City seeks annexation of 1,786 acres off Honeycutt Road

Maricopa may be growing again – this time in terms of size, not population.

The City Council will explore whether to annex 1,786 acres of unincorporated land just east of White and Parker Road land and just north of Honeycutt Road.

The site includes part of the University of Arizona’s Maricopa Agricultural Center, a 2,100-acre farm used by the university’s College of Agricultural and Life Sciences to conduct research on agricultural technology.

The City initiated a request for annexation of the land outside of city limits.

A staff report outlined the procedures the City will undertake during the process.

“Approving the request will allow staff to initiate the procedural steps of the city code and state statute requirements,” the staff report said. “Per city code, a neighborhood meeting is required to be held along with public outreach in the format of mailed notification letters to all property owners within 600 feet of the subject property, newspaper legal notice within the local circulator, and posted signage on the subject property.

“State statute requires a blank annexation petition to be recorded prior to the scheduled public hearing. Following the public hearing, the blank annexation petition will be released to the property owner(s) to sign. Once the city has received the signed petition, an annexation ordinance will be brought back to the City Council for possible adoption.”

The council would be required to adopt a plan/policy or procedure to provide the proposed annexed area with appropriate levels of infrastructure and services within 10 years either prior to or during the annexation proceedings.

Should annexation be approved, the process will move quickly.

The City’s tentative timeline is less than six months, with submission of a petition to the Pinal County Recorder by Nov. 14.

City Council would adopt the Annexation Ordinance and 10-year Infrastructure, including the fiscal impact analysis on Dec. 6, kicking off a 30-day protest period. That period would tentatively end Jan. 7, 2023, and at that time the City Clerk would file a copy of the annexation ordinance with Pinal County.