa del residents can monitor the amount of water they augment their wells with from the pipeline and meters.

The town of Payson will sell water from its wells to

Pete Aleshire/Roundup

Hundreds of customers of Payson Water Company vent their frustrations about a proposed water rate increase that will raise average bills by 50 to 138 percent. Ironically, most of the communities live along streams like the East Verde River (top).

Mesa del residents, but they will not have to pay for trucking, which should significantly reduce summer water bills even with the surcharges to pay for the pipeline connection.

Unfortunately, the other communities along the East Verde River corridor that could also benefit from C.C. Cragin Reservoir water, cannot use that water without buying into the pipeline.

Whispering Pines and East Verde Park enjoy views of the river where C.C. Cragin reservoir water flows, but PWC does not have the right to use the

reservoir water.

Instead, these communities will have increased water bills without an improvement in the infrastructure, according to testimony by PWC employees during the ACC rate case.

East Verde may need to have water hauled in by truck, according to filings.

Residents from the community have filed interventions to keep the rates and fees for overusing water during the dry months to a minimum.

But the battle over water continues.

Residents protest prospect of huge rate increase BY

PETE ALESHIRE

ROUNDUP EDITOR

Eight unincorporated communities served by a controversial private water company found a new unity and voice — mostly by opposing a proposed rate increase.

The eight communities include Mesa del Caballo, East Verde Estates, Gisela, Deer Valley, Whispering Pines, Geronimo Estates and others, all served by the misleadingly named Payson Water Company (PWC). Brooke Utilities last year sold the company to Jason Williamson, who immediately sought a steep rate increase — the first in a decade.

The rate increase request has two components — both of them controversial. The average user would pay between 50 percent and 138 percent more, depending on average monthly use. People who use the most water in each community could face bills double or triple the old rate.

The Arizona Corporation Commission (ACC) held a series of hearings on the rate increases, which exposed passionate opposition and deep suspicion. The ACC then held a rare public hearing in Payson, which drew hundreds of angry water customers.

The debate about the rate increase has exposed the water shortages, deteriorating system and frustrating lack of leverage the private water company customers have. By contrast, the publicly owned water companies in Pine, Strawberry, Payson and Star Valley have all managed to eliminate water shortages, secure an ample future supply and charge rates much lower than the increased rates the PWC customers will likely end up paying before the smoke clears.

Despite the stark contrast, not even the bitter water dispute had spurred any open movement toward annexation to any of the public water districts. The small, poorly organized communities have also not made any strong move to secure a right to water from the Blue Ridge pipeline, with the exception of Mesa del Caballo, which sits right alongside Payson’s planned treatment plant for the

Pete Aleshire/Roundup

Arizona Corporation Commissioners Susan Bittersmith and Bob Burns heard three hours worth of complaints about a proposed water rate increase recently in Payson.

Blue Ridge water.

The rate increase will likely make water sharply more expensive in those unincorporated communities, but probably won’t do much to end the chronic water shortages in some of them. Mesa del Caballo will end up connected to the Blue Ridge pipeline with plenty of water for its future needs.

However, the the connection could roughly double average monthly water bills, while saving the steep cost of water hauling.

Setting the pipeline connection aside, the proposed water rate increase will increase the current, average $21.75 water bill to about $33.48 — a 61 percent increase for a homeowner using 2,980 gallons.

The company trimmed its original request to raise rates enough to increase revenues by $399,000, but cut that target to $290,000 under pressure from the ACC staff.

The new rate structure would charge $23 a month for a basic water meter, plus $4 for each

1,000 gallons used up to $3,000.

After that, the per-gallon charge would rise with use. People would pay $7.66 per 1,000 gallons from 3,000 gallons to 10,000 gallons and then $9.61 per 1,000 gallons over a monthly total of 10,000 gallons.

That tiered rate structure poses big problems for the rural communities of Deer Creek and Gisela, where many people raise crops and livestock. The average customer uses nearly 7,000 gallons a month in Gisela and about 4,400 gallons a month in Deer Creek. That’s why those communities would face an increase in the average bill of 138 percent and 84 percent respectively.

The customers of the company rose up in unanimous opposition to the rate increase at the recent ACC public forum in Payson.

Mesa del Caballo residents worried about those big increases on top of hefty charges to hook up to Payson’s Blue Ridge pipeline. Other communities like East Verde Estates worried about the addition-

al imposition of water hauling charges when supplies run low in the summer, which could triple their bills.

Throughout the emotional hearing, residents said they felt ripped off by former Brooke Utilities owner Robert Hardcastle and don’t trust the figures provided by the new owner of Payson Water Company.

Royce O’Donnell joked, “I was wondering who brought the rope — in your case the ropes,” he said to the three commissioners facing the nearly unanimous opposition to the rate increases largely supported by the ACC staff.

Ed Eckhardt, of East Verde Estates, said the company’s rate filing is full of contradictions and missing information. For instance, some records show the company pumped 5 million gallons — but sold only 3 million gallons. “So we’re missing 2 million gallons. It concerns me that your staff hasn’t done anything to analyze this properly. I’m disappointed that many of our problems are caused by system failures and not a shortage of water.”

Residents of Gisela objected passionately to a proposal to first raise the minimum base rate sharply and then shift to a tiered water rate structure that charges heavy users much more per gallon. They said the underground flow of nearby Tonto Creek provides plenty of water for their shallow wells.

Pat Tatum, of Gisela, said, “You’re telling us that we’re going to be penalized for continuing our traditional way of life. We have 532 people in 288 households on 650 acres surrounded by public lands so we can never expand. What right does this commission have to tell us we can’t have an orchard when the Valley has 4 million people living in a desert with lawns, swimming pools and no water conservation at all — using water that comes off our watershed?”

Commissioner Bob Stump noted that Arizona remains one of the few states in which the Constitution set up a corporation commission.

“They wanted us to be a bulwark against monopolies. Of course, you have the power to vote us out — but I want to thank you for being here.”

12

PAYSON ROUNDUP PROGRESS 2014

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PAY S O N R O U N D U P

COMMUNITIES

PROGRESS 2014

13

Change is in the wind for Rim Country

Pete Aleshire/Roundup

As economy finally mends, Payson draws up its plan for the future BY

PETE ALESHIRE

ROUNDUP EDITOR

ingers crossed everyone: Looks like Payson has turned a corner. Alas, the last few years have delivered up a succession of false summits and setbacks.

But consider the portents of change, blowing in a pleasant spring breeze.

— Payson continued to make solid progress on building the Blue Ridge pipeline, which will make it one of the few communities in Arizona with plenty of water to supply all its anticipated future needs.

— Payson built and staffed a third fire station and finally brought the police force up to full strength — albeit by stretching the budget reserves dangerously thin.

— The Forest Service finally moved to sell the Rim Country Educational Alliance the 253 acres needed to build a 6,000-student university campus in Payson. Hurdles remain, but Arizona State University’s still interested and advocates hope to get phase one open to students in the fall of 2016.

— After years of building virtually nothing, developers with projects totaling some 600 homes have opened discussions with the town about restarting long-mothballed plans.

— Applications for new business licenses have risen sharply — so have real estate sales and average home prices.

All of that makes Payson’s ongoing effort this year to revise its general plan and establish a blueprint for future growth crucial.

Payson will complete overhauling its general plan this year, a land use blueprint for the future. The plan envisions a town of about 38,000 in 20 square miles, the commercial and cultural hub of a much larger area.

Much of the emphasis on town planning has focused on broadening and deepening the economic base of a community that had come to rely too heavily on seasonal tourism and attracting retirees.

Outdoor and family tourism remain crucial to the economy, since the area serves as a gateway to four national forests, three major yearround streams and countless tributaries and hundreds of miles of hiking, biking and riding trails radiating out from the edge of town.

Moreover, the region remains popular with retirees — with easy access to Phoenix, varied medical and social services, many recreational amenities for seniors and grandchildren alike, plus mild but distinct seasons that satisfy the urge for a little snow and fall colors without the need to break out the snow shovels.

However, the land use blueprint envisions more stable, year-round, high-wage industries. That’s why the town leaders have so doggedly pursued the plan to build a four-year university here — with all its spinoff benefits.

The general plan reflects those priorities, setting the limits on everything from housing densities to where commercial businesses, industrial development and apartment complexes end up.

The revision of the plan that will go to the voters later this year focused on making sure the town provides plenty of space for businesses that produce both jobs and sales tax, which supports most town services. However, residents also don’t want to sacrifice the small-town feel, forested neighborhoods and amenities — like the town’s two huge parks.

The last time the town overhauled its general plan, many residents worried mostly about managing growth without outstripping the water supply. But starting work on the Blue Ridge pipeline to double the town’s water supply took care of the water worries. And the recession refocused most residents on attracting new residents and businesses

F

L

See Payson’s future plans, page 18

As signs accumulated that Rim Country’s economy had turned a corner, Payson wrestled with how to accommodate future growth without losing the things people treasure — like the community spirit behind the great success of the Payson Community Garden (above) and the pleasures of Green Valley Park (below). The town will continue working on its once-a-decade general plan revision. The map at the bottom shows the town’s targeted growth areas. The general plan provides for a build-out population of more than 38,000.

PAYSON ROUNDUP COMMUNITIES PROGRESS 2014

14

What’s happening in our schools?

Despite dwindling support from the state, Rim Country schools still making progress BY

MICHELE NELSON

ROUNDUP STAFF WRITER

As of March 2014, the National Education Association reported the state of Arizona holds the dubious distinction of coming in dead last among the 50 states when it comes to perstudent spending.

Despite that, Rim Country schools seem to have turned a corner.

Payson School District

The largest school district, Payson Unified School District (PUSD) has, for the first time in five years, seen enrollment increase and the number of homeless and displaced students drop.

The district has a budget of $14 million for the upcoming year, which will allow the it to continue enrichment programs such as music and athletics.

PUSD has four school sites including two elementary schools, a middle school and a high school.

Unlike most school districts, PUSD students spend time at each school site.

