43 minute read
Local businesswoman called 'intriguing'. . . . . . . . . .Business
Book calls Chandler businesswoman ‘intriguing’
Kris Mill says people come up to her all the time surprised and happy to see her and her food truck at events around the Valley.
“When we’re at events, I get a lot of feedback from customers, like, ‘Thank goodness you’re here, because we’re tired of the greasy food,’” Mill said. “People are trying to eat healthier. There are more people now who are vegetarians and vegans than when I … started this about six years ago.”
Mill serves vegetarian and vegan food from her truck, Wok This Way. She is co-owner with a young man she calls her nephew, Jake Lipovitch. They aren’t actually related: he’s the first-born son of her best friend from sixth grade. Still, they might as well be related with how close they’ve become.
Mill said they both share a passion for cooking. Jake, who will soon be 16, has Down syndrome and that has motivated Mill to help. She said teaching people with Down syndrome how to cook healthy meals and providing them those meals is one thing she can do, because people with that condition often tend to be overweight.
“He loves to cook with auntie,” Mill said. “He’s one of the many reasons, he’s the largest reason, why I have this food truck.”
Another thing she can do is give them jobs. She said they make excellent workers and half of her staff have Down syndrome.
“It’s a way for them to feel empowered,” she said.
Mill says she is working to make her food truck business fully sustainable, including zero waste. She hopes to get a second food truck in the coming years,
Kris Mill operates a food truck called Wok This Way, which serves healthy options.
(David Minton/Staff Photograpehr)
See 48WOMAN on page 31
Chandler group aims to help Black-owned businesses
There may have been some progress in efforts to improve opportunities for Black business owners, but that doesn’t mean there still remains a lot to do.
Just ask Keasha Beach of Chandler, who started BASE Arizona, an acronym for Black Alliance & Social Empowerment.
Beach recalled a woman telling her how she walked into a bank 10 years aho to secure a loan. “She said, ‘You know, about 10 years ago when I had just started my business, she goes, ‘I walked into the bank and I had everything all put together. Everything sounded good on the phone, but the moment I walked into the bank, they just denied it. They didn’t even ask me any questions about it.’”
Experiences like that strike close to home for Beach.
“My dad has had issues with that,” she said. “I remember sitting with him, kind of talking to him about that, and he said, ‘Look, I just try not to walk into the bank. I don’t even give them my full name. I give them like an initial. I don’t want them to be able to recognize as being a Black applicant … because I know right away it’s going to be denied.”
Beach started BASE Arizona after the murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis. She was on a video conference with other Black activists who were detailing many of the problems they face.
“I remember getting off of that call and going, ‘Man, there was nothing to really take away from the call besides we have all these issues, we have all these problems,’” Beach said. “I felt like we didn’t do anything and I wanted to do something with this call.”
Her brother started BASE of Southern Oregon and the two of them worked out what they wanted this organization to be. Beach reached out to others in Arizona to form BASE Arizona.
She said its mission is to empower the Black community.
As its website, basearizona.org, explains, it aims to “provide a space to promote solidarity, empowerment, and economic development that might be imagined for this generation and the next, given the realities of the history of Arizona.
“BASE respects the past by drawing from the wisdom of the Civil Rights Movement and acknowledging the organizational genius that resulted in equality for Black people nationally,” it continues. “It updates this legacy and honors the current collective of change makers and activists who strive for inclusion and equity that is real.” It adds that it “serves to create a welcoming and supportive community where Black people in Arizona feel safe, respected, and comfortable being themselves when expressing any aspect of our many cultural ethnicities.” Since Beach grew up in Chandler, graduating from Dobson High School, her initial focus is this city. However, her goal is to grow beyond it. The funding for BASE Arizona has come from three individuals, but Beach says they are growing fast and need corporate funding going forward.
That money goes to a variety of events and programs. For example, BASE started offering $1,000 scholarships to high school seniors.
It runs several other programs as well.
Afro Skoutz helps youngsters ages 5 to 13, to become “culturally knowledgeable, empowered and respected members of the community.”
BASE Worx is an incubator program for Black-owned businesses that “emphasizes strategic planning, operational efficiency, and maximum profitability with a heavy emphasis on business strategy and planning.
Additionally, each month BASE Arizona sponsors events to celebrate the community. It started as Food Truck Friday. Beach said hundreds of people turned out and it has become one of their more popular events.
“We don’t see ourselves as the whole pie, but we see ourselves as a piece of the pie,” Beach said. “We collaborate a lot, that’s huge for BASE.”
She estimated there are about 50 Black-owned businesses in Chandler. Beach said BASE helped 25 of them acquire paycheck protection program loans during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. All of them are still open today.
Beach attended Mesa Community College and then graduated from the W.P. Carey School of Business at Arizona State. She also serves on a committee with the Chandler Chamber of Commerce.
Even though she set out to help the Black community in Chandler, Beach said others have reached out to her and their events are drawing even more people. That’s why she’s looking for corporate sponsors.
