Teen deaths spark alarm / P. 13
Housing market shifting / P. 23
An edition of the East Valley Tribune
INSIDE
NAU
NORTHERN
ARIZONA UNIVERSITY
GRADUATION SECTION
COMMUNITY...... 15 The new Crismon High School is steadily taking shape.
SPORTS................ 25 QC athletes shine in state track meet.
COMMUNITY.........................15 BUSINESS ..............................16 GRADUATION.......................19 REAL ESTATE.........................23 SPORTS....................................25 CLASSIFIEDS.........................26
FREE | QueenCreekTribune.com
Sunday, May 22, 2022
New budget boosts QC rec facilities bigtime BY KATHLEEN STINSON Tribune Staff Writer
T
own Council has approved a record $730.2 million budget for the fiscal year beginning July 1 that includes the promise of new facilities to address Queen Creek residents’ recreational needs. The budget, passed on May 18 on a 4-2 vote, includes $40 million for a rec-
QC losing luster for tiny owls
reation center and another $25 million to construct an aquatics center. Council members Leah Martineau and Emilena Turley cast “no” votes while Mayor Gail Barney was absent because of a continuing illness, Vice Mayor Brown said he is voting for the budget “very happily,” stating it provides “fully funded pensions,” increased public safety services, more funding for road and street improvements.
“In this budget, we are setting up ourselves to be a community that even more living-wage employers will want to locate to and when that happens, we will also get big ticket items,” he said. Brown cited money earmarked for parks, which he said “residents have been telling me for years (they want) – and a pool.”
A grand occasion
see
BUDGET page 10
BY CECILIA CHAN Tribune Staff Writer
N
early a decade after Wild at Heart helped dig a habitat for the western burrowing owls at Zanjero Park in Gilbert the raptor rescue nonprofit returned to relocate the ground-dwelling birds – uprooted by the nearby construction of the Lindsay Road Interchange. With the removal of the 8-inch-tall owls that nest underground, so went the only known spot Gilbert had where the
see OWLS page 6
May 19 was a joyous day for about 450 Queen Creek High School seniors who gathered at Desert Financial Arena at Arizona State University to receive their well-earned diplomas and move on to the next stage of their lives. Eastmark High graduated the previous day. For a look at some of the sights from the QC High ceremony, see page 21. (David Minton/Tribune Staff Photographer)
Central Arizona College www.centralaz.edu
Paths to Great Careers