As a rural school district, Payson has challenges with its demographics including a higher-than-average percentage of special education and lowincome students.

Yet, the teachers find the time and resources to offer students extras such as ski and caving trips with outdoor adventure clubs, a chance to design research projects using a satellite orbiting the planet Mars, state-of-the-art 3-D printer for engineering projects, studying the night sky, hands-on ecology studies at the East Verde River, a championship band and music program, college credits for classes taught in partnership with Gila Community College, a full drama program, complete agricultural, business, computer, engineering, construction and culinary arts programs, as well as a championship athletics program that draws in the whole community.

The Rim Country community has supported its school system with a bond passed in the early 2000s. This allowed the district to significantly upgrade the facilities and buildings. The historic rock building near the

newly built Julia Randall Elementary (JRE) building now houses administration, while the elementary school covers grades 3-5, plus a pre-kindergarten program.

Rim Country Middle School and Payson High School also received upgrades and a fresh coat of paint.

Just as every other district in Arizona has struggled with state-imposed budget cuts, PUSD suffered, but the tide seems to have turned during the 2013-14 year.

Test scores have held steady — remaining a little bit above the state and national average in most grades.

But the 2013-14 year represents a transition year for the district. Next year, the district will no longer test on the Arizona Instrument to Measure Standards (AIMS) test. Instead, the district will shift to a test that reflects more national expectations.

The school system remains a focal point of the community, dominating sports coverage in the local paper, receiving consistent coverage of special events and performances and benefiting from more than $200,000 donated annually to the state’s Credit for Kids tax write-off donation system, as well as thousands of hours from volunteers.

Pine-Strawberry District

The Pine-Strawberry District has a new superintendent/principal, Cody Barlow, who has filled the shoes of former longtime superintendent Mike Clark quite successfully.

The students in the forested district continue to put on plays and concerts, participate in spelling bees and science fairs, and hold sport tournaments.

Tonto-Basin School District

Tonto Basin also has a new leadership, but unlike Pine, the superintendent and principal positions were split into two after a tough parting of the ways with former administrator Mary Lou Weatherly.

The new superintendent, Keith Greer has embraced the small-town life of Tonto Basin supporting a dinner before school starts at a local ranch and touting the annual

Pete Aleshire/Roundup

From Friday night football (top) to Christmas concerts (above) Payson schools knit the community together. So does the school-hosted Halloween gathering in Tonto Basin (right) Halloween Festival so well, families came from all over the county to participate.

Marilyn Simmons took on the day-to-day administering tasks of principal. Since she has a musical teacher’s background, she played the piano at the annual Veterans Day parade.

The parents and community say they are happy with her work.

Charter and Private Schools

The Payson Christian School purchased the Frontier Elementary School site from PUSD. The school’s website said it continues to improve its offerings and is seeking accreditation through the Association of Christian Schools International.

For extracurricular activities, the school has a ski club, yearbook, a sports league with cross-country, volleyball and basketball.

The Shelby Charter School in Tonto Village uses art and hands-on experiences to teach

many of the required subjects.

One of the school’s alumni became a chess champion and recently worked with Cuba Gooding Jr. on the movie “Life of a King.”

Payson Center for Success (PCS), is a charter high school within PUSD. PCS has a more flexible schedule than the traditional high school. The student to teacher ratio is smaller and most of the work is done online.

Students can work as fast as they wish, but must keep up with expectations.

PCS has numerous field trips that help with curriculum.

Linda O’Dell, the Gila County Superintendent of Schools, runs Payson Education Center (PEC).

The school offers personalized, individualized teaching with computer, textbook, project and web-based instruction.

The school has field trips and visits from politicians such as Congressman Paul Gosar.

PAYSON ROUNDUP COMMUNITIES PROGRESS 2014

15

Community college dean recounts year’s achievements BY

PAMELA BUTTERFIELD

DEAN OF GCC, PAYSON CAMPUS

Pete Aleshire/Roundup

GCC board member Larry Stephenson hands out diplomas at a graduation ceremony. The college has increased enrollment and added programs despite deep cuts in state support for community colleges.

Gila Community College (GCC) enjoyed a successful year of providing courses and programs to residents of Gila County.

In May, approximately 50 individuals will earn associate degrees in the following areas: • Administration of Justice • Cosmetology • Early Childhood Education • Education-Elementary • Education-Secondary • Electrical and Instrumentation Technology • Fire Science • General Studies • General Technical Studies and Nursing In addition, in Payson, over 200 students will earn certificates in the following areas: • Basic Emergency Medical Technician • Basic Wildland Firefighting • Bookkeeping • Certified Personal Trainer • Fire Department Operations • Hazardous Material First Responder • Laboratory Assistant, Medical Assistant • Nursing Assistant • Phlebotomy The college continues to provide quality workforce training and transfer programs for the community.

The Associate of Applied Science in Nursing remains the most popular degree, with many students currently working on the prerequisite courses to gain admission into the program.

GCC partners with Payson Regional Medical Center, Rim Country Health and various medical facilities in the greater metropolitan Phoenix area to provide clinical experiences for the nursing students.

The college partners with Rim Country Health and Payson Care Center to provide

clinical experiences for the nursing assistant students.

As a provisional college, GCC partners with Eastern Arizona College to provide fully accredited post-secondary educational services. The college also partners with Arizona State University, Northern Arizona University and the University of Arizona to provide a seamless transfer experience with guaranteed admission.

ASU, NAU and Grand Canyon University all offer GCC students opportunities for reduced tuition.

Additionally, GCC continues its strong partnership with Payson Unified School District and Northern Arizona Vocational Institute of Technology (NAVIT), providing Career and Technical Education (CTE) courses for high school students both on the college campus and at the high school.

Central programs held at GCC include fire science, nursing assistant and medical assistant. On the high school campus, students earn college credit for courses in: • Basic Animal Systems • Automotive Maintenance • Construction Technology • Culinary Fundamentals • Information Technology • Marketing Management • Theatre Production Furthermore, high school students can take American Sign Language or Spanish for college credit on the high school campus before school.

Gila Community College remains committed to providing courses for personal enrichment to Gila County residents. Art and physical education courses prove to be the most popular. A sampling of art courses include: • Drawing • Ceramics • Crafts • Jewelry • Photoshop • Digital photography • Painting

Popular physical education courses include aerobics, bowling, pilates, t’ai chi ch’uan, yoga and use of the college wellness center. These courses are popular with senior citizens, who, if age 55 and older and an Arizona resident, receive a senior scholarship and have their tuition paid by the college.

The Small Business Development Center (SBDC) provides business services at no cost to the individual or business.

The SBDC can help with business planning, loan applications and more.

Looking forward, the college is beginning a medical coding and billing certificate program this fall and is planning for a future cosmetology program.

Friends of Rim Country Gila Community College is a newly formed 501(c)3 organization founded to provide scholarships to Payson Campus GCC students. A fundraising dinner and auction will be held at Chaparral Pines Clubhouse on June 28.

Contact the Payson Campus front office to make a donation or request an invitation to the dinner and auction.

GCC could not have educated and trained our students without the help and support of our three full-time and our 65 adjunct instructors.

Adjunct instruction is integral to the success of our programs, and we are grateful to the individuals who choose to work with us and share their expertise with our students.

Each Gila Community College staff and faculty member strives to provide an excellent educational experience for students of all ages and goals.

Gila Community College appreciates the support of the Payson community in helping us achieve our mission.

Registration for summer and fall courses is now ongoing. GCC invites you to pick up a class schedule in the front office or look online at www.gilaccc.org to see if there’s a course for you in our course offerings.

Julia Randall Elementary School has new principal, lots of HEROS This year, with a new principal and a dedicated counselor, the elementary school has focused on different anti-bullying programs.

Using the HERO (Helping Everyone Respect Others) anti-bullying strategy, the school has: • Hosted HERO rallies — attendance was based on good behavior.

• Distributed HERO bracelets.

• Longhorn Pride Award — Daily drawing recognizing an individual doing good deeds.

• Recognition of HERO student — each Friday a student from each grade is chosen as a HERO student. They embody outstanding character, leadership and the six pillars of character: trustworthiness, respect, responsibility, fairness, caring and citizenship. They have their picture taken and put on the HERO wall with their prize.

• TRC — a program in the classrooms designed to teach children responsibility for their behavior and removes disruptions from the classroom so teachers can teach and students can learn.

• Daily Good Things.

The physical education department under Donna Moore won numerous awards for participating in P.E. programs: • Fuel Up To Play 60 NFL exercise and nutrition program. JRE students ranked second in Arizona and 41st in the nation.

• Operation Tone-Up team took first place in Arizona in the “Fittest School Challenge.”

• Jump Rope for Heart — JRE students raised $6,000 for the American Heart Association.

Academics were not forgotten:

JRE’s Christmas concert this year filled the PHS Auditorium to overflowing.

• Millionaire Club for students who read a million words or more. One third-grade student read 5 million words.

• Project Wet — a hands-on program sponsored

by the Payson Water Department designed to teach students about erosion, the water cycle, water sheds and water conservation. The program is geared toward Arizona state education standards.

• Wildlife Outreach Education Program — Sam Huselton, coordinator of the program, brought a horned owl, turtle and snake for fourth-grade students to meet and study. The discussion focused on animal adaptations.

• Annual trip the Browns’ Ranch in Tonto Basin to complete the Gila County agricultural unit. Events included panning for gold, planting, a petting zoo, branding wood and wagon rides.

• Bashas’ and the Arizona Department of Weights and Measures program designed to teach children about math and how to get around the grocery store.

• Read alouds.

• Vegetable garden — students planted a garden in their quad outside of the cafeteria.

• Studied owl pellets to see what they eat.

• Real life with a checkbook: teachers have students in their classroom maintain a checkbook throughout the year.

Students receive a monthly “salary” from which they pay a monthly rent for losing homework or not following the rules.

Students may earn more money by making reading goals, keeping up grades, and other personal actions.

Teachers have students balance checkbooks each month — they even file a tax return by April 15!