In the meantime, it is doing what it can to support Black-owned small businesses.
“Access to capital, that’s the biggest issue,” Beach said, recalling how one Black business owner couldn’t get funding to fix a company truck that had been vandalized.
“This company has been in business, they’ve gotten through COVID, you know they’ve been around for the last four years, and here they are asking for some capital to get their truck taken care of so they can continue their business, and they haven’t been able to do that,” Beach said. “They set up a GoFundMe. So, yeah, it’s something that’s still happening.”
Information: BASEArizona.org.
Keasha Beach started BASE Arizona, an acronym for Black Alliance & Social Empowerment, to help Black business owners. (David Minton/Staff Photographer)
48WOMAN from page 29
one dedicated to vegetarian burgers. And then possibly a third truck after that, which she hopes will be electric.
Her efforts to provide healthy food choices, employ people with Down syndrome and work toward sustainability have been noticed. The Arizona Historical Society and 48 Women chose the Chandler resident as one of the 48 most intriguing women in Arizona this year. The book, titled ““48 Women: Arizona’s Most Intriguing Women,” is being published next month and can be ordered at48women.org/thebook.
She is the only Chandler resident on the list. “It surrounds my passion for what I do for the community,” Mill said. “I’m very involved in sustainability, zero waste, hiring special needs, especially Down syndrome, for employment.”
She is also working with others to create a nonprofit to get people with special needs involved in the culinary arts.
Mill said she believes her truck is the first in Arizona that specializes in vegetarian and vegan dishes. She said it’s also the first in the state to become zero waste.
“When the truck was built, from the start, it was built to be a green food truck,” Mill said. “All of the appliances that are on the truck, including the lighting (were built that way). We do compost.”
She said she is working with Arizona State University on a project to use her greywater for agriculture.
Mill said she started with the dream of opening her own restaurant, one that was healthy that she would want to eat at. After trying some pop-up restaurants, she and Jake decided on a food truck. She said all of the meals they offer are 550 calories or less and all of the food is fresh. She said there’s nothing frozen on the truck.
In keeping with the wok theme, the dishes are Asian influenced.
The pandemic has been just as tough on the food truck industry as it was for restaurants. Supply lines continue to be a problem, Mill says. And on top of that now, there are concerns over gas prices that restaurants don’t need to worry as much about.
“The last two years were devastating to us,” Mill said. “Absolutely devastating. The industry is still getting hit. I’m trying to get people to work on the truck, people don’t want to work. They don’t even show up for interviews. I have a lot more success with my Down syndrome workers.”
Mill said there are signs that the pandemic is winding down.
“In the past six weeks, we have had multiple events,” Mill said. “And we’ve had people calling us to show up for events. It has totally changed.”
And Mill said she hopes other food trucks will follow her model and start offering more healthy options.
Where to find her
To find locations where the food truck will be, visit wokthisway.today.
Area Realtors group packs food for kids
SANTAN SUN NEWS STAFF
As kids prepared for spring break March 10, the West and SouthEast Realtors’ WeSERVE Leadership program teamed up with the Rise and Dream Foundation to pack food for 75 children facing food insecurity.
“Some less-fortunate children look forward to school because it provides them with a meal they would’ve otherwise not had due to financial circumstances,” noted a spokesman for the West and SouthEast Realtors.
Items were to students at Gateway Pointe Elementary School in Gilbert. The children are received backpacks filled with food to supplement their meals throughout the break. Food consisting of breakfast, lunch, and dinner items were discreetly placed in the backpacks.
WeSERV’s Leadership Program conducts a service project designed to assist the community each year.
Sarita Hill, a WeSERV Leadership participant, passionately spoke about the Rise and Dream Foundation’s Harvest for the Hungry initiative and persuaded the Realtors to help out. “A lot of these children and their Members of the WeSERV Leadership group packed meals on March 20 at VIP MortgagSee REALTORS on page 32 es in Gilbert for 75 local school students who risked not having enough food during spring break. (David Minton/Staff Photographer)
Senior Lockbox Program
Chandler Police offers a Senior Lockbox program, providing lockboxes for emergency personnel to gain access to the senior’s home after being summoned for emergency purposes. chandlerazpd.gov/communityprograms/lockboxes-for-seniors
Gender wage gap has not narrowed – may widen
BY EMILY SACIA
Cronkite News
WASHINGTON – The wage gap that had been narrowing between men and women stalled in 2019, according to new numbers from the Census Bureau, and advocates fear the situation will only get worse when pandemic-era data is released.
The gap improved in both Arizona and the U.S. as a whole over the last fi ve years, but the pace of change has been slow and is getting slower.
“The most recent research has shown that women in the labor force are at a 33-year low following the pandemic,” said Elizabeth Barajas-Román, president and CEO of the Women’s Funding Network. “At this pace, we won’t close that wage gap until 2157.”
On average, women who worked full time and year-round in the United States earned 81 cents in 2019 for every dollar their male counterparts made. That was down from 81.1 cents in 2018, but still represented a better than 1-cent increase since 2015.
