By Phil Riske, managing editor
The last true cowboy of the Arizona Legislature is gone.
Senator Jack Brown, a conservative Democrat from St. Johns who served in the Arizona House and Senate for 17 terms over 36 years, died Wednesday at age 86.
I was fortunate to have covered Mr. Brown in the Senate for Arizona Capitol Times and witnessed there a man with Arizona ranching in his blood, a dying breed of lawmaker willing to reach across the aisle for the betterment of the state, a man who always made time for a reporter interview and a man of humor.
In caucus meetings, he was a calming voice against fellow Democrats who would propose scorched earth tactics.
Why would a man way past retirement age continue to serve in the Legislature, when he could enjoy free time on his ranch with his wife, Beverly, and eight children? I put that question to him when he announced he would run again for the Senate in 2002.
Half wryly, half serious, I think, Mr. Brown said because the state health insurance coverage was so good for him and his family.
The debate around state funding for Phoenix light rail drew heated debates for several weeks, so Mr. Brown, Senate minority leader at the time, decided to calm things down a little.
For a week or so, he would ask to be recognized and then deliver the “Daily Update on St. Johns Light Rail Project.” It brought the house down.
“There’s still not a shovel of dirt that’s ever been turned, and there never will be,” he joked to the Arizona Capitol Times in 2010, when he retired from the Legislature after 36 years as a representative and senator.
Unlikely we will see his kind again at the State Capitol.
“I miss his calming drawl, his cowboy good sense and his heart of gold,” Assistant Democratic Senate Leader Steve Farley said in a prepared statement.