At the end of the year, students “spend” extra money on auction items such as toys.

One teacher said, “Parents love this authentic task because the kids talk with them and it brings up lots of related social studies and math topics.”

Payson High School details academic gains and new programs BY

SUSAN CAMPBELL

SPECIAL PROJECTS COORDINATOR, PAYSON SCHOOLS

Payson Unified School District (PUSD) is in the business of education. PUSD welcomes ALL children and youth from pre-kindergarten through 12th grade.

The district offers students instruction in reading, writing, math, science, social studies, civics, technology, fine arts, career technical education, foreign language and physical education.

Payson Schools are a taxpayer-funded, public entity, in the centuries-old American tradition of offering a free public education to ALL students.

The Payson School District’s No. 1 goal is “Continuous Improvement of Student Achievement.”

“We believe ALL students can demonstrate growth throughout a school year,” said Campbell. “We use the art and science of teaching to help students reach 21st-century college and career readiness upon graduation from high school.”

A public school district answers to many constituents and stakeholders: Students Parents Staff Voters Citizens Lawmakers Auditors State and federal laws Media PUSD must keep a laser-like focus on “Continuous Improvement of Student Achievement” while balancing a host of internal and external demands.

PUSD made many changes in 2013 and have plans for expanding service in 2014.

For the current 2013-14 school year, PUSD added the following to the district: — Free all-day kindergarten.

— Individually tailored assessment tests in reading and math from kindergarten through 10th grade to determine progress and provide interventions for struggling students.

— Moved curriculum closer to alignment with the Arizona College and Career Ready Standards through Beyond Textbooks.

— Added “Reteach and Enrich” periods K-12 to challenge ALL students to reach and exceed gradelevel requirements.

Plans for the upcoming 2014-15 school year: — Improve and increase access to current technology from basic infrastructure to Chromebooks in ALL students’ hands.

— Continuous improvement of student achievement.

PUSD plays an integral and unique part in the Rim Country including: — Payson Schools has been a part of the Rim Country community for more than 100 years.

— Three and four living generations of Rim Country residents have been educated at Payson Schools.

— Payson Schools annually serves more meals than any local restaurant, puts more miles on its vehicles than any local utility company and generates all its electricity and then some from its solar installation.

— PUSD has 275 employees and opens its doors from 7:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday.

Education has seen numerous changes and PUSD is no stranger to change.

Students know more and master it sooner than they did five to 10 years ago. Teaching methods have

Pete Aleshire/Roundup

Interim PUSD Superintendent Johnny Ketchem and board member Rory Huff ponder budget news. evolved from lectures only to multiple interactive ways of teaching, including hands-on and group activities.

New changes in education require teachers and students to be evaluated on how much students learn, understand and retain.

Classrooms have incorporated a rapid rise in technology, which students have mastered well ahead of their teachers and most other adults.

If the Payson Unified School District continues on the trajectory started this year, we foresee schools moving from good to great and staying there.

The economy has influenced the quantity of students at Payson Schools and has greatly affected the budget.

As part of her position, Campbell collects infor-

mation on the demographics of the district for grant writing purposes.

The local economy will continue to challenge families to fully provide for their children due to the shortage of living-wage jobs and wage stagnation.

Payson Schools will be a refuge for students whose families are in a virtual cycle of crisis or near-crisis.

For more questions, please contact: Susan Campbell/Special Projects Coordinator (in consultation with PUSD administration) Payson Schools P.O. Box 919 Payson, AZ 85547 474-2070 susan.campbell@pusd.com

PAYSON ROUNDUP COMMUNITIES PROGRESS 2014

16

Star Valley focuses on roads, upgrading water system Council approves first park and master plan to overhaul roads, cope with flooding BY

TERESA MCQUERREY

ROUNDUP STAFF REPORTER

“The water department is where we want it to be,” said Star Valley Town Manager Tim Grier in an interview discussing the small community’s progress in 2013 (detailed in another Star Valley story in this edition).

Now the focus is on making more improvements to the town’s roads and creating a park for residents and visitors. Naturally, there are more issues to be addressed, but for the present, the roads and park are where the attention of the town council, Grier and the rest of the small, effective staff is directed.

The town had contracted last April with PinalGila Consulting for $7,500 to develop a master plan of the community’s streets.

Bruce Varker of Pinal-Gila Consulting told the council his firm would measure the streets (how many miles of roads the town has and their widths); catalog them; analyze their needs; prioritize the work (which are likely to fail sooner rather than later); and give the council a cost estimate of the work to be done over the course of years. He said his firm could also create a road maintenance schedule and would have staff available to see that all the work is done correctly.

Star Valley had paid $4,200 of the contract to Varker for a streets and roads master plan.

However, the consultant had done very little over the course of more than six months, so in November, the council directed Grier to dissolve the contract and request Varker return 100 percent of the money paid. The town manager, who is also the town’s attorney, was also directed to pursue litigation if necessary to get the money back.

The council’s goal in regard to its streets and roads is for them all to be safe and preserved in such a way that they can be maintained regularly in a cost effective manner, Grier said.

Over the years Roy Haught of Roy Haught Excavating has helped the town with road projects and more recently the efforts to make the new town park a reality.

“Roy grew up in Star Valley and probably knows the roads around here better than anybody,” Grier said.

So, Grier went to him and asked if he could help them out with creating a roadwork plan — addressing many of the same issues with which the consultant was supposed to deal.

Star Valley bought out a water company owned by Brooke Utilities for about $700,00 then spent $300,000 making system upgrades and repairs, without disrupting service to the 40 percent of residents who rely on the system with only a minimal rate increase — relying on reserves and grants.

“It’s working out great,” Grier said.

In fact, at the Star Valley Town Council meeting April 1, 2014 a presentation on the upcoming and proposed road projects was presented.

The first improvement projects will be to the low water crossing on Sprague Ranch Road and another on Moonlight Drive. The council has authorized Sunrise Engineering of Payson to detail the projects; with Haught’s company proposing to do some site work and the overlay on the streets once the construction is completed.

Other projects Haught proposed to improve Star Valley roads: • Patches on Moonlight, Dealers Choice, Pinon, Claxton, and Valley Road, which would involve making sawcuts to the pavement and filling with eight inches of new base as well as special edging where needed.

• Filling cracks of one-quarter inch and larger on Knolls, Dealers Choice, Mountain View, Claxton, Switchman, Pinon, Moonlight, Houston Creek,

Gila County Board of Supervisors

welcomes you

to the Rim Country Tommie Cline Martin, Supervisor District 1 928-474-7100

Michael A. Pastor, Supervisor Distrct 2 928-402-8753

John Marcanti,

Supervisor Distrct 3 928-402-8726

Hillside, Springdale, Sunbeam, Rainbow, Pineridge, Valley Road and Haught Road; this would including blowing out the cracks with air and one application of hot rubberized crackfill.

• Building shoulders around a culvert on Mountain View and on Claxton, plus placing riprap around the Mountain View culvert and on Pinon.

Town park

A Star Valley Town Park is another big point of progress for the community.

The town purchased a little more than five acres to the southeast of the Plant Fair Nursery, off East Highway 260, late in 2012 and started discussing plans of the property last fall. Costing only $250,000, the purchase was made with the need for expanding municipal facilities at some point in the future.

An old house, barn and an aviary occupied the land. The town had the uninhabitable residence demolished and briefly discussed parceling the acreage and selling some of the land to the neigh-

boring nursery. That discussion fell by the wayside when the consensus of council members decided the town should not be in the real estate business.

At its first meeting in March, the council heard a proposal from Grier to use the property as a town park. The plan is for a place to have picnics, enjoy the great weather, play volleyball and horseshoes, possibly have a child-friendly water park, an offleash dog park, interpretive trails, a community garden, fitness course, lighting and perhaps use the aviary as a bird rescue facility.

The mayor and all the council met the proposal with tremendous enthusiasm and work to develop the park was on the fast track.

The site has been prepared and picnic tables are already in place as are the horseshoe pit and volleyball courts. The park will have five grills for cookouts and a water fountain, plus a dog waste-bag dispenser in the first phase.

The additional amenities are suggested for later improvements to the site.

PAYSON ROUNDUP COMMUNITIES PROGRESS 2014

17

Tonto Village and other communities near the creek got good news in the form of thinning projects, bridges and a new fire station — only to learn the Hellsgate Fire Department faces budget cuts and layoffs due to the loss of a federal grant. Here, Hellsgate firefighters conduct a night time training session by setting fire to a junker car.

New fire station, bridge point to progress in Tonto Village BY

TERESA MCQUERREY

ROUNDUP STAFF REPORTER

To the outsider the small communities in what’s essentially the backcountry of the Rim area are pretty sleepy.

That would be a misconception in regard to Tonto Village.

The little hamlet north of State Route 260 off the Control Road is a busy little place. There are all kinds of activities offered by the Fireflies auxiliary to the Hellsgate Fire Department, including celebrations for Memorial Day, the Fourth of July and Labor Day. The Double D watering hole and café has regular, hotly contested pool games, horseshoe tournaments and more.

Things are moving along to improve access into and out of the community and upgrade its security.

After years of planning and finagling for a place in line for federal money, a new bridge on the Control Road at Tonto Village is under construction.

Gila County Public Works officials call the project “reconstruction.”

However it will consist of erecting a single-span bridge, roadway realignment, raising the profile grade and graded ditches. The existing roadway will be obliterated and the existing crossing removed.

The channel that flows under the proposed bridge will be re-graded.

Steve Sanders, GCPW, told the board of supervisors the Control Road project also allows for an improved roadway tie into Johnson Boulevard, which is the main access road to Tonto Village. A severe skew angle at this location is not safe due to the limited sight distance to oncoming traffic. The new alignment will alleviate this problem and increase safety.

As the projects get underway, bypasses will be constructed to allow traffic to pass and minimize delays.

According to the Roundup’s correspondent for Tonto Village, Janet Snyder, crews poured concrete the first week of April and the second week of the month were moving dirt around to change access to the Control Road as the work progresses.