In Arizona, men’s wages averaged $50,069 in 2019, compared to $41,617 for women that year, according to the bureau, or 83 cents of income for a man’s dollar. While Arizona women did better than the nation as a whole, their gain since 2015 was only 0.4% – and the state’s wage gap actually widened by 2 cents since 2017.
“On a national scale and in Arizona, it hasn’t really been closing that much and it’s been a fairly slow process,” said Hayley Brown, a research associate at the Center for Economic and Policy Research.
The gap is wider and the pace of gains is slower for women of color, disabled or LGBTQ women who experience pay disparities disproportionately to non-Hispanic white women.
“Women earn 83 cents on the dollar, but really that breaks down when we happen to look at race,” said Christian F. Nunes, president at the National Organization for Women. “It’s really a white woman earning 83 cents on the white man’s dollar.”
Nationally, there’s no industry where women’s earnings exceeded men’s, regardless of the worker’s educational background and prior experience.
In Arizona, women did make more than men in 2019 in one fi eld: installation, maintenance and repair occupations, where they earned $1.07 for every dollar a man made. But in every other industry, women fell short.
But the wage gap varied widely by industry in Arizona. Women in farming, fi shing and forestry occupations earned 44% of what their male counterparts earned in 2019, for example, while women in health diagnosing earned 59% and women in construction and extraction jobs earned 66%.
The most-popular occupations for women in Arizona were customer service representatives, nurses and elementary and middle school teachers. But even those predominantly women-led industries experienced pay inequity.
“There’s defi nitely no guarantee that just because an industry or an occupation is women-dominated, that there’s going to be more pay parity there,” Brown said. “There’s defi nitely a gap for example, in health care and social assistance and in education, where you would theoretically expect that gap to be small to nonexistent.”
The Census Bureau data showed that women educators made 87 cents to male educators’ dollar, and female customer service representatives made 89 cents per dollar.
But experts pointed out that those numbers were from before the pandemic, which hit women workers harder than men.
“Women were impacted, both at the beginning of the pandemic, and now two years in, we’re seeing women at a whole diff erent kind of range also being impacted by the pandemic,” Barajas-Román said. “We know that’s going to have a deep impact on wage equality in the future.”
Experts agree that the pandemic had a negative eff ect on women workers across the board, but they say it disproportionately aff ected working-class women, some of whom were furloughed or reduced to working part time, or who were forced to take on extra responsibilities at home.
“The labor force eff ects were much, much bigger for working-class women than for women with at least a bachelor’s degree,” Brown said.
During his State of the Union address this month, President Joe Biden touted several initiatives he said would help get women back in the workforce, including proposals to cut the cost of child care and expand pre-K education.
Nunes welcomed those eff orts, but said much more needs to be done. And soon.
“This is a whole-system issue. There are things that Arizona can do … at the state level to make sure that they’re taking care of their residents,” she said. “You don’t always have to wait for the federal government to do things.”
This chart shows how the wage gap between women and men diff ers among the states. (U.S. Census Bureau)
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families don’t really have access to a lot of food. They rely on the school to provide breakfast and lunch,” Hill said.
“You don’t realize how hard it is for people to support these types of initiatives because they can’t really wrap their heads around the fact that some families don’t have food at home,” she added. “You don’t realize how many children come to school hungry.”
WeSERV’s Leadership Program students worked together to package the boxes of items.
Bill Paden, who is part of the Leadership Program, said his company VIP Mortgage was able to make a $5,000 donation through the VIP Foundation to help support Harvest for the Hungry.
The group purchased the items to be donated. Being a father of two young boys, Paden was eager to help the Rise and Dream Foundation because he couldn’t imagine a young child not having food.
“This my opportunity to give back to my community that has given me a lot,” Paden said.
West and SouthEast Realtors of the Valley, established in 1946, is a member-driven, nonprofi t trade association that serves over 26,000 Realtors and affi liates throughout Cochise, Maricopa, Pinal, and Santa Cruz Counties.
Association volunteers and the member services team work together to deliver resources, services, and education with a vision to be “one premier association” and a mission “to provide services that lead to member prosperity.”
Information: riseanddreamfoundation.com.
NASCAR driver Ricky Stenhouse Jr. has a sweet new sponsor – Gilbert-based SweetLeaf.
(Special to STSN)
Gilbert sweetener company joins NASCAR driver
BY ASHLYN ROBINETTE
Contributor
One way that JTG Daugherty Racing is preparing for the sweetest NASCAR series yet is by adding Gilbert-based SweetLeaf to their Kroger Racing family of brands.
SweetLeaf, the fi rst and oldest stevia sweetener in the U.S., is partnering with NASCAR driver Ricky Stenhouse Jr. to reach a new audience – NASCAR fans.
While NASCAR may not be known for nutritious off erings, SweetLeaf
President Michael May said he wants to expand SweetLeaf’s presence to people who probably haven’t been exposed to his brand previously in order to give them the opportunity to make healthier choices.
