Snider: October filled with exciting events

Welcome to October. The month is replete with notable events such as Name Your Car Day (Oct. 2), Sweetest Day and National Grouch Day (both Oct. 15), National Nut Day (Oct. 22), and, of course, Halloween (Oct. 31).

October is also known as National Dessert Month, Family History Month and National Pizza Festival Month — so enjoy! By the way, there are less than 90 shopping days left before Christmas.

Before I say more, western Pinal County said goodbye to a quiet giant last month. Colin “Bill” Scott died on Sept. 14 after decades of service and labor in the areas of agriculture, power, water and community. He will be missed.
As many of you know, when the 2010 U.S. Census counted our noses they found there were 375,800 people residing here. That triggered a new reapportionment process for Pinal County since we now must elect five county supervisors instead of three. Earlier this year, the Board of Supervisors authorized our Elections Department to employ consultants skilled in the arts of demographic analysis and familiarity with the U.S. Department of Justice pre-clearance process.

With their assistance, Elections Director Steve Kizer and his staff created and considered a number of redistricting map proposals. In the meantime, the city of Casa Grande, concerned about the prospect of being split into multiple supervisory districts, created its own map proposal and submitted it to the Elections Department. After due consideration, county staff brought three different supervisory district map proposals to the board during its Sept. 7 meeting and the board chose to place all three of the proposals before the public for input and comment.

There were a number of special input sessions held in various locations around the county last month. After all of the comments and suggestions are compiled, the board will meet this month to select one of those district map proposals for transmittal to the DOJ. The DOJ has 60 days to review our submittal and rule on whether our proposed redistricting map complies with the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and the criteria used by the DOJ’s Civil Rights Division under the provisions of Section Five of the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

Although the DOJ process of review (also known as pre-clearance) is complex, essentially the department can approve our proposal, put it on hold while asking for more information about certain aspects of the proposal, or simply return it to us with a note that it needs modification. It is, of course, our belief that whichever map proposal we submit will be pre-cleared without any further review by the DOJ. If we’re successful, then prospective candidates can begin to circulate nomination petitions with an eye to the Primary Election of Aug. 28 and the General Election on Nov. 6.

CAHRA (Community Action Human Resources Agency) will be holding utility assistance application events for those needing help with their utilities. Scheduled sessions in various locations in western Pinal County will take place throughout the month. For more information, call CAHRA at 520-466-1112.

Before I get to your appointment book, it’s time to brag about our own Frito-Lay plant. Over the last three years, the visionary folks at Frito-Lay worked hard on a Near Net Zero concept that aimed to reduce the resources needed to make its products. Led by the intrepid Jason Gray, they stalled a water recovery/reuse facility designed to recycle 75 percent of all process water used. Five separate and distinct photovoltaic solar fields were installed throughout the property to produce enough power to meet 50 percent of the plants annual electric load. A huge biomass boiler was constructed sufficient to produce all of the steam needs for the plant’s operations and reducing their use of natural gas by over 80 percent.

And in 2009, they became the first snack food manufacturing facility to be certified LEED 2.0 Existing Building in the corporation, Arizona and the nation. Frito-Lay USA, and its parent company PepsiCo, celebrated this achievement on Oct. 5. Once again, wonderful things are happening in Pinal County!