Security Guard Training in Tucson, AZ

For the first time in more than three decades, voters agreed to an override for the Tucson Unified School District, Wednesday evening’s unofficial preliminary results of Proposition 414 show.

Prop. 414 was passing with 56% of the vote as of Wednesday evening.

In the Sunnyside and Flowing Wells Unified School Districts, bonds of $120 million and $30 million, respectively, are on their way to approval, the unofficial results show.

Propositions 414, 415, and 416 would boost education spending in three Tucson-area school districts, affecting nearly 70,000 K-12 students and almost 10,000 full-time employees. The three propositions include big-picture pay raises, building repairs, expanding student programs, upgrading athletic facilities and improving HVAC systems.

“What this override promises to do is transform the academic trajectory of our district,” TUSD Superintendent Gabriel Trujillo said Wednesday afternoon. “At the centerpiece of this effort is going to be a historic raise for our teachers — a $3,000 a year raise for the life of this override. Academically, it’s going to put reading and math intervention teachers in all the schools that don’t currently have them which is going to be huge for academic performance and school improvement in our district.”

On Tuesday night, about 30 members of the Tucson Education Association, the labor union that represents teachers and most other classified employees in the Tucson Unified School District, ate pizza at American Eat Company on Tucsons south side. Some TEA members chased toddlers and others hung out with their families, as they waited for preliminary results on Prop 414, TUSD’s $45 million override.

“I am anxious. Just anxious,” said C.E. Rose K-8 counselor Nicole Janzen as she stepped outside the American Eat Company bar. “I would say 99% of the people that answered doors when I knocked on them were like ‘yes, we will do anything for educators, anything for schools.’ ”

Union members have canvassed over the last two months — knocking on doors all over the Tucson area in Southern Arizona’s largest district with about 40,000 students and 7,000 employees at 88 schools.

“I myself, along with my husband, hit maybe 200 doors and every person we were able to talk to was very positive,” said TUSD Governing Board President Jennifer Eckstrom. “I was somewhat confident.”

Eckstrom’s positive vibes radiated on Tuesday. It was her birthday. “I tell people I was born into politics because every so often election day is on my birthday,” she said. “Voters are seeing what’s going on with schools and they are understanding.”

The cornerstone of TUSD’s $45 million budget override is a 4% raise for certified teachers. For example, a first-year teacher earning the base pay of $37,800 today would make $39,312.

The raise could help Arizona lift its national education profile — which is consistently near the bottom. In 2024, Arizona ranked 49th nationally in elementary teacher pay and 42nd in secondary teacher pay, according to data from The Center for the Future of Arizona.

The override combines two key priorities from the district and the Tucson Education Association: Provide immediate raises to make teacher pay more competitive, and increase long-term career earnings with increases to steps in the salary schedule to retain educators.

Por primera vez en más de tres décadas, los votantes aprobaron una extensión presupuestal para el Distrito Escolar Unificado de Tucson (TUSD), según muestran los…

The average TUSD teacher salary was $56,898 for this past school year, according to its website. That’s up 3% from 2024 — but it’s 21% below the national average.

Even as some states pass record increases, average teacher pay has failed to keep up with inflation over the past decade. Adjusted for inflation, teachers across the nation on average make 5% less than they did 10 years ago, according to National Education Association data.

Almost all local school districts have overrides in place, but TUSD has not had one in over 30 years. The last time the largest school district in Southern Arizona asked for an override, in 2009, voters said no.

Overrides and bonds each affect property taxes. But overrides pay for people — teachers, staff, new programs, etc. — and are not paid back. Bonds are loans and pay for capital expenses — building renovations, new construction, security systems, etc. — and are paid back over time with interest.

Overrides typically last seven years and are funded through property taxes. The average TUSD homeowner would pay about $200 a year more on a home valued at $200,000, based on a proposed increase of $1.02 per $100 of net assessed valuation.

The override package equals 15% of the district’s revenue control limit — the maximum budget calculated by state funding formulas. It would generate a maximum of about $45 million a year in the first five years, followed by $30 million in year six and $15 million in year seven. Districts typically go back to voters to renew an override in years four or five, TUSD Chief Financial Officer Ricky Hernández said.