“We have a marketing slogan and it goes ‘Making the World a Sweeter Place,’” he said. “But for us it’s not our slogan, it’s our mission. We want to improve the world and we want to do it one person at a time by improving the things that are taken into their bodies.”
People can’t choose “better-foryou products” if they don’t know they exist, May said. With NASCAR’s national reach, SweetLeaf’s sponsorship will introduce their products to a new demographic.
“We have to democratize our products,” May added. “The natural channel where we’re number one in, there’s a certain type of consumer that goes into that store. We need to get our brand in front of people who have never heard of SweetLeaf before.”
As someone who has to be in good shape to race, Stenhouse shares the same goal as SweetLeaf in encouraging people to make more health-conscious decisions.
“Our sport is always changing and on the driver’s side there’s a lot of eff ort in working out and eating healthy,” he said. “But that trickles down to our crew and fans as well. On the race track you’ll see a lot of fans get up in the mornings and camp out there. Some will even run and work out around the track.
“Having SweetLeaf be a part of our group is a healthier way to sweeten our food.”
SweetLeaf sweeteners, which are available in granular and liquid forms, have zero calories, zero sugars, a non-glycemic response, and no artifi cial ingredients. Stenhouse personally enjoys the diff erent fl avors available and often puts SweetLeaf drops in his coff ee and sprinkles SweetLeaf on top of plain yogurt for extra fl avor.
Stenhouse’s partnership with SweetLeaf will further his promotion of a healthy lifestyle for his fans. Besides getting more products in people’s hands, Stenhouse said that SweetLeaf will help grow NASCAR’s audience as well.
“SweetLeaf is new to our series and I think it’s good for them because they’re getting out in front of a diff erent market of people but also SweetLeaf’s normal users can tune in to our races,” said Stenhouse, who has two victories, three pole awards, 19 top-fi ve and 40 top-10 career fi nishes in the NASCAR
– Ricky Stenhouse Jr.
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Veteran-owned dance studio growing after pandemic
BY JOSH ORTEGA
Staff Writer
February 2020 probably wasn’t the best time to open any kind of business, much less a dance studio.
Two years later, Country Nomads at 835 E. Southern Ave., Mesa, not only lives but continues to expand its reach as military veterans Joel Bartlett and Gabriel Dubois – along with Kacee Crandall – teach country swing through what they call “a simple and easy format.
“The Fundamentals we teach are Frame, Connection, and Control (FCC),” they explain on their website. “FCC will not only allow you to dance safely, efficiently, and effectively but you will look stylish and smooth.
“With our progressive learning approach, you will always be learning something new and building on your skills from the ground up. Every lesson builds on top of each other until you reach your desired goal.”
The trio teach throughout the country as well as in their studio – hence their name “Country Nomads.”
“Dancing saved all of our lives in some way,” Crandall said.
They started teaching 20 private lessons a week in their living rooms.
Eventually, taking apart Crandall’s apartment living room and shoving the furniture into kitchen became too much for them – and her roommate.
In February 2020, the group went to look at a studio and by the end of the day had struck a deal with the previous tenant that cost $6,000 and their name on the lease, Dubois said.
Three weeks later, what they considered a dream deal turned to “heartbreaking and stressful” when they had to close due to the pandemic.
“There was no rent relief,” Crandall said. “There were bills that had to be paid.”
Their country music and nomad lifestyle evolved from their common background.
Dubois has split his nine years of service in Army Intelligence between active duty and Reserves, taking him to Alaska, North Carolina and Arizona.
He said he became interested in country swing the way any 21-year-old young man does: for a woman. His interest quickly grew as he wanted to learn more and make sense of the dance movements.
“I started learning different ways of doing these dance moves in a way that made sense, felt good and didn’t hurt,” he said.
Bartlett had some dance experience growing up, having taken ballet as a kid and some hip-hop as a teen.
His time working on a farm in rural Illinois – along with his four years as a Marine rifleman at Camp Pendleton, California – introduced him to country music and the lifestyle that accompanies his journey.
“Dancing saved my life,” Bartlett said “So, being able to pass that love on to other people is beyond amazing for me.”
Crandall grew up in a military family in Sierra Vista and considers herself “game-taught” from learning the small technical skills and abilities from the other two.
“My dance experience came strictly from being their follows,” she said. “I think I went from being a social dancer to a dancer when I met them, and then a professional dancer over the last four years for me.”
Now, they have the studio, the bills have gotten paid and they’re still doing what they love: teaching people how to become confident on the dance floor.
That’s what Dubois and Bartlett said brings them the biggest thrill – besides traveling across the country and meeting other people in the country-swing dance community.
“I’ve done so many different things in my life,” Bartlett said. “And this by far is beyond anything that I could ever ask or dream of, just simply having fun and being able to dance.”
Information: countrynomads.com
Top: Country Nomads, from left, Joel Bartlett, Gabriel Dubois and Kacee Crandall own Country Nomads dance studio in Mesa but also travel around the country teaching people country swing. (Josh Ortega/STSN Staff) Bottom: Gabriel Dubois and Kacee Crandall demonstrate one of the more elegant country swing moves. (Special to the STSN)
SWEETLEAF from page 33
Cup Series.