The Hellsgate Fire Department is currently building a new fire station in Tonto Village using money generated from sending local crews to fight wildland fires for the U.S. Forest Service.

The area urgently needs the new station, said Fire Chief Gary Hatch, who has worked years to secure a site and the $425,000 in funding.

The new, 5,000-square-foot building will replace a small, deteriorating station just a few blocks away, built in 1982 — mostly without permits.

Everything will change when crews complete the new station — hopefully later this year.

The metal building will feature five bays, a staff office, fitness room,

living quarters and a training/community room. The new location will also allow for quicker emergency access to the Control Road, the main artery to nearby subdivisions in the district, Hatch said.

The existing station, a small, bright red building at 151 N. Matthews Lane, will not be missed.

Hatch said he has known since first walking into the fire station many years ago that it needed to go. It originally had no office space; just a small kitchen that workers discovered was filled with black mold.

The mold was cleared out and a new kitchen added along with storage and office room. Support beams now lift up the sagging roof to accommodate fire trucks. Even so, one of the two trucks must sit outside.

Hatch plans to keep the original structure of the old station as a workshop.

Some have questioned whether the department really needs a new station, especially with its tight budget.

“The biggest issue we have is that the other station (the old one), the cost of fixing it is about half of what we have here (at the new station),” Hatch said.

As the Tonto Village Fire District grew, the district repeatedly added to the original building. To resolve roof drainage problems, the old station would have needed a whole new roof structure — including trusses. In addition, it would cost a lot to fix some of the building’s footings, stem walls and the septic system. The building also lacks central heating and cooling. Major renovations could possibly lead to other unforeseen additional costs to bring the property up to current building code standards.

Even then, the district would still have a small station without any room for expansion, Hatch said.

The new station, at the intersection of Fitch Lane and West Johnson Boulevard, will sit on two-thirds of an acre and provide room for all the department’s needs for years to come.

For all these reasons, the Hellsgate Fire District board approved a $375,000 lease purchase agreement for a new station.

The district secured a 20-year loan, with an interest rate of 3.43 percent for the first 10 years.

The fire district also secured a refinance on the existing lease purchase and combined the two current apparatus leases at 2.93 percent, down from 4.66 percent.

The refinancing will reduce the annual apparatus payments by $10,200 over three years and help offset the building payment.

This will save the district $23,000 in interest on the apparatus lease over the life of the agreement. Annual payments for the apparatus and building will come from the capital reserve funds built by response to wildland fires.

In the past, the station served as the main station for the Tonto Village Fire District before the merger with the Diamond Star Fire District in 2008, forming the Hellsgate Fire District.

The Tonto Village station currently serves 1,100 residents. Eight volunteers staff the station, with at least one on duty at all times. The station responds to roughly two to three fires a year.

To cut down on construction costs, several firefighters, including Hatch, are doing much of the work on the new station.

Volunteers cleared the site, hauled in dirt to build up the pad and will likely put up the building. They will pay to have the concrete pad laid and an exhaust system installed along with a septic system and sprinklers.

Other communities

The small Rim communities beyond Mesa del Caballo on Houston Mesa Road are also seeing long-awaited progress in access issues.

The same project that is getting the Control Bridge built at Tonto Village is also replacing the low water Second and Third Crossings on Houston Mesa Road with bridges and a large box culvert at Reynolds Creek on State Route 288 south of Young.

The work could cost Gila County about $300,000, but the board of supervisors agreed to participate in making the improvements, which started in 2013.

“The current (in August 2012) engineer’s cost estimate developed using 70 percent plan submittals is $5,414,637. The county’s required 5.75 percent match is $311,342. It’s probable that as plans near completion there will be a slight increase in the engineer’s estimate. The county’s match requirement will come from the Gila County Half-Cent Transportation Excise Tax,” Sanders said.

The projects have been in the works since February 2011.

The proposed work: • Houston Mesa Second Crossing — Reconstruction will consist of erecting a two-span bridge, wall, minor roadway realignment, raising the profile grade and graded ditches. The existing crossing is undersized and unable to meet capacity for peak storm events, often causing road closures. It will be removed as part of the project.

• Houston Mesa Third Crossing — Reconstruction will consist of erecting a two-span bridge, roadway realignment, raising the profile grade and graded ditches. The problems with the Third Crossing are the same as those with the Second Crossing.

In conjunction with the Houston Mesa Road projects, work will progress on the Blue Ridge pipeline in the area to further lessen traffic problems for area residents.

“All Gila County will do is accept the work for maintenance after it is completed,” said Joel Mona, engineering liaison for the Tonto National Forest in August 2012.

Fires, floods, gizzard shad: Tonto Basin takes it in stride BY

MICHELE NELSON

ROUNDUP STAFF REPORTER

Fires and floods didn’t phase Tonto Basin, which hired a new schools superintendent and continued to lobby for a new bridge.

Fire and floods, gizzard shad versus the bass, new school leadership, expanded medical care with a whole lot of fun thrown in — just a typical year for the folks in Tonto Basin.

As always, with a river running through town, weather plays a big part in the yearly adventures of Tonto Basin residents.

The fire season of 2013 saw dry lightning start the Pinion Fire in September. The fire started 15 miles southeast of Tonto Basin.

With more sycamores and cottonwoods than ponderosa pines, the area will never see a crown fire, but a wildfire still causes everyone to get on edge.

This fire was controlled after a few days with no structural damage. Two hundred acres burned.

By December, the fires were out and the first of only a couple of winter storms hit Rim Country.

But it was big.

Water rushed down from Rim waterways causing Tonto Creek to overflow its banks. All three crossings shut down stranding everyone living on the east side of the creek.

But that was the last time anyone had to worry about a winter storm.

Before and after the dry and wet weather, Tonto Basinites celebrated traditional hooplas with the Halloween Carnival and the Veterans Day Parade.

Each October the little Tonto Basin School invites anyone in the county to come in and enjoy a cake walk, costume contest and carnival booths.

This year, to celebrate 30 years of the Halloween Carnival, the school went overboard advertising the event.

Families came from Globe, Miami, Strawberry, Pine and Payson. The parking lot overflowed and children from 6 months to 80 years old dressed up as ghouls, goblins, movie characters and critters.

Event founder and organizer Jeannie Cline said she had

never seen so many people come before, but she said, “I made the mistake of telling our new superintendent it was our 30th year.”

Just a couple of weeks after the wildly successful Halloween Carnival, the community hosted the Tonto Basin Veterans Day Parade.

Those who entered created floats honoring women veterans, local businesses, and vets from every war.

Then the town shut down for everyone to scatter and enjoy a barbecue at the Punkin Center or Butcher Hook restaurant.

Yet not all was fun and games this year.

The world renowned bass fishery Roosevelt Lake, suffered a blow to the bass population with the scourge of gizzard shad.

The bait fish work well in Eastern rivers and lakes, but not in the dryer Western lake environment. The little fish don’t stay so little in Roosevelt Lake. They eat up the water plants that bass use to hide and hunt and reproduce.

A loss of the fishery prodded local business owners, fishermen and local authorities to pressure Arizona Game and Fish into finding solutions to the problem.

This month (April 2014), Game and Fish dropped in hundreds of new bass and began to improve the underwater environment with water plants.

Tonto Basin not only improved its natural environment, but its medical environment.

Payson Regional Medical Center opened up Rim Country Family Care – Tonto Basin Clinic in February.

Nurse practitioner Teresa Corrigan, FNP-BC, sees patients on Wednesdays and Saturdays from 8:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m.

Tonto Basin School saw all new administration come in this year.

Different from how the administration worked in the past, the school split the work of the superintendent and principal between two people.

Superintendent Keith Greer works part time, while principal Marilyn Simmons handles the day-to-day responsibilities of managing the school and staff.

PAYSON ROUNDUP COMMUNITIES PROGRESS 2014

18

Pine and Strawberry get their groove on

Pete Aleshire/Roundup

Pine seeks creative solutions with renewed sense of community BY

TERESA MCQUERREY

ROUNDUP STAFF REPORTER

The unincorporated communities of Pine and Strawberry made big strides this year in their effort to not only resolve long-standing difficulties — but forge a deeper sense of unity.

The dramatic events affecting the Pine-Strawberry Water Improvement District got the biggest headlines.

Most important: The district continued to add to the town’s water supply — making the decade-long building moratorium imposed as a result of the refusal of the private water company owned by Brooke Utilities to provide new supplies of water.

The district moved decisively to develop new wells and storage, eliminating the moratorium as well as the costly summer rite of water shortages and water hauling charges.

However, assorted difficulties also spurred a recall effort against the board, the abrupt resignation of five board members and a temporary takeover of the district by the Gila County Board of Supervisors. For a time it looked like the water wars would dominate and embitter the community for the whole year, but somehow the dramatic events seem to have healed the divisions. With a May election scheduled and an audit promised, controversy seems to have largely

died away.

That has allowed Pine and Strawberry to get back to what they do best — nurture a small-town lifestyle that engenders a strong sense of community involvement.

The Pine approach to problems shone through in the community’s energetic and creative efforts to provide fire protection.

The Pine-Strawberry Fire Department continues to operate with a staff of professional firefighters, with strong support from the community. The Pine Strawberry Fuel Reduction Committee has worked closely with the fire department, raised money, sought grants and even recruited volunteers to develop a network of trails that can double as firebreaks.

The challenges remain substantial, but the community spirit indomitable.

Local business owners have also banned together to increase the community’s visibility, with a host of festivals and special events. Several bike-oriented races and events testify to a determination to make the area a mecca for mountain bikers.

Resident or visitor, the communities of Pine and Strawberry, while not off the beaten path, are where to get away from the hustle and bustle. Small, quiet and friendly in a wonderfully old-fashioned

way, the area offers a variety of home options.

In Pine, second-home owners dominate the real estate market, which offers lots of homes in all price ranges nestled in the trees, many with sweeping views of the looming Mogollon Rim. The topography and the varied building patterns in the course of the community’s long pioneer history has created a mix of homes for vacationers, retirees and year-rounders.

