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AHWATUKEE FOOTHILLS NEWS www.ahwatukee.com
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Wednesday, April 5, 2017
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Taking on fundraising by themselves
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Flag-burning prompts call for ‘Ahwatukee Unite Day’
AHWATUKEE FOOTHILLS NEWS BY PAUL MARYNIAK AFN Executive Editor
T AHWATUKEE FOOTHILLS NEWS . 18
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GRANDE DAME
Ahwatukee Realtor a local pioneer, too
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TEA FOR TUKEE
(Photos by Dianne Ross/AFN Contributor)
Ahwatukee residents Xavier Kennedy, 8, and Kiki Owens, 15, don’t know each other, but they have a lot in common. Both are staging unrelated fundraisers on their own to help kids less fortunate than them. See pages 8 and 9.
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BAD HOP
Overall Cactus League attendance down
Widow tells state that ABM board cut her from ballot in ‘careless’ election BY PAUL MARYNIAK AFN Executive Editor
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Center Court widow has filed a complaint with the state against the Ahwatukee Board of Management for excluding her as a candidate in today’s board elections – allegedly because she opposes housing on the defunct Ahwatukee Lakes Golf Course. The elimination of Karin E. Gray left only four
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candidates for four vacancies on the nine-seat ABM board – including the people selected to fill vacancies created last fall by the resignation of three board members who were open-space advocates. In a complaint to the state Real Estate Department, Gray accuses the board of conducting the election in a “careless, arbitrary and capricious way.” Gray said ABM board President Dan Smith told See
ABM on page 6
he overnight burning of an American flag hung outside a retired U.S. Marine’s Ahwatukee home has provoked outrage and prompted a call for a community-wide display of flags this Sunday to protest the desecration. Nine-year veteran Brian Ellison discovered the flag’s charred remains as he pulled out of his garage on 16th Avenue in the Club West area around 7 a.m. last Thursday, March 30. “He was extremely upset,” said his wife, Lisa Woods Ellison. “People have died for that flag and this is just outrageous. I was in shock. I could not believe someone would do this.” And while police investigate, the Ellisons are calling on all Ahwatukee homeowners to post flags outside their home on Sunday, April 9, for what they’re calling “Ahwatukee Unite Day.” “I want to ask the Ahwatukee Community to place an American flag on your home and show everyone we do not tolerate or accept this behavior,” Lisa Ellison said. “It would be nice if everyone put a flag up outside their house on Sunday. Of course, we’d like them to keep it up, but at least on Sunday we could have ‘Ahwatukee See
FLAG on page 14
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