Stenhouse looks forward to amplifying SweetLeaf’s brand message while May is excited for new people to recognize SweetLeaf, try it for the first time, and hopefully make that better-for-you choice time and time again.
SweetLeaf is celebrating 40 years in business.
It is now the country’s leading stevia sweetener in natural food stores and has won 38 awards for taste and innovation.
May’s father, James May, started the company in 1982 with the idea that he wanted to bring people a better quality of life, not just longer life. Making easy, healthy lifestyle swaps with stevia in place of sugar can lead to a dramatic change in overall health.
“My father introduced stevia to the U.S. market and really to the world in the early ’80s,” May said.
Now known around the world as “the father of stevia,” James was first introduced to the stevia leaf in Paraguay. After learning more about the possibilities of naturally replacing sugar, he followed his dream of making the world a healthier and sweeter place.
“When my father started SweetLeaf, he started it outside of his garage,” May said. “He left his previous job and didn’t have a salary for the first few years. My parents really gave everything they had to build this company.”
Although his parents have passed away, May said that it’s wonderful to be able to carry on what they established and build on that legacy. His own children are even taking an interest in taking over the company one day.
“It’s always been a family business,” May said. “We try to maintain that character. We try to include all of our team members in this idea that we are all just one big family.”
May is excited for SweetLeaf to enter different markets and to introduce new products in the future. “We have a long-term plan to really grow and develop different types of better-for-you products that hopefully our current consumers and new consumers will enjoy,” May said. “We really want people to be able to choose healthy and you can’t have that choice unless you know that product is out there.”
Stenhouse’s vehicle was decked out with SweetLeaf’s logo at the NASCAR Ruoff Mortgage 500 at Phoenix Raceway on March 13. The brand will also take over Stenhouse’s vehicle during the Folds of Honor Quiktrip 500 at Atlanta Motor Speedway today, March 20, in which he’s driving No. 47 Camaro ZL1.
SweetLeaf products are available at: sweetfeaf.com, health food stores, natural grocers, supermarkets, and online retailers.
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Left: Hamilton senior pitcher Logan Saloman, an Arizona State signee, pitched a complete game as a freshman to help the Huskies win the title. Now, he hopes to get back there and cap off his high school career with another championship. Right: Hamilton senior Gavin Turley, “right,” and junior Roch Cholowsky, “left,” are two of nine total Division I recruits for the Huskies this season as they embarked on a redemption tour after last year’s semifinal loss. (Dave Minton/Arizonan Staff)
Hamilton baseball hungry for redemption
BY ZACH ALVIRA
Sports Editor
The last time Hamilton right-handed pitcher Logan Saloman took the mound in a state title game, he was a wideeyed freshman that had earned the trust of his coaches and teammates.
Saloman threw a complete game back in 2019 as the Huskies went on to beat Corona Del Sol 8-1 at Tempe Diablo Stadium. That is arguably one of Saloman’s best memories from his time at Hamilton.
Now a senior, he hopes to have that same feeling this season with a star-studded lineup alongside him with the Huskies. But what makes this team perhaps more dangerous than in year’s past is the redemption they all seek after falling in the semifinals last season.
“We want it bad,” Saloman said. “That loss last year hurt a lot. We want it even more now.”
Hamilton was the favorite to repeat in 2020 following its latest state championship in baseball. But the season was cut short due to the beginning of the pandemic.
At the time, Hamilton had just wrapped up the Boras Classic and was the top-ranked team in the nation in MaxPreps’ baseball rankings. When spring sports were given the go-ahead in 2021, Hamilton again emerged as a favorite. But the Huskies ran into a talented Alhambra team led by a stellar pitching staff in the semifinals.
Liberty, another powerhouse baseball program, went on to win last year’s state title.
That feeling after the semifinal loss hasn’t subsided for Hamilton’s players. Roch Cholowsky, a junior infielder that committed to UCLA before his sophomore year, knows that pain all too well. Also a member of the Hamilton football team, he was the backup quarterback when the Huskies fell in the final on a missed field goal to rival Chandler two years ago and when they were upset by Saguaro last season.
“(Winning the title) is all we are working for, honestly,” said Cholowsky, who figures to be the starting quarterback in the fall. “We are going to do everything we can to get there. We had
the talent last year, we had the coaching. We just saw a good pitcher who had a good day.”
Hamilton’s redemption tour has so far started out strong.
The Huskies began the season on a six-game win streak before entering the Boras Classic against Legend High School from Parker, Colorado. The fourday tournament brings together some of the best baseball programs in Arizona along with a few from out of state.
Hamilton is the headline program playing in the Classic as the sixthranked team in the country. Bishop Gorman from Las Vegas, the No. 7 team, is also participating.
Boras is one of two major tournaments the Huskies will partake in during the 2022 season. In April they will travel across the country to North Carolina to face off against some of the nation’s best at the USA Baseball National High School Invitational. Head coach Mike Woods said it’s a unique opportunity for his team to compete against some of the best.
