I’m writing to you just after returning from Buffalo, N.Y., a trip that really got me thinking about things back home in Maricopa.

First, it was a biting 43 degrees and rainy when I touched down at Buffalo Niagara International Airport. Back home, we had already eclipsed triple digits on the thermometer en route to what experts grimly predict may be our worst summer on record for wildfires and heat deaths. To be honest, as a red-blooded southerner who’s spent the last few years in metro Phoenix, I’ve always remarked at how easy it is to forget the entire country isn’t being smothered by the late spring sun this time of year, and how callow I must be to ever think otherwise.

But the excursion largely got me thinking about just how good we have it here in Maricopa. As managing editor of the most-circulated print news publication in Pinal County, I understand the influence I wield when it comes to platforming community voices, which is why I indefatigably work to understand public perception on a personal level and field questions and concerns daily about the burdens this community bears. Traffic, crime, apartments — it’s all rooted in unease over our city’s rapid and unprecedented growth.

Here’s some perspective I brought home with me. Buffalo is a city that’s lost more than half its population since 1950. Sure, their demographic trends mean less traffic on the roads. But instead, the city sees a poverty rate over 28% — seventh worst in the country and five times Maricopa’s — and a median household income half that of Maricopa in the state with the heaviest tax burden in the union, according to Intuit. That means fewer jobs and much higher crime rates than when the city was growing.

The other thing that struck me was the sheer number of Buffalo Bills flags, signs and mailbox decals. Literally, it feels like every house is repping the Bills Mafia in some conspicuous way. It reminded me of when I was heading up a newspaper back in Virginia, in a city half the size of Maricopa, when the Bills picked Tremaine Edmunds from my then-local high school in the 2018 NFL Draft.

That city was shrinking quickly, too, as were its schools and their athletic budgets. The sports cognoscenti back in Virginia lamented he’d be the first and last product out of that city, established in 1793, to make the big leagues.

Our own hometown hero, who occupies the cover of this issue, is also the first local talent taken in the NFL Draft. But for a city established just 20 years ago, coaches and administrators in the Maricopa school district tell me he’ll be the first of many as budgets increase and facilities improve — thanks to our city’s growth. You’ll read all about that, and how the Maricopa native Jacob Cowing came to hear his name called at this year’s NFL Draft, in this month’s tell-all cover story.

When I tune into the San Francisco 49ers games this fall to cheer on that former Maricopa High School Ram, I’ll be thinking about how Jacob’s story came to be — because his parents loved Maricopa so much, they moved here from out of state. We all moved here because we love Maricopa in our own way. And living in a lovable city ain’t so bad if you ask me.