The adjacent community of Strawberry offers similar treasures, with a greater share of ranching properties in the narrow, meadow-graced valley. The community has many horse properties and also lies along the road that leads to the trailhead of the Highline Trail and Fossil Creek.

Summer festivals, rural ambiance, a mild climate and a state-of-the-art, fullservice library add to the popularity of the tiny mountain hamlets.The two unincorporated communities host numerous festivals that attract throngs of visitors as well as summer and full-time residents who savor the small-town camaraderie and cultural heritage.

Festivities kick off in May and continue through to the Fall Apple Festival, with holiday celebrations tacked on at the end of the year. Anchoring the events are the

decades-old Memorial Day, Independence Day and Labor Day arts and crafts festivals that draw throngs visitors from around the state.

The Strawberry Patchers’ Quilt Festival and Strawberry Festival are also popular summer attractions.

While the Fire on the Rim Mountain Bike Race is relatively new, it is growing in popularity and has become an attractive stop on the state’s cycling circuit.

Held in September, the race includes 15-, 30- and 45-mile events on high country trails. A beer garden, food wagons, auctions, spaghetti dinner, kids race, bands and camping add to the overall ambiance.

Newcomers are also drawn to the two towns because of their location near the Blue Ridge Reservoir northeast of Strawberry off SR 87. It’s a popular spot for trout fishing, boating, camping and stargazing.

Also in the two mountain towns, the Historic Walking Tour, Pine-Strawberry Museum and the presence of the many original log and rock cabins, provide residents, both new and old, with a connection to the pioneers who settled the area in the mid-1800s.

Some of the old buildings have been transformed into antique stores, cafés and gift shops that are popular draws among visitors and part- and full-time

Payson’s future plans From page 13 and establishing a stable, year-round economy less subject to the boom and bust of the sales-tax-dependent tourist industry.

Payson residents have focused on reviving — and then diversifying — the economy of a town that once relied on new construction and tourism to sustain a 4 percent growth rate.

The plan now includes a proposed 6,000student university campus, likely to produce a more diverse, year-round economy. Backers early this year hoped to conclude a deal to buy 253 acres from the U.S. Forest Service for a distinctive campus nestled in among towering ponderosa pines.

The general plan includes restrictions on land use; a circulation plan that determines how much traffic each street will carry; and detailed projections for housing, resource management, annexations and many other elements.

The 2000 U.S. Census listed 7,000 housing units, 1,200 of them vacant and 780 of them seasonal. The town had 5,800 households — 4,000 of them families, with an average family size of 2.71. At that time, the town had roughly 11,000 adults and 2,740 children and about 4,000 people older than 65.

The Payson townsite was founded in 1882 with a population of 40 people. The tally grew slowly to 200 residents in 1922, then to 500 in 1930. By 1990, the population had reached 8,377. It exploded in the next decade, rising 62 percent to 13,620 in 2000. The U.S. Census Bureau listed the population at 15,171 in July of 2011.

Tellebration (above) draws the best storytellers in the state every year to Pine. The event perfectly captures the sense of community and small-town charm that makes the unincorporated community a hotbed of individualism — and volunteerism.

Pete Aleshire/Roundup

Payson’s general plan overhaul aims at building on the small-town foundation exemplified by hosting the World’s Oldest Continuous Rodeo to becoming a diverse, year-round town of about 38,000 by adding things like a university to the tourism and retirement-home base.

residents. Among the pioneer homes that have been renovated is the popular Randall House that sits in the middle of Pine. Years ago it was transformed into a restaurant that serves up unique breakfasts, quiches, juicy burgers and creative salads.

Pine and Strawberry are a retiree’s dream and a vacationer’s haven, partly due to the mild year-round climate in which the winter lows hover around 23 degrees and the summer highs reach 92 degrees. The temperatures are cool enough in the summer to spend the entire day outside. While snow occasionally drapes the towns in the winter, it is usually short-lived.

The two towns, located just above 5,500 feet in elevation, are located underneath the Mogollon Rim in the largest stand of towering ponderosa pine trees in the world. Today, Pine and Strawberry have a year-round population of about 4,000 people, but that can more than double in the spring and summer when heatweary, desert dwellers eager to escape the Valley’s searing temperatures flock to the two towns.

The community is served by a K-8 school; the Senior Citizens Affairs Foundation, plus operates a thrift store; the Isabelle Hunt Memorial Library; and community groups.

Quick Facts

Payson Gila Co. Arizona

Population 2012 Percent under 5 Percent under 18 Percent 65 years + Percent Female Percent white African American American Indian Asian alone, Two or More Races Hispanic or Latino White, not Hispanic

15,215 5 18 31 52 92 0.4 2 1 2 10 86

53,144 6 21 25 50 81 1 16 1 2 18 65

6.65 million 6 25 15 50 84 5 5 3 3 30 57

Same house 1 year + Percent Foreign born Non-English at home High school or higher B.A. or higher Veterans, 2008-2012 Commute (minutes) Housing units, 2010 Homeownership rate Apartments, condos Median home value Households, Persons/household Per capita income Household income Percent below poverty

83 5 7 90 18 2,150 20 8,958 73 10 $201,100 6,569 2.27 $24,690 $43,535 12

88 4 16 85 16 6,267 21 32,897 77 5 $140,500 20,245 2.59 $20,547 $38,504 21

80 14 27 85 27 530,700 25 2.9 million 66 21 $176,000 2.36 million 2.66 $25,571 $50,256 17

Business QuickFacts Number of firms Wholesaler sales Retail sales Sales per capita Motels/ food sales

Payson 2,575 $13 million 282 million $18,319 75 million

Gila Co. 5,250 XX 551 million $10,545 $106 million

Arizona 491,529 $58 billion $87 billion $13,637 $13 billion

Geography Square miles Persons/square mile

19.47 786

4,758 11.3

114 million 56.3

PAYSON ROUNDUP PROGRESS 2014

Moving Forward Payson Schools has had a fast-paced, change-filled year.

The results of making rapid, significant changes are paying off.

Implementation of the Arizona College and Career Ready Standards While the subject of the Arizona College and Career Ready Standards, also known as the Common Core, has been fraught with controversy, Arizona school districts are required by law to implement these standards.

Standards are not Curriculum.

• Standards = WHAT students need to know.

• Curriculum = HOW local schools and districts will achieve Standards mastery for all students.

• Curriculum ≠ one-size-fits-all.

• Curriculum = Community values, student needs, available resources and the talent and expertise of the instructional staff.

• Standards + Curriculum = A pathway for every student to reach college and career readiness upon graduation from high school.

Beyond Textbooks Turning Standards into teachable Curriculum on the scale of the Arizona College and Career Ready Standards is a huge job! Beyond Textbooks helped Payson Schools access innovative lessons, Powerpoint presentations, live streaming videos and many other supplements to enhance classroom instruction.

Data Talks—Measurement of Student Progress Schools can measure student progress toward standards mastery.

Once-a-year state testing, AIMS, is one way to measure student mastery. AIMS, however, is an older test that measures older standards. AIMS is a “snapshot”, a picture of how students are doing at a fixed point in time.

Benchmark testing and progress monitoring, assessments selected by the district, are “videos”, showing student movement toward and beyond mastery over a period of time. Payson Schools uses evidence-based benchmarking and progress monitoring three times a year. These assessments allow teachers to address deficiencies early and often with prescriptive interventions.

School Safety and Security School Safety and Security requires planning, partnerships and practice. Payson Schools has made rapid and major strides in all these areas this year.

• • • • • •

Emergency Response Plans have been rewritten to meet National Incident Command System requirements.

All principals, other administrators and key staff completed three levels of FEMA emergency response training.

Payson Schools strengthened long-standing partnerships with first responders, health professionals and mental health providers.

Schools fine-tuned protocols for evacuations, lockdowns, shelter-in-place and reverse evacuations.

Schools drilled their protocols multiple times.

All schools evaluated building, campus and neighborhood security challenges and took steps to plug holes and correct deficiencies as funding permits.

From pre-school through high school, students and staff are learning and practicing the who, what, when, where, why and how of preparing for and responding to an emergency.

Exemplary Customer Service Exemplary customer service, a district goal, recognizes that parents entrust Payson Schools with their most valuable treasure, their children, day in and day out.

Customer service values the contributions of all stakeholders: taxpayers, students, families, teachers, staff, administrators, volunteers, visitors and community partners, in the success of Payson Schools.

Customer service can be measured.

• All schools and the District Office now have dedicated visitor parking.

• Awareness and control of school access have improved.

• Name badges identify staff members.

• Easy-to-complete electronic and phone surveys help Payson Schools take the “pulse” of the district.

Less measurable but equally important is our commitment to meet “customers” with knowledgeable, above-and-beyond engagement. The smile that says “Welcome to Payson Schools” is a value-added benefit of exemplary customer service.

Payson Schools invites you to: • Visit • Observe • Comment • Help And…

Let us know how we’re doing.

A Note of Thanks from Interim Superintendent Johnny Ketchem I would like to thank everyone in the community who has supported me in my role as Interim Superintendent. It has been a very enlightening and gratifying experience.

We still have many tasks to accomplish in the next three months. When my tenure is complete at PUSD, I plan to stay involved with the district and the community, trying to give back as much as the district and the community have given me.

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PAYSON ROUNDUP PROGRESS 2014

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FIRE

PROGRESS 2014

The edge of disaster

Deadly fire year focuses attention on urgent preparations to protect Rim Country from wildfire BY

PETE ALESHIRE

ROUNDUP EDITOR

L

A year of tragedy and anxiety focused new attention on efforts to avert the kind of lethal firestorm that last summer enveloped the small, unincorporated community of Yarnell.

The death of 19 Prescott wildland firefighters during a futile effort to save some 500 structures in the small, tragically unprepared community of Yarnell raised alarms all across the board.