“It’s an opportunity to show what we can do,” Woods said. “We try not to get too far in front of us. On paper, this
may be one of our best teams. But you don’t win games on paper. I’m excited because of the potential these guys have.”
Woods doesn’t read too much into his team’s national ranking. For the most part, it’s expected.
The team’s motto is “Compete.” It’s plastered along the walls of the Hamilton baseball field and on team-issued shirts. Being the best isn’t a trait that comes and goes with Hamilton, it’s the standard. The high level of coaching players receive and the ability to play alongside other top players is what draws in talent.
And this year, Hamilton has plenty of it.
The Huskies have nine Division I recruits on the roster this season. Saloman signed with Arizona State before his senior season. Junior utility player Josh Tiedmann and junior pitcher and outfielder Zach Wadas are committed to play for TCU. Senior pitcher Kole Klecker signed with the Bullfrogs before his senior season began.
Junior infielder Ryan Kucherak is currently committed to Baylor, while fellow junior infielder Will Shelor is committed to Arizona. AJ Diaz, a sophomore infielder, has already made his commitment to the Wildcats in Tucson. Senior outfielder Tanner Holland is currently signed with Central Arizona College, one of the top junior college programs in the country.
The talent is spread out across the field and especially at the plate. That’s part of what makes this team so dangerous this season. Not to mention the camaraderie.
“Our chemistry on the field translates to off the field,” senior outfielder and Oregon State signee Gavin Turley said. “We’ve all become really good friends and we are always picking each other up and we’re all hungry. We got so close last year and didn’t go all the way so this year, we’re going after it.”
Cholowsky and Saloman share the same mindset as Turley. The team is a close-knit group that knows how to have fun while being the best. That was made clear in the home dugout after a win over Chandler when they began dancing to part music.
But most importantly, this team has one goal in mind.
“We need one before the seniors leave,” Cholowsky said. “We need to get a ring.”
– Gavin Turley
Baseball is back but Valley casualties remain
BY MICHAEL GARAFFA AND COLE BRADLEY
Cronkite News
Reports of a new collective bargaining agreement have left baseball fans giddy, but the lengthy haggling hasn’t been without casualties.
Out-of-state fans who already had booked travel turned to golf or lamented their unfortunate fate. Valley workers who counted on Cactus League competition had to find other means of income. Players lost valuable workout time and opted to create their own spring training in Mesa.
“Think of all those jobs impacted across all the facilities. People really depend on spring training to keep their revenue going,” said Erin Schneiderman, a clinical assistant professor in Arizona State’s School of Community Resources and Development. “It’s definitely impacting a large number of people within our state.”
During the negotiations, players turned to the Valley for help. Mesa’s Bell Bank Ballpark, the new, sprawling state-of-the-art facility, attracted dozens of MLB players who gathered to stage their own version of spring training as they awaited resolution to the work stoppage.
Players worked out on fields sporting black T-shirts with the MLBPA logo. “Brotherhood” is etched on the back, written in different languages, to signify the group’s camaraderie. Cody Bellinger, Kiké Hernández and Trevor Bauer were among the several dozen shagging fly balls, fielding grounders and tossing bullpens.
“Huge kudos to the PA and the players for putting this on and having this type of facility for us to come down,” said Cubs third baseman and 2021 Rookie of the Year candidate Patrick Wisdom. “You get to know (players on other teams) on a personal level instead of (just) number so-and-so on the other team.”
The facility is high-end, with perks including cryotherapy, a nutrition room and a catering service.
Former Arizona Diamondbacks pitcher Anthony Banda, now with the Pirates, said the makeshift gathering provided a brotherhood atmosphere that made it feel like the real thing.
“It’s been like normal big league spring training, really,” he said. “It’s always fun to see guys out here that I really didn’t (know).”
Slater said a deal was needed because “over the last 10 years, industry revenues have grown by close to 70%. Meanwhile, in the last four years, player salaries have stayed stagnant,” adding, “It’s unfortunate that the fans are the innocent bystanders in all of this and the game of baseball has to suffer.”
So do those attached and attracted to the game.
“People want events,” Schneiderman said. “For the third year in a row, spring training is disrupted, and it’s making a big impact on tourism. The stadium workers, the umpires, think about all the people affected jobwise. It’s really hurting our state.”
Schneiderman, who is a former vice president of events for the Arizona Super Bowl Host Committee, referenced a past study by the L. William Seidman Research Institute at ASU’s W. P. Carey School of Business that revealed $644.2 million in economic impact from the 2018 Cactus League campaign. That same study in 2020 showed that 3,202 jobs were created before COVID-19 shutdown spring training on March 12, paying $128.3 million in total to those workers.
The lockout sparked discussions on how those same employees will be paid during negotiations. In 2020, the fallout of the pandemic saw thousands of stadium operations workers laid off by MLB and its teams.
