Free Republic

PHOENIX - How to help rural Arizona counties, especially those along the U.S.-Mexico border, is one of the priorities Governor-elect Janet Napolitano said she will work on during her administration. While the problems of border counties are not on the back burner, Napolitano said she will first take care of the state's budget crisis and clean up Arizona's educational woes. Part of the state's economic well-being is tied to the border and the nations south of the United States, she said in a telephone interview Wednesday. "Arizona is the gate to the south, and I don't just mean Mexico,"...

PHOENIX—A delegation of Mexican senators and officials from a human rights commission began a three-day fact-finding mission Wednesday to assess how Mexican migrants are being treated in ArizonaHigh on their priority list is discussing ways to prevent violence along the U.S.-Mexico border, reduce the number of deaths among illegal immigrants crossing the southern Arizona desert and combat migrant smugglers. "This is a three-tier problem," said Ruben Beltran, Mexico's consulate general in Phoenix. "We need to get more information out to migrants about the dangers of crossing the desert, warn migrants not to use coyotes (smugglers) and fight organized crime...

Wednesday, June 26, 2002NewsMax.com - PHOENIX – Self-described "environmentalists" have opposed forest management programs that could have prevented wildfires such as those burning thousands of acres in Arizona and Colorado, the new chairman of the Western Governors Association said Tuesday.President Bush also made a mocking reference Tuesday to the extremist so-called Greens, who would better be dubbed Grays, in "honor" of the ashen color of the land where pine forests once thrived.Speaking to reporters after an association meeting, Gov. Judy Martz, R-Mont., said as incoming chairman, her priority would be reducing the threat of wildfires to communities and the environment....