The tragedy forced the state Division of Forestry and the U.S. Forest Service to once again reconsider strategies when faced with a firestorm in the thickly overgrown forest and chaparral that hasn’t burned in 50 years. The fallout could well make firefighters even more cautious about trying to hold the line when wildfire threatens a community that hasn’t created a defensible buffer zone and hasn’t maintained building codes and lot clearings that would prevent a crown fire from sweeping through town.

The response in Rim Country has been mixed, with everything on the line.

Fortunately, the Payson Ranger District has spent years snagging federal, yearend surplus funds to clear buffer zones around most Rim Country communities.

The Forest Service has invested some $14 million in the task in the past five to 10 years. As a result, firefighters now have a place to make a stand on the outskirts of most major Rim Country communities should a Wallow-scale crown fire take aim at the region. Payson, Star Valley, Pine and Strawberry all have solid buffer zones.

Smaller communities like the subdivisions along the Control Road and Christopher Creek remain far more vulnerable.

On the other hand, years of state and federal budget cutting have increasingly dried up the grants that the Forest Service and many Rim Country communities have relied on to clear those buffer zones and re-thin them every five or 10 years.

Some communities have stepped up in a struggle to fill the gap, with the Pine Strawberry Fuel Reduction Committee setting the pace. The citizens group has built trails to serve as firebreaks, raised money to continue curbside brush pickup and worked hard to educate residents as to the need to clear their lots to a Firewise standard.

However, Gila County has done virtually nothing to overhaul building codes. The most endangered communities are all unincorporated communities approved by See Rim Country, page 22

21

22

PAYSON ROUNDUP FIRE PROGRESS 2014

Rim Country scrambles, stumbles in face of fire threat From page 21 the county and surrounded by thick forest. The county hasn’t even been able to convince the Forest Service to provide a second escape route in case the approach of a wildfire cuts off evacuation on the main route into the community.

Although Gila County has made strenuous efforts to help firefighters by developing a network of 45 water stations in remote areas to fill fire trucks and firefighting helicopters with water, the county has no organized effort to encourage Firewise lot clearing and no plans on the book to overhaul the building code to meet international and Wildland Urban Interface (WUI) standards.

The county did manage to get the brush pits reopened after a closure of several months. The brush pits provide a place for people to dispose of brush they clear from their property. But the Pine Strawberry Fuel Reduction Committee was dismayed to discover the county will likely charge it $10,000 to dispose of brush cleared from lots in Pine. The group raised $14,000 to resume curbside pickup, but most of that will apparently go to the county. Turns out, the group will produce more brush waste than the free brush pits can handle, so they may have to pay disposal rates at the county landfill — consuming most of the money they raised to provide the curbside pickup through the summer.

Efforts in Payson have also proved fitful.

The town’s efforts to provide leadership on fire issues faltered last year with difficulties involving longstanding tensions between the town council and the fire department.

The town council in a budget-cutting effort eliminated the fire marshal’s position. The move raised questions. Some suggested Fire Marshal Bob Lockhart had irritated the council by interpreting fire codes too inflexibly. The issue first surfaced during an extended back and forth on what requirements should be imposed on an ammunition manufacturing business by the airport — but also sometimes broke the surface on things like whether to require small restaurants or sandwich shops to install commercial stoves with hoods and fire suppression systems. Council members insisted the elimination of the position was a strictly budget-based decision, but doubts lingered.

Next, longtime fire chief Marty deMasi retired. deMasi had clashed in his laconic way with various council members, mostly a low-key, behind the scenes chaffing. He elected to retire shortly after the elimination of the fire marshal’s position. deMasi had about six months of unused leave time and accumulated sick leave and the council decided to leave the position vacant to save money while deMasi used up his leave time. This left the department leaderless, although battalion chiefs stepped up to keep things running smoothly on a day-to-day basis.

The departure of the Payson fire chief effectively pulled Payson out of long-running talks about increasing the operational cooperation between the five Rim Country fire departments. Payson and

Pine both rely almost entirely on paid firefighters with expensive benefits. The other fire departments depend on welltrained and certified volunteers to augment the efforts of a core of full-time firefighters. The fire chiefs of the smaller departments pushed for closer coordination — perhaps a merger — with the tacit support of deMasi. However, the Payson chief’s departure removed the largest town in the region from the discussions at a crucial juncture.

Against that backdrop, came the halting efforts to update the Payson building code to improve fire protection as well as adopt a WUI code.

The fire department last year urged the building advisory board to recommend adoption of a host of fire-related changes in the building code and an edited version of the WUI code. The board deadlocked on a 3-3 vote, with half the members in favor of the fire department’s recommendations and the others favoring more changes. The town essentially dropped the issue for months after that vote.

Then Payson Mayor Kenny Evans pushed for a top-to-bottom overhaul of 1,000 pages of building code, including changes intended to reduce the danger a wildfire will sweep in from the forest and rage through town.

The council spent months trying to plow through thick briefing books detailing changes in almost every aspect of the building code, including the fire codes.

The effort broke the surface recently, with an eye-opening study session during which the council embraced the idea of trying to get people to voluntarily clear brush and trees from their property —

but mostly balked at toughening the 184page section of the building code relating to fire protection and adopting a specific WUI code.

At the study session, many council members sharply criticized the provisions of both the international building code as it relates to fire protection and a WUI code intended to keep fires from spreading either from town out into the forest or vice versa.

The sharp criticism of building code regulations from several council members sounded a worrisome note, given the urgency of the danger the community faces from wildfire.

The code intended for use in communities facing the danger of wildfires includes things like flame-resistant roofing and building materials, sealed attic ventilation, a ban on flammable, overhanging eaves and porches open to embers on the underside. Such codes also require homeowners to keep vegetation away from houses.

By contrast, Payson’s current building code discourages or forbids the removal of native vegetation. As a result, Payson from above looks like a thick forest with interlocking branches — ideal for a crown fire like the Rodeo-Chediski to spread through town.

Several Arizona towns suffered near disaster in recent years, demonstrating the importance of a Firewise building code, including thinned buffer zones and clearing of brush and trees from residential properties. A thinned buffer zone saved Alpine and Springerville from the Wallow Fire several years ago. Last summer in Yarnell, a wildfire that killed 19 firefighters also destroyed most of the

homes in the community without an adequate cleared area around the house.

However, Payson’s fire code revision is for the moment caught up in the mammoth task of overhauling the town’s entire building code, with growing indications that the building pipeline may soon start to fill up. Town officials say developers seeking to build hundreds of homes have started the town approval process in recent weeks.

The town hopes to revise the building code this spring, which involves thousands of individual changes.

“It’s easier just to adopt the whole thing (the building code), but that could add $15,000 to $35,000 to the cost of a residence,” said Evans. “It’s a very, very complex process. Just because (the building advisory board) voted not to adopt the international code didn’t mean they don’t want to do anything.”

Evans said the revision will include issues like roof and building materials, overhanging eaves, porches without barriers to keep embers from getting under the house and brush and tree clearing.

However, those changes have become caught up in the mind-numbing task of making sometimes bewildering changes in every element of the building code.

“We’re moving as fast as we can move, but it’s a Herculean task,” Evans said.

He said ideally the code will reflect the different needs of different neighborhoods. For instance, he said in areas thick with trees the code might require much more expensive and fire-resistant building materials — especially roofing.

“So you might have a strict WUI standard on more deeply forested areas. If you apply the WUI code strictly, you

might have to cut down 15 old-growth ponderosa. It would be nice if the world was simple, but we’re trying to maintain a forested feel to the town.”

Ideally, he said, the code would let homeowners and the town council settle on tradeoffs and establish its priorities — for instance between saving as many trees as possible in town and creating defensible clear spaces around homes.

In the meantime, the council has given at least verbal support to seeking measures that will encourage people to voluntarily clear the trees and brush from their property that could consume whole neighborhoods should a major wildfire approach town limits. Even if firefighters can stop a crown fire in the cleared buffer zone as they did when they saved Alpine, such a fire can cast burning embers out into the forest a mile ahead of the active fire line.

Payson has become a sea of trees, which nearly hide most of the houses.

Few of those houses have fire-resistant roofs and many have brush crowding up under flammable, overhanging wooden eaves, porches with space beneath to collect burning embers and often uncovered vents into attics in which floating embers can lodge. Even a close approach by a major fire could shower the town with sparks and embers, setting fires in treetops that could then spread through town.

Payson has established an informal citizens committee headed by Councilman Fred Carpenter, charged with figuring out ways to encourage people to Firewise their lots.

The council will take up overhauling the fire code in June.

PAYSON ROUNDUP FIRE PROGRESS 2014

23

Whispering Pines volunteers help patrol the forest BY

ALEXIS BECHMAN

ROUNDUP STAFF REPORTER

While Rim Country holds its breath for fear of a major wildfire each summer, some Rim Country communities are proactively planning and finding ways to cut fuels and spread education.

After the Water Wheel Fire in 2009 nearly overcame Whispering Pines, the community rallied and partnered with the local fire department and Forest Service to voice their concerns and offer volunteer support and cooperation.

Out of several meetings grew the

Whispering Pines Fire District (WPFD) Fire Patrol Program.

Operated by members of the WPFD and community volunteers with support from the Payson Ranger District, the program works to increase public education and fire prevention programs.

Every weekend, from the beginning of May through the end of September, fire personnel and volunteers travel the roadways and trails around the district’s communities, stopping at every occupied campsite and talking with campers.

They distribute materials on proper campfire location, extinguishing a camp-

fire, local wildlife, weather, emergency services and trash disposal.

The WPFD Auxiliary also provides a large dumpster at fire station 71 in Whispering Pines during the summer months where campers can throw their trash.

The auxiliary funds this by holding fundraisers as well as a monthly pancake breakfast on the second Saturday of the month between April and October.

In 2014, the district added a new piece of equipment to its wildland firefighting toolbox — a small, self-contained firefighting skid mounted in the bed of their

Polaris Ranger.

