Perhaps the biggest reason was the de facto revenue raid on the treasuries of other governmental entities the project would entail. Under the proposed deal, the city would have bought the dirt, kicked in a loan to help build the hotel and then leased it back to Starr Pass. That's even assuming it was a good idea to subsidize this form of activity in the first place, or that a resort five miles out was going to benefit the city's convention business. Watch for the Starr Pass owners to come back with something else, probably a big rezoning on the land beyond its current low-density housing. Or another way to get the taxpayer to pick up the tab for their proposed resort venture.
Free enterprise marches on.
State Bar Executive Director Bruce Hamilton is on administrative leave while the organization's board of governors investigates allegations of sexual harassment. It's a reasonably juicy story the local media completely ignored. A Skinny source told us he read an article in the Arizona Republic and called both Tucson dailies and all three network TV outlets here to see if they could provide more details. The Arizona Daily Star carried one short blurb in the back pages, but that was it.