(Editor’s note: Opinion pieces are published for discussion purposes only.)
Arizona Progress Gazette
During the 2006 election season many city officials throughout Arizona, including Phoenix, campaigned against Proposition 207. They warned many things why the “Private Property Rights Protection Act” should be defeated. Chief among them were that providing too much individual protection for homeowners and commercial property owners would hamstring municipal redevelopment and historic preservation efforts. Voters rejected such arguments and Proposition 207 passed with a sizable 65% of the vote.
This is an important history lesson as some want to suspend the law and dictate what the new owner of the twenty-year old Chinese Cultural Center near 44th and Van Buren can do with their property.
But not all.
As a mob rained down on Phoenix City Hall and demanded Mayor Greg Stanton and his fellow politicians lay fetal rather than display fidelity to state law, the city’s Planning Director Alan Stephenson took a more courageous tact, no matter how uncomfortable and inconvenient.