With the extremely dry winter and facing a potentially active wildfire season, Chief Ron Sattelmaier purchased the skid to enhance the district’s wildland fire tools. “This apparatus allows firefighters to access otherwise inaccessible areas around the fire district as well as the Tonto National Forest that surrounds all the communities of the district,� he said. “The most important aspects of the Fire Patrol Program is the public educational opportunities; the distribution of garbage bags to campers, provided by the

Forest Service; and checking campsites for and extinguishing abandoned or improperly extinguished campfires,� he said.

Over four camping seasons, the WPFD Fire Patrol Program visited 6,290 campsites, extinguished 216 illegal or abandoned campfires, expending 1,740 man-hours and driving 7,450 miles. “With the addition of the new tools for this program, the district will be able to continue the program on into the future and deliver these services more efficiently and more cost effectively,� Sattelmaier said.

Christopher Creek grants reduce fire danger through thinning BY

ALEXIS BECHMAN

ROUNDUP STAFF REPORTER

Thanks to federal grants, one community is making great strides to clear dangerous overgrowth and bolster fire breaks.

In 2014, the Christopher-Kohl’s Fire Department received its third federal grant to clear brush and protect homes from the threat of wildfires.

This year’s $200,000 Wildfire Hazardous Fuels Mitigation grant through the state department of forestry is the largest so far for the small department, which covers some 40 square miles.

It will use the money to clear 90 acres of private land near Ponderosa Springs overgrown with trees and shrub.

When complete, the properties will all be Firewise.

Christopher-Kohl’s Fire Department covers a large area of mostly summer homes, including Christopher Creek, Colcord, Ponderosa Springs, See Canyon, Tonto Creek Estates, Zane Grey Estates and Kohl’s Ranch. Currently, only Kohl’s Ranch has met all the requirements for the voluntary Firewise designation.

Fire Chief Rob Jarvis explained that back at the start of the 20th century, northern Arizona’s forests had about 30 to 50 ponderosa pines per acre. Today, thanks to fire suppression efforts and grazing that removed the grass that once carried frequent, low-intensity fires, the forest now has 300 to 400 trees per acre.

The close-spaced trees with interlocking branches have created the perfect conditions for devastating crown fires. While fires used to skim across the ground, leaving the larger trees intact, today’s wildfires easily hop across the treetops in the over-

grown forests. That is what happened during the Rodeo-Chediski and Wallow fires, leaving moonscapes of matchsticks, Jarvis said.

CKFD is working to clear the brush around properties so fires can’t climb into the treetops and spread out of control.

In 2011, the grant helped the department clear around Whispering Hope Ranch, Mountain Meadows Church Camp, R-C Scout Camp, Tonto Creek Christian Camp and in Christopher Creek. None of those nonprofit groups had enough money to do the work themselves. “The camps, if threatened by wildfire, could threaten hundreds of children,� wrote CKFD in its grant application.

In 2012, the department cleared 46 acres of private property bordering U.S. Forest Service land, often butting up to Tonto National Forest fuel breaks.

The Payson Ranger District constructed fuel breaks around Christopher Creek and Hunter Creek, after the homeowners of each community raised $80,000, according to Angela Elam, district ranger.

The Payson Ranger District has spent about $14 million creating a network of firebreaks around most Rim Country communities, mostly with leftover Forest Service money — since the district years ago completed a master environmental assessment of the clearing effort and so has managed to snag, last-minute leftover money each year.

With the latest grant, CKFD will continue clearing private properties.

Hired contractors will chip, stack or remove the slash from the areas. CKFD will use its brush trailer and truck to assist if needed and supervise all burning of piles.

With the three grants, the district has cleared nearly 500 acres.

Pete Aleshire/Roundup

Rim Country communities rallied this year to protect themselves from wildfires. A thinning project in Christopher Creek cut down many small trees (above) and volunteers in Pine built a new hiking trail (right) that will double as a firebreak and access route for firefighters protecting the community.

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The forest’s best hope Forest Service awards contracts for 4FRI thinning BY

PETE ALESHIRE

ROUNDUP EDITOR

Photo courtesy of the U.S. Forest Service

L

This photo shows what’s left after a crown fire in a densely overgrown forest. The fire burns so hot it kills everything and makes the soil actually water resistant — even in a normally fire-adapted system.

The Forest Service finally started this year on Rim Country’s best chance of averting a towndestroying, economy-wrecking wildfire.

The Four Forest Restoration Initiative (4FRI) staggered forward as the second but still controversial contractor finally started thinning several thousand acres of dangerously overgrown forest.

That includes about 1,000 acres on the outskirts of Christopher Creek, where the contractor Good Earth has already dramatically reduced tree densities.

The project remains some two years behind schedule and far short of the 30,000-acres-per-year pace the contractor promised. Moreover, the contractor plans to build mills that can turn the small trees and brush into energy, jet fuel and finger jointed furniture remain vague and unrealized. The contractor recently received permission to build its first new mills in Williams instead of in Winslow as originally planned.

Moreover, worrisome divisions remain between the Forest Service and the group of local officials, environmentalists and forest advocates who devised the innovative plan to call upon a reinvented timber

industry to thin the thickets of small trees that now dominate millions of acres. Most of the division now centers on whether the Forest Service will also let the contractor take many of the larger, fire-resistant trees.

Still, in the frustrating, slow-motion world of the U.S. Forest Service, the past year has produced encouraging signs of progress in the massive task of forest restoration.

The Forest Service has already approved Good Earth’s request to shift operations to Williams, which is further from the bulk of the land that needs thinning. Company officials say that a Williams location east of Flagstaff will prove more convenient for the early projects already underway, most of which are in the Kaibab and Coconino national forests around Flagstaff and up toward the Grand Canyon.

The 4FRI approach stems from years of effort by a group of loggers, local officials and environmentalists to find common ground, after a century of mismanagement followed by two decades of lawsuits and appeals that caused the collapse of the oncevital logging industry. In the past century, the loss of grass due to grazing and relentless fire suppression has increased tree densities from about 50 per See Forest restoration, page 25

Pine volunteers take action to protect homes BY

MICHELE NELSON

ROUNDUP STAFF REPORTER

In 2004, the communities of Pine and Strawberry had a wake-up call.

A structure protection team came into the communities and determined Pine and Strawberry had a 20 percent survival rate if a devastating wildfire came to town.

The residents decided they had to do something.

They decided to create the Pine Strawberry Fuel Reduction Committee to oversee efforts to reduce the amount of forest fuel in the surrounding areas.

Through numerous grant awards, the committee, along with the Forest Service, created a 300-foot firebreak to protect the mountain hamlets.

But every year, that firebreak and the brush surrounding homes needs maintenance.

Everything went along fine, until devastating cuts to grants and Forest Service funding gutted the fuelreduction programs.

So, the Fuel Reduction Committee got creative.

They started the Fire on the Rim Mountain Bike Race in 2012 as a fundraising event to pay for fuel reduction and brush removal efforts.

Each fall after the Fire on the Rim race, the Fossil Creek Creamery holds the Farm Dinner. Chefs from around the Rim Country donate time and food costs to support fuel reduction efforts.

The committee started a brush pickup program.

However, due to a lack of grants, the committee has resorted to raising money for the program that picks up brush plucked by property owners piled on the streets. It will depend on how donations go this year to see if the program continues as it has in the past.

One of the most innovative ideas Pine and Strawberry use to protect against fire: trails.

“The start of this project came about several years ago as a result of a project PSFR did seeding the fuel break with native grass in order to create a low intensity fuel that can be burned off every few years,” wrote the committee on its website (http://psfuel reduction.org/home/). “While out there casting seed we saw that the section behind the neighborhoods on the north side of Pine was very hard to get to because there is very limited access and steep terrain. It’s also more difficult for the Forest Service to maintain that portion of the fuel break. So the idea of putting in a new trail was born.”

Each weekend, the members of the Fuel Reduction

Committee get out on the trail and build more portions.

They have almost completely built the new Bearfoot Trail that skirts Highway 87/260 between Pine and Strawberry. The trail is built to the International Mountain Bike Association’s standards.

These standards create trails that are easy to hike and maintain all while taking the hiker past beautiful vistas and cool resting points.

“Many other organizations are involved in the project from the recreation standpoint, but the main purpose of this as far as we’re concerned is wildfire mitigation,” said the committee on its website.

Other projects include educational material for school children, Firewise signs in the forest, and seeding the fuel break with native grasses to encourage fire to return to its traditional method of burning.

No other community in the Rim Country has as motivated a volunteer group or commitment to the cause of mitigating wildfires.

Other communities around the Rim Country have gathered together to remove brush from around homes, or partnered with local fire departments, as in Whispering Pines, to go out and educate campers on being fire safe.

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PAYSON ROUNDUP FIRE PROGRESS 2014

25

Forest restoration plan offers hope for Rim Country From page 24 per acre to perhaps 1,000 per acre across vast swaths. The giant old-growth trees that once dominated the ponderosa pine forests now constitute about 2 percent of the trees in a forest choked with small trees vulnerable to crown fires.

The 4FRI group agreed that a revitalized timber industry could help restore forest health if it focused on the thickets of trees less than 16 inches in diameter, while leaving the larger trees alone. However, since the Forest Service has taken up the initiative the once solid consensus has frayed mostly over concerns about the contractors chosen and the Forest Service’s refusal to accept a strict diameter limit on the trees cut.

Good Earth took over the stalled project from Pioneer Forest Products and initially agreed to follow the same business plan — which included a new mill in Winslow to both turn small trees and brush into energy and produce furniture from the small trees.

The shift to Williams is designed to take advantage of the initial flow of wood from already approved projects near Flagstaff, which faces grave danger from even small fires like the Schultz Fire, which destroyed homes and caused landslides and flooding off the denuded landscape.

In Rim Country, Good Earth has started work on the 1,000-acre Mercer Project on the outskirts of Christopher Creek. That project will help add to the buffer zone protecting Christopher Creek, Tonto Village, Kohl’s Ranch and a string of small communities along the Control Road from a megafire.