The package focuses on six areas:

Voters agreed in November 2023, when they approved TUSD’s 10-year, $480 million bond measure to renovate aging schools and update security and safety systems, technology and vehicles. That money comes from bond sales and is repaid over time. An override would increase property taxes for seven years.

“This means we know Tucson voters believe in TUSD and the staff who enrich our students’ lives,” said TEA president Jim Byrne. “It also means we have secured a crucial source of funding that can maintain and enhance what’s happening on our campuses. We know this doesn’t fix everything, but it’s an important step on the road to the schools our students deserve.”

As part of a $120 million bond, the Sunnyside Unified School District aims to repair and upgrade most of its 21 sites across the second-largest district in Southern Arizona. It will be repaid over a maximum of 20 years.

An assessment last school year revealed 15 of Sunnyside’s 21 sites are between poor and fair condition, said Sunnyside superintendent Jose Gastelum.

“We hit it hard in terms of getting out and sharing factual information and sharing the why,” Gastelum said Tuesday night as early results were posted. “People got out and to know that they are voting for it speaks volumes for us.”

“We passed an override in 2023 and two years later asking for this bond, it comes full circle,” he said. “There’s still trust in the community and they believe in what we are doing. I owe it to our families and our voters and some have children in the district and some don’t and if we want great schools and great communities, you have to invest and they have done that.”

The bond focuses on six areas:

The Flowing Wells bond asked taxpayers for $30 million in capital improvements focusing on new building construction, renovation and updates. The bond funds are to be repaid over a maximum of 20 years.

“We are really grateful for our community showing their support for our district,” Flowing Wells Assistant Superintendent Tamára McAllister said Tuesday night as preliminary results came in. “We really feel like this vote is an affirmation of the work we do in Flowing Wells and this is beginning the work of using the funds and putting them to use.”

According to Flowing Wells Superintendent Kevin Stoltzfus, proposed improvements include: school safety (such as fencing, remote entry systems, shatter-resistant glass treatments); new construction, mostly to replace prefabricated buildings that have reached their end of life; renovate existing buildings; and provide student transportation vehicles, he said.

The bond would also help build a two-classroom early childhood center for pre-K students on the campus of Richardson Elementary School, at 6901 N. Camino De La Tierra.The bond focuses on five areas:

TUCSON, Ariz. – Pale gold sunlight is breaking over the Catalina Mountains this morning, revealing another warm and crystal-clear start to southern Arizona’s Halloween week. Breezy east winds are stirring dust along the I-10 corridor, and by late morning, gusts could reach 25 mph—enough to rattle patio furniture and toss lightweight decorations.

According to the National Weather Service in Tucson, dry air remains firmly in place under a blocking ridge, keeping skies sunny and temperatures well above late-October norms. Highs near 87° today and upper 80s on Thursday will make afternoons feel more like early fall than the start of winter. Those planning outdoor school events or afternoon commutes should brace for steady east winds, especially across open desert roads south toward Sahuarita and Benson.

Halloween Friday looks nearly perfect for trick-or-treating, with bright sunshine early and calm, dry air by sunset. Evening temperatures will hover around 70° at dusk, dipping only into the low 60s late—comfortable enough for light costumes without jackets. Roads and sidewalks will stay dry, and no rain or dust impacts are expected for events across Pima County.

Looking ahead, models hint at a slight cool-down starting Saturday as northwest breezes return. Highs should ease into the mid-80s, a pleasant shift for late-fall cleanup and early decorating before November’s chill sets in. To be fair, Tucson’s streak of cloudless skies can’t last forever—long-range trends point toward cooler, possibly wetter conditions by mid-November.

After all, clocks fall back early Sunday at 2 a.m., signaling darker evenings and the real start of the Southwest’s slow slide into winter.

Five-Day Forecast for Tucson, AZ:Wed: 87/57 – Sunny, breezy east winds; gusts near 25 mph.Thu: 89/57 – Sunny, warm; light afternoon breeze.Fri: 87/55 – Clear, mild; ideal trick-or-treat weather near 70° early evening.Sat: 86/56 – Sunny, turning slightly cooler; light northwest wind.Sun: 89/57 – Mostly sunny; warmer again before next week’s cool trend.

