https://www.azcentral.com/story/opinion/op-ed/laurieroberts/2017/12/18/…
You’re driving on Loop 202 toward Tempe and there they are, five sparkling glass and steel buildings nestled along Tempe Town Lake.

http://tucson.com/news/local/steller-consider-tucson-s-limping-economy-…

J.D. Mesnard, speaker of the Arizona House, and other legislators toured promising places on Tucson’s economic landscape at the end of last week.

The group hit our booming downtown. Journeyed to Raytheon, with its impending expansion. Toured the Port of Tucson and saw its intermodal connections to Mexican trade.

http://www.azcentral.com/story/opinion/op-ed/2017/08/15/phoenix-wants-m…

It must be odd for City of Phoenix officials to admit they cannot sell their prized jewel, the Sheraton hotel, without guaranteeing the buyer won’t pay Phoenix’s high business property taxes. The incentive deal they are offering the buyer adds insult to this injurious affair.

As Phoenix negotiates the sale of the city-owned Sheraton hotel in downtown, a new aspect of the deal is sparking controversy: a proposed $97 million tax break for the buyer.

The city already expects to take a hefty loss on the Sheraton. In July, Phoenix entered into exclusive talks to sell to TLG Phoenix LLC, an investment company based in Florida, for $255 million.

Phoenix still owes $306 million on the hotel — the largest in the state with 1,000 rooms — and the city has already sunk about $47 million of taxpayers' money into it.

http://azcapitoltimes.com/news/2017/07/20/legality-of-pinal-county-tran…

Pinal County is asking voters this November to approve a half-cent sales tax to fund regional transportation projects. Notwithstanding the failure to advance legislation that would allow the county to levy the tax at varying rates among different classifications, the county is proceeding with ballot language to do just that.

http://www.phoenixnewtimes.com/slideshow/downtown-phoenix-who-gets-tax-…

Critics of Phoenix's use of the Government Property Lease Excise Tax, or GPLET (pronounced jeep-let) for short, often argue that it creates an uneven playing field. Often, seemingly identical apartment complexes, office buildings, or hotels sit side-by-side, one receiving a substantial reduction in their property taxes, the other not.

http://www.azcentral.com/story/news/local/phoenix/2017/06/15/phoenix-pe…

Soaring pension costs are strangling Phoenix’s city budget, but city officials are weighing a plan to ease the near-term misery: Punt on paying pension debt, and spend big later.

The maneuver could cost the city up to an additional $2.3 billion in police and fire pension costs over the next 30 years — and possibly much more if investments don’t perform as assumed.

http://azcapitoltimes.com/news/2017/05/25/public-school-advocates-hold-…

It was a surprise and a pleasure to see the Arizona School Boards Association President Tim Ogle weigh in so publicly about his concerns with equitable school funding. On this point, taxpayers and school advocates should be in harmony: Arizona’s outmoded funding formula is ill designed for the 21st century.

Another tax season has passed and of the millions of law-abiding taxpayers who filed, many had to wonder if their private financial information would remain secure. There is ample evidence to justify taxpayer concerns about confidentiality and security. In 2013, Maricopa Community College District notified over 2 million individuals of a massive data breach and there are countless other examples that have occurred across the country.

Finally, a tax incentive got too big for its britches, triggering a backlash.

The bloated incentive in question is the misnamed government property lease excise tax, or GPLET in tax wonk circles.

At root, GPLET is a fraud and an abuse.

Under the Arizona Constitution, government property is exempt from property taxes. With a GPLET, a developer pretends to convey its project to the city, removing it from the property tax rolls. The city then leases it back to the developer.