The Mercer Project is among some 15,000 acres worth of initial task orders the Forest Service has awarded to Good Earth Power AZ as part of a 10year contract to thin some 300,000 acres. Almost all of those initial task orders are previously approved thinning and forest restoration projects, most of them to create buffer zones to protect forested communities.

A few other Rim Country projects are in the pipeline.

The Apache-Sitgreaves National Forests recently announced that the 1,300 Alder thinning project just north of Woods Canyon Lake will also become part of the 4FRI contract. That previously analyzed project will protect one of the most popular tourism areas in Arizona from the effects of wildfire. It will probably also increase runoff into Woods Canyon Lake and other popular fishing and recreational areas.

The thinning project should increase watershed yields by dramatically reducing the number of trees competing for rainfall and snowmelt. The increase in forest densities in the past 50 years have dried up many once reliable springs and streams.

That’s one reason Payson has been pleading with the Forest Service to make a thinning project on the watershed of the Blue Ridge Reservoir a top priority. The town’s future water supply depends on the long, deep, narrow reservoir that gathers runoff

Pete Aleshire/Roundup

The Four Forest Restoration Initiative hopes timber companies can make money by replacing fire prone tree thickets (left) with more open and natural conditions (right). Tree densities have increased from perhaps 40 per acre to more like 1,000 per acre across much of northern Arizona. from one of the most productive watersheds in the state. A crown fire on that thickly overgrown watershed could cause mudslides and erosion that would significantly reduce the capacity of the reservoir.

The Forest Service is still analyzing a plan to thin a total of some 33,000 acres around those lakes to restore forest health, protect forested communities and protect forest-dependent species like the Mexican spotted owl. That project could also ultimately wind up as part of the 4FRI project.

However, the project also illustrates the continued struggle over the fate of the largest trees as part of the 4FRI approach.

A flat, easy-to-enforce ban on cutting most ponderosa pines larger than 16 inches in diameter lay at the heart of the 4FRI consensus. However, the Forest Service has said that a strict diameter cap would likely prove too inflexible. For instance, they might want the contractor to thin thick stands of bigger trees in certain circumstances — like pro-

ducing more diversity and avoiding having all the trees in an area be the same age or protecting rare and valuable meadows.

Critics like Gila County Supervisor Tommie Martin fear that if the Forest Service insists on “flexibility” in cutting the big trees, the contractor will end up focusing on those bigger, higher-value trees.

The Environmental Impact Statement already prepared by the Forest Service for the 33,500-acre Rim Lakes Forest Restoration Project rejected the idea of a 16-inch diameter cap.

The debate is also playing out in another project that’s not actually part of the 4FRI project — this one on the North Rim of the Grand Canyon.

That timber sale wasn’t prepared using the 4FRI guidelines, but actually had very similar goals. The Forest Service marked the trees for cutting, with the goal of restoring forest health and protecting sensitive and endangered species dependent on oldgrowth trees like the northern goshawk and the

Mexican spotted owl.

However, an analysis of the proposed forest restoration project suggests that 30 percent of the trees and 70 percent of the wood volume would come from the trees larger than 16 inches in diameter.

The original consensus approach to 4FRI would have put trees larger than 16 inches off limits. That agreement broke a legal deadlock in the face of a dramatic increase in wildfires in the past decade.

Supervisor Martin has spent years with the group working out an agreement intended to put the timber industry back to work while convincing environmental groups they didn’t need to keep filing lawsuits to protect the remaining big trees.

The Forest Service eventually adopted most of those recommendations, but said it needed flexibility when it came to deciding how many of the big trees to let the private contractors cut. Supervisor Martin has repeatedly expressed concerns about the shift in contractors and the Forest Service’s refusal to adopt the 4FRI approach to saving large trees, fearing it would lead to renewed deadlock and lawsuits.

All that makes the Jacob Ryan Project along Highway 89 in the Kaibab National Forest something of a test case for the Forest Service approach to forest restoration. The 26,000-acre project actually dates back to 1998 and at one time included an 18inch diameter cap. However, the Forest Service analysis concluded it would have to cut some big trees to benefit the endangered northern goshawk, which hunts in a closed forest canopy.

The analysis says that on average the project area has tree densities of between 245 and 295 trees per acre, with many areas with densities exceeding 451 trees per acre.

Other studies suggest pre-settlement ponderosa pine forests had tree densities closer to 30 to 50 trees per acre, with great variations between isolated areas with greater densities.

The Center for Biological Diversity sent out its own analysts to review the proposed timber cut for the 400-acre “Wild Buck” Project. The analysis concluded the Forest Service has marked for cutting on that 400 acres no fewer than 1,174 old-growth trees greater than 24 inches in diameter, accounting for 38 percent of the wood volume. Trees greater than 16 inches would account for 30 percent of the trees cut and 78 percent of the timber volume.

Those giant, centuries-old trees are generally very resistant to wildfires. Their lowest branches are often 20 feet or more above the ground, out of the reach of low-intensity ground fires. They once dominated the ponderosa pine forests, but now represent only 1-3 percent of the trees in the forest.

However, they’re by far the most profitable tree for most existing mills to process.

The 4FRI project rests on the assumption timber companies will invest in mills that can turn little trees into fuel, furniture, energy and other products.

However, so far few such mills exist. However, so far, none of those alternative plants exist.

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PETE ALESHIRE

code, which features things like flame-resistant materials on roofs.

The report revealed that at one point the communications The Yarnell Fire made it clear: We’ve run out of time. got so chaotic that an air tanker put out a backfire the Granite The completely predictable, badly bungled fire that killed 19 Mountain Hotshot crew had lit in an effort to create a firebreak Prescott firefighters made wildfires the top story of 2013 — that would keep the wildfire from reaching Yarnell. especially for Rim Country communities nestled in a badly The fire commanders never drew up a comprehensive or overgrown forest. workable strategy for coping with the fire, delayed decisive The fire graphically illustrated the consequences of buildaction until it had grown out of control, failed to coordinate the ing more and more subdivisions in the middle of a tinderbox activities of the crews and the air tankers, assigned the forest — without cleared buffer zones or fire-adapted building Granite Mountain crew a task with little chance of success and codes. then lost track of the crew at the critical moment, the report The tragic death of a brave and highly trained wildland fireconcluded. fighting crew making a doomed effort to save the unprepared The deaths of the firefighters, the millions of dollars in community of Yarnell also underscored the increasingly ongoing annual costs for benefits paid to the families, the masunworkable system for stopping fires burning in densely oversive potential impact of lawsuits already filed and the increasgrown forests — and the terrible ingly “radical” behavior of fire in danger caused by the failure of brush and forest that hasn’t those endangered communities to burned in half a century will likely protect themselves. make fire managers much more The fire destroyed 503 strucreluctant to risk firefighters’ lives tures. A study showed that of the to save towns in the future.

14 homes in the fire’s path cleared The report concluded the to Firewise standards — not one state fire managers “failed to priburned. But the fire claimed most oritize the safety of firefighters of their neighbors’ homes. over the protection of non-defensiTwo reports offered chilling ble structures and property.” details and a catalogue of miscalNeither Gila County nor culations that led to the deaths of Payson have adopted Firewise the Prescott crew trapped in a building codes.

Such codes require brush-choked canyon just 600 flame resistant roofs, bar flammayards from safety. A state investible overhanging porches and gation ultimately faulted the state eaves, require clearing of brush fire managers for losing track of around buildings and other measthe crew, allowing them to leave a ures designed to prevent a fire safe burned zone as the fire shifted from spreading through a thickly course and failing to communicate forested town like Payson. effectively in the final march The deaths of six firefighttoward disaster. Moreover, the ers 23 years ago in the Dude Fire, state’s delay in calling for suffijust north of the Control Road in The U.S. Forest Service provided the photos cient resources, confusion at the Rim Country foreshadowed the above and at top left of the Yarnell Fire and the command level and scrambled Yarnell tragedy. A 100-foot-tall wall communications let the fire blaze Cronkite News Service took the photo at the of flame caught those firefighters bottom left of the Granite Hills Hotshot crew out of control. when a towering superheated fire By the time the flames trapped that died in the blaze. plume collapsed. They were also the crew in a box canyon, the trying to protect a small, already evacuated subdivision built 2,000-degree wall of fire towered 80 feet high and closed in on them at a dreadful speed of 12 miles an hour. The crew had just without a Firewise building code in the middle of a thick, two minutes to prepare for the arrival of flames hot enough to unthinned forest. crack the granite boulders that surrounded them.

Investigation conclusions The Arizona Division of Occupational Safety and Health (ADOSH) concluded that the firefighters were “unnecessarily The report suggests the fire commanders underestimated and unreasonably exposed to the deadly hazards of wildland the fire from the start, given the tinder-dry conditions, the firefighting due to poor communications and the lack of an massive fuel loads on the ground and the lack of any cleared, effective strategy.” defensible space around Yarnell or the other communities.

The agency imposed $559,000 in fines and penalties on the Although the fire commanders and teams deployed were seaArizona State Forestry Division, most of which will go to the soned and well qualified, they never caught up to the behavior families of the dead firefighters. The state has appealed the of the fire after waiting the first one or two days to mount an ruling. all-out assault.

The ADOSH report concluded that the firefighters couldn’t Barely plausible plans to use the Hotshot crews to hand-cut have saved Yarnell, which sat in the middle of a sea of brush a long enough fire line to stop the fire were quickly overand trees that hadn’t been burned or thinned in 50 years. Once whelmed when the hot, scalding winds picked up. When drivthe fire got loose in dry windy conditions — the firefighters en by a 10-mile-an-hour wind, a fire will move at about 2.4 had no chance of stopping the 50-foot flames as they bore miles an hour on 26-foot flame lengths — a speed the firefightdown on Yarnell, a small, unincorporated community that had ers could outrun. But at 40 miles an hour, the fire will advance not cleared the brush on the outskirts of town or on lots inside 12 miles an hour on 50-foot-long flames — a speed that makes town and hadn’t adopted a Wildland Urban Interface building escape impossible.

BY

Haunting lessons of Yarnell

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