TUCSON, Ariz., Oct. 27, 2025 /PRNewswire/ - Mattamy Homes, North America's largest family-owned homebuilder, has been recognized as a 2025 Tucson Top Workplaces winner by Energage.

Only 11 organizations with up to 150 employees in the Tucson Metro Area earned a spot on this year's list, and Mattamy Homes is proud to be among them. This is the first time the company has applied for and received this prestigious honor.

"This award is especially meaningful because it reflects our team members' voices," said Anjela Salyer, President of Mattamy Homes' Tucson Division. "At Mattamy, we are committed not only to building exceptional homes and communities, but also to creating a workplace where people feel they belong, are empowered to thrive, and can see a future for themselves. This recognition affirms we are on the right path and motivates us to keep raising the bar."

The Tucson Top Workplaces award celebrates organizations that prioritize a people-first culture and demonstrate exceptional employee satisfaction. This award is based entirely on confidential employee feedback gathered through the Energage Workplace Survey.

"Earning a Top Workplaces award is a badge of honor for companies, especially because it comes authentically from their employees," said Eric Rubino, Energage CEO. "That's something to be proud of. In today's market, leaders must ensure they're allowing employees to have a voice and be heard. That's paramount. Top Workplaces do this, and it pays dividends."

Mattamy's culture emphasizes inclusion, support and community involvement. Team members benefit from unique programs like the Employee Home Ownership Program, which provides financial support toward purchasing a Mattamy home, as well as the Mattamy Volunteer Program, which offers paid volunteer days, donation matching and community grants.

In Tucson, team members have put the company's core value of Community into action by helping build a Habitat for Humanity home, conserving and transplanting cacti and plants, serving meals at the Primavera Men's Shelter, and organizing local school supply and holiday drives. These efforts demonstrate pride and commitment to both their workplace and the broader community.

About Mattamy Homes

Mattamy Homes is the largest family-owned homebuilder in North America, with more than 47 years of operations history across the United States and Canada. Every year, Mattamy helps 8,000 families realize their dream of home ownership. In the United States, the company is represented in 11 markets – Charlotte, Raleigh, Phoenix, Tucson, Jacksonville, Orlando (where its US head office is located), Tampa, Sarasota, Naples, Dallas and Southeast Florida. In Canada, its communities stretch across the Greater Toronto Area, Ottawa, Calgary and Edmonton. Visit www.mattamyhomes.com for more information.

About Energage

Making the world a better place to work together.^TM Energage is a purpose-driven company that helps organizations turn employee feedback into useful business intelligence and credible employer recognition through Top Workplaces. Built on 18 years of culture research and the results from 27 million employees surveyed across more than 70,000 organizations, Energage delivers the most accurate competitive benchmark available. With access to a unique combination of patented analytic tools and expert guidance, Energage customers lead the competition with an engaged workforce and an opportunity to gain recognition for their people-first approach to culture. For more information or to nominate your organization, visit energage.com or topworkplaces.com.

SOURCE Mattamy Homes Limited

Blue Owl-backed Beale Infrastructure is planning new data center campuses in Arizona and Oklahoma.

The data center developer has filed applications for a second data center campus outside Tucson, Arizona, and is also seeking to develop two sites outside Tulsa in Oklahoma.

Beale looks at second Arizona site

As reported by local press, including AZ Central and KGUN9, the town of Marana has received applications to build a data center campus.

Two applications were submitted to the town this month to develop two sites located south of Pinal Airpark Road and west of I-10 into a data center campus.

Marana is a town that mostly lies in Pima County, northeast of Tucson.

Town officials said the applications were submitted by Lazarus and Silvyn, P.C., representing Fremont Peak Properties LLC, which is a Beale Infrastructure-owned company.

The two sites total 300 acres each, and are currently owned by Corp. Presiding Bishop of Church LDS and Kai Family Tr97 & Kai Tr 97 S12 LLC.

“They haven’t identified a specific number of buildings, but it’d be a series of buildings that are put up that store the servers and all of that that provide support for technology, as far as the cloud storage, AI, things of that nature,” Marana’s development services director, Jason Angell, told KGUN9. He added the site would be air-cooled, however.

