Council tables majority of action items to Sept. 20 meeting

In its last action Tuesday night, Maricopa City Council approved a resolution to adopt a set of general concepts to be considered by the Arizona Independent Redistricting Commission in the creation of new congressional and legislative districts.

The population of Pinal County has doubled in the past decade from 188,000 to 376,000, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.

The city is requesting that all areas of Pinal County be included within a single congressional district. The city also is requesting there be two predominantly rural congressional districts in Arizona, with Pinal County being placed in one of those two rural districts.

After the resolution passed, Councilmember Carl Diedrich joked to City Attorney Denis Fitzgibbons that it had passed on Wednesday instead of Tuesday.

“Make sure you note on there we actually approved it on the 17^th,” Diedrich said.

Tuesday’s regular meeting began at 7 p.m. but did not adjourn until about 12:20 a.m. More agenda items were tabled than given action at the nearly five-and-a-half hour meeting, which included two hours of public comment on a request by Verizon Wireless to build a cellular tower at the northwest corner of the Cobblestone Farms subdivision.

After council heard a presentation by Rick Shaw of Shaw and Associates, a Scottsdale company that represents Verizon in its request for a conditional use permit, and several Cobblestone residents speaking against the tower’s construction, council tabled action on the CUP until its Sept. 20 meeting.

Diedrich said he was not comfortable with making a decision despite hearing two hours of testimony from both sides.

“We need to sit down with the residents and Verizon,” he said.

Councilmembers Marvin Brown and Marquisha Griffin were not present at the meeting and Mayor Anthony Smith said the CUP needed to be voted on by a full council.

 

Though only five of the seven councilmembers were present, there was still a quorum and the council could have taken action on any agenda item.

 

Council tabled an intergovernmental agreement with the Maricopa Unified School District for public use of its playing fields at its two middle schools. The agreement was passed by the MUSD Governing Board last week at its regular meeting.

Council also tabled action on about a half dozen contracts, including three $200,000 contracts with on-call geotechnical consultants to supplement existing city efforts in providing reports for site development, flood control projects, environmental projects and other related services.