JAN 6–19, 2018 | www.SanTanSun.com
Relentlessly local coverage of Southern Chandler and our neighboring communities
Upgrade of Arizona Avenue segment praised, feared BY COLLEEN SPARKS Staff
A major construction project on Arizona Avenue is expected to start in just days, making some residents anxious to see if it will improve safety and help the local economy or boost traffic and steer people away from businesses. The roadway and streetscape work is likely to begin Jan. 15 on Arizona Avenue between Frye and Pecos roads. Crews will create wider sidewalks, add bicycle lanes, create raised medians, enhance storm drainage, install street lighting and signs and make traffic signal changes. They also will replace 1,700 feet of an old waterline beneath Frye
Road west of Arizona Avenue as part of the many aesthetic and safety-oriented changes. A raised median with landscaping down the center of the road could improve safety as it will discourage people from jaywalking or riding bicycles across the road, said Jim Phipps, public information officer with the City of Chandler’s Public Works Department. A traffic signal and crosswalk will be built at Fairview Street. Sections of Arizona Avenue also will have a raised median where it does not intersect with side streets. “We’re hoping that will give people a protected crossing area that they will use,” Phipps said. “Right now, they have to go up to Frye or down to Pecos. It should
help with respect to that raised median down the center and could improve safety. People right now on bicycles and stuff can go right across the road. Medians will kind of prevent that. “The aesthetic part is to try to make the gateway from the 202 freeway into Chandler more welcoming, nicer-looking and to improve the experience for pedestrians because it’s a wider sidewalk, some seating/benches, bike lanes on both sides, new streetlights help light the street,” Phipps added. “It will give some continuity to that part of Arizona Avenue with respect to better tying into the downtown with the consistent improvements that go beyond Frye Road.” Road enhancements on Arizona
Avenue between Chandler Boulevard and Frye Road were finished in 2010. The new phase is expected to be finished in October. During the first two-thirds of the construction period, over about six months, all four traffic lanes on Arizona Avenue in the work area will stay open, Phipps said. For about the last three months, while the raised median is being built, only one lane in each direction will be open during non-peak hours Monday through Saturday. However, during the busiest traffic times, drivers will be able to use all four lanes in the construction area, even in the last three see
ARIZONA AVENUE page 3
Yarbrough now sees need for tax credit cap BY HOWARD FISCHER Capitol Media Services
Kimberly Carrillo/Staff Photographer
Nora Ellen and son JD Mesnard
Chandler mom and son merge political paths BY PAUL MARYNIAK Executive Editor
Children often follow in their parents’ footsteps when choosing a career, but Nora Ellen and JD Mesnard turned that dynamic on its head – twice. He was in the first year of his first term in the Arizona House of Representatives in 2011 when his mom made her first run for Chandler City Council and won. Now, Ellen has her eyes set on her son’s State House seat as he goes after the Senate seat in Legislative District 17, which covers most of Chandler and Sun Lakes as well as bits of Mesa and Gilbert. Term limits are propelling both their moves in next year’s election as see
MOTHER AND SON page 15
Kimberly Carrillo/Staff Photographer
A taste before building At 18 months of age, Elva Xing of Chandler apparently thought it best to taste a block before fi guring out what to do with it. The tot was among a number of children under 5 who gathered last week at Chandler Library’s downtown branch to have fun building things with blocks. For more photos on their activity, see page 53.
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The architect of an ever-increasing flow of state tax revenues to help send students to private and parochial schools said he’s willing to consider a cap now that the diversion has topped $74 million a year. Senate President Steve Yarbrough acknowledged that he has been a staunch defender of the tax credits originally available only to individual taxpayers. The Chandler Republican was the sponsor of a major expansion of the law, allowing corporations to give what they would otherwise owe the state in income taxes instead to organizations that provide scholarships for the private schools. Most significant is that Yarbrough demanded – and got – an annual escalator clause, boosting the amount that corporations can divert by 20 percent a year. For this year, the cap is $74.3 million. That rises to nearly $89.2 million next year, $107 million the year after that more than $128 million the following year. And there is no limit. To put that in perspective, corporations, already benefiting from a multisee
YARBROUGH page 10
F E AT U R E STO R I E S Pickleball sweeping Chandler, region . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . COMMUNITY . . . . . . . Page 16 New road menace: drugged driving . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . COMMUNITY . . . . . . . Page 20 Couple finds use for old Riggs Farm. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . BUSINESS . . . . . . . . . Page 23 Kyrene kids have fun with STEM . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . NEIGHBORS . . . . . . . . Page 44 City finds partner for MLK celebration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ARTS . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 55
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