The Marana town council updated its ordinances last year to clarify approval requirements for data centers. Town officials told AZ Central they have had conversations with several interested companies over the past three years.

Beale continues on in Arizona

Beale Infrastructure is a data center developer backed by alternative investment asset company Blue Owl.

The company is hoping to develop a large-scale data center campus elsewhere in Pima County, but has been facing pushback from local residents and officials.

Project Blue is a 290-acre site set to host a data center campus, with Amazon linked to the project. Beale has said there is no agreement in place with AWS.

The initial phase of the project is located in Pima County’s Southeast Employment and Logistics Center. At least three data centers are reportedly set to be built, but the final number of buildings could be higher; reports suggest up to 10 buildings totaling 2 million sq ft (185,805 sqm) and 600MW are planned. Beale has said it aims to invest $3.6 billion in the project. Construction work on the first phase is set to run from 2026 to 2029, with the first buildings potentially going live in 2027.

Local officials last month denied an annexation request that would have given the project access to the city’s reclaimed water system. The company, however, has since filed for a ten-year, 286MW energy supply agreement with the Arizona Corporation Commission, the state’s utilities regulator.

Beale has also announced an updated project design for its proposed data center project in Pima County, suggesting the project will go ahead without the previously requested water connection.

The updated design, developed in partnership with the Pima County board of supervisors, incorporates air cooling technology that utilizes a closed-loop system. The company will not use any reclaimed water from the city for the project.

“We appreciate the dialogue with the Pima County Board of Supervisors about the project plan and will be soliciting and implementing feedback from members of the community,” Michael Nudelman, chief development officer at Beale Infrastructure, said last month, “this revised project plan is designed to the highest standard of sustainable facility operations, utilizing existing clean energy resources and incorporating air cooling technology.”

The No Desert Data Center Coalition is continuing to mobilize against the project, recently protesting outside a Democratic Party fundraiser, calling on Pima County board supervisor Matt Heinz to reverse his support for the project.

Beale comes to Oklahoma

Beale Infrastructure is also known to be planning a development outside Kansas City in De Soto, Kansas. On its website, the firm notes planned development in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

This week, the Broken Arrow Sentinel and News9 reported that Beale is planning a development in Coweta, a city southeast of Tulsa in Wagoner County.

The proposed Project Atlas development is targeting land along 16192 State Highway 51B, just south of Coweta and east of Highway 72.

Coweta City manager Julie Casteen told the Sentinel that Beale has a purchase and sale agreement with both the Coweta Industrial Development Authority and a private owner for the site, and a rezoning request has been submitted.

Full details about the proposal are unclear, but the company is hosting an open house about the project later this month.

Local property records show the Coweta Industrial Development Authority sold 40 acres of property to Chicago-based Quartz Mountain Properties for $850,000 late last year. Quartz Mountain, which is involved in another Beale project in the area, signed another land deal with Hopping Family Trust earlier this year.

Beale has also been named as the firm behind Project Clydesdale, a planned 506-acre data center campus in Owasso, a city northeast of Tulsa.

The development, in Tulsa County, will be located north of East 76th Street North, east of North Yale Avenue, south of East 86th Street North, and west of North Sheridan Road. The project will consist of at least one phase with three possible additional phases, with each phase covering approximately 200,000 sq ft (18,580 sqm).

First reported in May, the county board approved the project’s economic development plan and tax incentives last month. Beale was working with Quartz Mountain on that development.

Neither Tulsa, nor Oklahoma more generally, has a major data center ecosystem.

Google operates a data center campus to the east of Tulsa in Pryor, Mayes County. Announced in 2007, it launched a facility there back in 2011 and has expanded at regular intervals since.

TierPoint operates several data centers in Tulsa. Last year, Tonaquint acquired an EdgeX data center in Oklahoma City.

A 340-acre campus known as Project Anthem is in the works in Tulsa. Meta has been linked to the development, which is due to begin construction next year.

A newly discovered comet could be visible to the naked eye this week, and its name should give you a clue about where it was spotted first.