An initial $1 million relief fund – announced on Tuesday by MLB – for spring training employees will help soften the blow.
Before Thursday’s news, many fans visits ballparks in the hope of seeing minor league players, anything.
Outside of American Family Fields of Phoenix – the spring training home of the Milwaukee Brewers – Paul Mueller sauntered outside the locked gates of the unusually quiet complex.
His trip had been planned for months, one that he hoped would include getting to watch his beloved Brewers prepare for the season ahead as so many other fans do this time of year.
“There’s a lot of people to blame and it’s out of our control and it kind
of makes you lose interest a little bit,” Mueller said. “It’s frustrating, no doubt about it.”
The native of Oshkosh, Wisconsin, has made the trip each of the last three years to Phoenix but has been turned away by the pandemic, limited tickets and now a lockout.
“I understand how it can ruin others’ outlook on the game, because it did back in (1994),” Cubs fan Chuck Dreixler said. “It will never be ruined for me. It’s upsetting not to see anybody on the field, but we were going to come out here no matter what.”
Stephanie Klein, a Brewers fan from Dubuque, Iowa, tried to make the best of the situation. The way she sees it, watching minor leaguers train from afar is still baseball.
The Kleins decided to improvise and attend an Arizona State baseball game as well, watching the Sun Devils play No. 4 Oklahoma State at Phoenix Municipal Stadium.
“My husband and my son have been huge baseball fans their whole life so in that sense we’ll always like baseball,” Klein said. “We’ll probably try and go to some more minor league games to kind of get our baseball fix another way.
“At the end of the day it’s still a game and it’s still baseball. It’s never going to go away. We’ll do whatever we need to just to experience baseball.”
Prior to the start of the pandemic, 912,956 fans attended Cactus League games according to the ASU study. Those numbers took a dip in 2021 with Covid-19 restrictions on attendance, limiting ticket sales, but coming into 2022 it seemed that those figures were primed for an uptick.
They’ll be better. But in the Valley, at least, damage was done.
Rich Labbate of Gilbert on March 14 posed for a picture with his son Rocco, 7, in front of the Wrigley Field replica marquee sign at Sloan Park with a custom message. (Josh Ortega/ Staff) “People want events, for the third year in a row, spring training is disrupted, and it’s making a big impact on tourism. The stadium workers, the umpires, think about all the people affected jobwise. It’s really hurting our state.”
– Erin Schneiderman
Have an interesting sports story?
Neighbor’s suicide leaves regret, questions in its wake
BY DAVID LEIBOWITZ
Columnist
The white house sits across the street from the window fronting my desk. Not much distinguishes the place from the rest of the block where I moved two weeks ago. Four orange trees, their trunks painted white, line the east edge of the driveway.
The side gate has a sign that reads “Beware of the Dog” in faded orange letters. On the porch sits a white pot sprouting a metal replica of a sunflower. The flower’s bright yellow adds a little cheer to the scene, but this is not that kind of story.
I met the woman who owned the house once, a few days after I moved in. I was unloading the last of my boxes. She walked over from across the street and introduced herself as Linda. She looked to be approaching 80, and blunt in the way people of a certain age can pull off.
“It’s a nice street,” she assured me, with a hard glance that seemed to suggest I had better keep it that way. I learned Linda had lived in the small white house for decades, beside Carolyn, her best friend and forever neighbor. There was rarely traffic on the block. Dogs barked on occasion. I told her my name. Then my phone rang. It was a work call I needed to take.
We said goodbyes and I thought nothing more of it for a few days, when I came home to a street full of police cars and an ambulance. The low white house had police crime scene tape blocking the driveway. Officers milled about. Carolyn, the forever neighbor, sat on her porch talking into her phone. I could see her shoulders heaving.
The sergeant running the scene met me in the street. He had little to say except there had been a death. Now a death investigation was happening. I asked whether there had been a crime. He said he didn’t think so, that it looked like an older woman, the home’s only occupant, had taken her own life. No, not with a gun. It appeared she had hanged herself.
“That’s sad,” was the best I could do. “Very sad,” he agreed. A thought occurred to me: “I guess she might have been lonely.”
A couple of visitors have come and gone from the house since that afternoon, and I have looked for excuses to bump into Carolyn from the house next door, to ask if there’s anything I can do. Each morning, I glance through the obituaries, to see if there might be more to Linda’s life – loved ones left behind, a memorial service scheduled, a charity where one might pay tribute.
Possibly, that’s the reporter in me, wanting to know “the rest of the story,” as Paul Harvey used to say. But more likely, it’s the human being in me, the new neighbor who wishes he hadn’t answered his phone, who regrets not being warmer, who wonders how he might have made some small difference.
This is magical thinking, I suppose. The world may feel small today, with everyone in each other’s business on Facebook, on Twitter, online, but the truth is, we have never been more isolated.
Buried under the outward self we show the world, the #blessings and proclamations of gratitude, each of us has endless hidden nuances, stories we take pains to keep locked away.
Now I write a story about a neighbor no longer here to read it, while I stare at the house she left vacant and wonder what happened behind those closed curtains, that front door with the iron security grate.
