Friday, March 15, 2019

Bits and Pieces

Reminder: Town Centre Zoning Amendment Is Not Dead
We saw a posting on Nextdoor.com celebrating the fact that the zoning amendment to Town Centre was not passed by council. The posting seemed to feel this defeated the amendment. The amendment was not defeated. It was continued.

As we reported last week, the amendment will be heard again on April 3 and it is very much alive. Mayor Winfield proposed that the hearing be continued because, as he wrote us: "I thought the proposal could be improved and the proponent seemed willing. We'll see what they present April 3."

So, if you are interested, you should mark the date on your calendar and be sure to be there.

Resident Don English: "Flat out say no.." to Town Centre Amendment
Resident Don English made a compelling case to not approve the rezoning of Town Centre. He eloquently covered the issues he sees them. You can watch is remarks here. He speaks at about the 2 hour mark.

English ended his comments with his reflection on what the August election of a new mayor and 3 new council members meant to him:  "We had an election. A new leadership. A new direction. You promised to take a harder look at rezoning. Here is your chance to let the 'rubber meet the road'. Here is a chance for you to do that. Take a harder look and really put a moratorium on this or just flat out say no."

Sometimes it is important to remind those we elect why we put them there. That is what English tried to do.

Kreigh Park renewal continues to late summer
The 5 ball fields at Kreigh Park plus a portion of the park adjacent to the fields have been out of service since September. Only the play area, pet area and Oro Valley pool have been usable. The renovation includes new irrigation, new grass, laser-leveled fields, new fencing, dugouts, and upgraded restrooms.

Piece by piece it is coming back. The three baseball fields will open later this month and the softball fields will open early summer. Between July and September, the town will be working on improving the older north restroom, adding shade structures and installing lighting under the play structure.

"The sport field improvements completed this fiscal year cost $340,000 and $200,000 next fiscal year for the restroom, shade structure and lighting improvements. We were awarded a $200,000 grant from State Parks (pass through from the Land and Water Conservation Fund) to be applied to this project." (Source: Jessica Hynd, Town of Oro Valley)

Power outage on Oracle corridor... Again
Tuesday night, the electricity was down along the Oracle corridor. The area was bounded by Linda Vista, Desert Sky, Tangerine and the Catalina Mountains. Many homes and business were without power for about an hour. This is the second time this year that power has been lost in this area. This is the older section of town that has undergone growth. We wonder if the growth has exceeded TEP's ability to provide reliable power service.

This is the second major outage in two months. The other was on January 16. In addition, there have been numerous other breaker interruptions. These generally last long enough for you to have to reset you clocks but not more than a minute or so. TEP tells us that these interruptions happen when there is an imbalance between power coming in and power going out.

Regardless of why it happens, it seems to us the the Oro Valley TEP power supply in the older section of town is simply not reliable.
---