Comet C/2025 A6 (Lemmon) was discovered early this year by one of the telescopes on — you guessed it — Mount Lemmon, where the University of Arizona operates a wildly prolific monitoring network dedicated to finding so-called near-Earth objects that could pose a threat to our planet.

The Catalina Sky Survey leads the world when it comes to cataloging new comets and asteroids. Close to half of all known near-Earth objects were discovered in the past 27 years by staff members at the NASA-funded, mountain-top survey run by the U of A’s Lunar and Planetary Laboratory.

Catalina Sky Survey director Carson Fuls was the first to notice Comet Lemmon, though he couldn’t tell what it was at the time.

He said it was “just a point” in an image captured on Jan. 3 by the 60-inch Mount Lemmon Survey telescope, so he reported it as a possible asteroid to the Minor Planet Center, a global database maintained by the International Astronomical Union for tracking such things.

The Minor Planet Center ultimately identified it as a comet on Feb. 21, based on follow-up observations.

Comet Lemmon poses no risk to our planet. The closest it will get to us is roughly 55 million miles away, and that already happened at around 5 p.m. local time on Monday.

Fuls said current projections suggest Lemmon may grow slightly brighter in the sky through Oct. 27, when it should begin to dim.

“Comets are kind of notoriously hard to predict when it comes to how bright they’re going to get,” he said.

If you know just where to look, Comet Lemmon is already what astronomy buffs call “backyard visible” with a pair of binoculars or a small telescope.

Fuls said he found it from his house in the Catalina Foothills on Sunday night using a pair of bird-watching binoculars, though it wasn’t easy, even for him. “I could see the corona and a bit of the tail,” he said. “It was still quite dim.”

The best way to see it is to go outside at about 6:30 or 7 p.m., roughly 30 minutes to an hour after sunset, and look north toward the Big Dipper. Lemmon will be located just below and to the west of the Dipper’s handle, Fuls said.

It is supposed to be the brightest comet of 2025, he said, but it is unlikely to be visible with the naked eye except in very dark places, free of most light pollution.

This is Comet Lemmon’s first visit to the inner solar system in about 1,350 years. It won’t be back again for another 1,150 years or so.

In photos captured so far by astrophotographers, Lemmon glows green as a result of photons from the sun exciting carbon in the coma surrounding the flying ball of rocks, dust and melting ice, Fuls said. “The color helps us figure out — to some extent — what the comet is made of.”

The Catalina Sky Survey operates nightly, except during the full moon, using nine full-time observers in staggered shifts. Each observer typically works three nights in a row and sleeps during the day between shifts in the crew quarters on the mountain. “It’s kind of a tough schedule,” Fuls said, but the people doing it tend to love the work.

Instead of peering through the eyepiece of a telescope, they spend most of their time in front of a monitor, searching for unidentified asteroids and other objects in fresh images of the sky collected by as many as five different scopes used by the survey.

Advances in optics, computers and tracking software have made the job significantly easier over the years, but no replacement has yet been found for human eyes and intuition, Fuls said. “There is always a person in that loop.”

Had Lemmon been recognizable in that first image from Jan. 3, when it was still more than 418 million miles from the sun, we’d all be referring to it as Comet Fuls now.

New comets are automatically named after the individuals who discover them, but only if the objects are identified as comets right away. Otherwise, they take the name of the facility that captured the first images of them, once they have been confirmed as comets.

That’s why this Comet Lemmon is by no means the only Comet Lemmon. No fewer than 66 of them have been discovered from — and named for — the survey telescope on Mount Lemmon since 2006. Lemmon also appears in the hyphenated names of at least 19 other comets, for which the telescope north of Tucson is listed as the co-discoverer.

But don’t feel bad for Fuls. He already has his name on 10 comets he has discovered himself since 2017 — a total that puts him in the middle of the pack among current observers with the Catalina Sky Survey.

According to the survey’s website, deputy director Alex Gibbs is the active leader with 33 comet discoveries. Rob McNaught, a former observer for the survey in Australia, holds the all-time record with 82.

Though its primary mission is to locate potentially dangerous asteroids in our immediate cosmic neighborhood, the Catalina Sky Survey has now discovered more than 570 comets, including that faint green smudge currently painting the evening sky to the north of Tucson.