So it goes. We are here until we’re not, and sometimes we take the rest of the story with us.
Group offers new reports, tips for consumers
BY DIANE E, BROWN
Guest Writer
The threats facing consumers seem to be increasing every year. Consumers are burdened by identity theft risks, robocall scams, and the difficulty of navigating our credit reports. Arizonans are facing surges in counterfeit products, dark apps that compromise our privacy, erroneous medical bills, and financing traps with gotcha clauses.
And then there are products we pay good money for that are difficult, if not impossible, to fix when something small goes wrong.
Arizona PIRG Education Fund has released a series of consumer protection tips and tools to help Arizonans address some of the most common consumer issues.
Top consumer complaints. In 2021, a record number of individuals from across the country filed complaints with the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) Complaint Database.
Topping the list of the issues that Arizonans complained about: credit reporting, credit repair services, or other personal consumer reports, including incorrect information or a problem with a credit reporting company’s investigation into an existing problem; and debt collection, including attempts to collect debt not owed.
Check out our tips on freezing your files, requesting your credit reports, and other steps you can take to protect yourself.
Failing the fix. Chances are you don’t walk into an electronics store and think, “I’m wanting to buy something unfixable.” But how do you know which products you’ll be able to repair to last? We compiled repairability rankings for 186 phones and laptops, grading manufacturers on whether they are Failing the Fix. Our resource guide is designed to help consumers who want to purchase easily repairable products.
Dark patterns. Apps, especially social media apps, collect an incredible amount of information about us without us realizing it. The Arizona PIRG Education Fund has compiled step-bystep instructions, using screenshots, on how to change your settings on leading apps to protect your privacy on both iPhones and Androids.
The ‘buy now, pay later’ phenom-
enon. The new ‘buy now, pay later’ financing scheme is causing complaints to soar. Consumers making purchases as small as $50 online are offered payment plans, which can turn into debt traps. We offer tips to avoid the interest and fees that often come with ‘buy now, pay later’ “deals”.
Counterfeit products. Often consumers associate counterfeits with luxury items such as bags or shoes; however, the variety of counterfeit products includes medicines, hygiene products and COVID-19 tests. See our tip guide on the best practices to avoid counterfeits when shopping online or evaluating reviews.
Surprise medical bills. Beyond illness or injury, being a patient isn’t easy financially. Arizonans need to know their new consumer protections against unexpected and unavoidable out-of-network medical charges. This hard-won Arizona PIRG-supported consumer law can save insured Arizonans from paying hundreds to thousands of dollars in surprise medical bills.
No doubt scammers are going to try to find new ways to scam. Consumer Protection Week may be over, but protecting consumers is never over for us.
Sign up to receive our emails and keep up-to-date on our work: arizonapirgedfund.org/contact and @ArizonaPIRG on Facebook and Twitter.
Diane E. Brown is the executive director of the Arizona Public Interest Research Group (Arizona PIRG) Education Fund, which conducts research and education. Reports and tips for consumers can be found on ArizonaPIRGEdFund.org.
Vote for legislators who care about public schools
In multiple surveys, well over 70% of Arizonans agree we need a robust K-12 education system for all students. But what have legislators like our State Senator JD Mesnard of Chandler chosen to do? Repeatedly work to move our public taxpayer dollars to unaccountable private schools and also to cut taxes, both of which reduce the funds available for fully funding our public schools.
Then, underperforming schools are criticized for less than stellar test scores. (Private schools’ performance? Who knows?) There’s also a claim that they have put a lot of money into school funding, and anyway, “You can’t just keep throwing money at the problem.” While it’s true that money won’t resolve all the challenges facing our schools, there are problems – like woefully underpaid teachers, crumbling buildings, out of date technology, and many others – that ONLY money can remedy.
But that’s not focused on. One wonders if they actually want the next generation of Arizonans to be less educated than their parents. That is harmful for Arizona and plainly unacceptable to most of us. Election season is coming.
Remember Mr. Mesnard and other candidates who say they value education yet support more vouchers for private schools and cuts to public education … and vote instead for someone
Letters
who supports public schools. - Judith Simons
Congress must make apps market fairer to public at large
Hopefully we will finally see Congress take action to make the app markets that we all use fairer and more affordable. I remember reading about the Open App Markets Act in an Op/Ed back in the fall (I think it was by Rep. Jeff Weninger). I am happy to see it moving forward, as the Senate Judiciary passed the bill out of committee with a super majority. This legislation, that would rein in the tech giants who have been using draconian and monopolistic methods to control their app stores and make it hard to get an app into the store, and even harder to turn a profit once they are available there.
Currently, Apple and Google require the app developers use their payment system for in app purchases, and then charge them 30% to do so. When Apple and Google have a similar app, this makes it practically impossible for the small app developer to compete in the market. Apple and Google also promote their apps over those of independent developers.
This bill needs to be passed to create a level playing field, foster innovation, and protect us, the consumers, from price gouging.
