Tim Steller

6 days ago | tucson.com | Tim Steller

Jaws dropped around Tucson when the announcement came out Tuesday afternoon: Tucson Electric Power is seeking a 14% rate increase. The surprise didn't just come from the big number, though that was a punch in the gut, coming from a company that won a 10% increase just two years ago. It was also the timing: The Pima County Board of Supervisors had hours before voted 3-2 to approve a plan for a huge data-center complex that could potentially become TEP's biggest single customer.

1 week ago | tucson.com | Tim Steller

Tucson's former city manager could be asked to rescue the Regional Transportation Authority's next 20-year plan. Michael Ortega has been named the interim director of the Pima Association of Governments and Regional Transportation Authority. When asked Thursday, he said he isn't sure how long he expects to be on the job or what his precise goals will be, beyond helping hire a new director. "It's going to be up to the board," he said.

1 week ago | tucson.com | Tim Steller

Pinal County Sheriff's Office detectives were there. Homeland Security Investigations agents were there. Then protesters showed up, and so Tucson police did, too. It was a weird Wednesday in Midvale Park, the subdivision on Tucson's southwest side. While activists surveilled the area in the afternoon for a reported immigration stop, investigators served a search warrant on a suspected drug trafficker, turning up large loads of  fentanyl, cocaine, and meth.

2 weeks ago | tucson.com | Tim Steller

Imagine your employer telling you that you won't be paid for two or three months. "But don't worry," they say. "We'll pay you in full after that." You check your savings account, your credit card balance, your line of credit to see how you can make it. You sigh and consider your options. It's the conundrum facing about 120 attorneys who are essential to justice being carried out at U.S. District Court in Tucson, and at federal courts all over the country.

2 weeks ago | tucson.com | Tim Steller

Disclaimers dot the nine pages of HB 2867, denying its likely impacts. “This section does not diminish or infringe on any right protected under the Constitution of Arizona or the First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States,” one such phrase says. Of course, you can tell that’s not true. If someone repeatedly declares they’re not infringing on your First Amendment rights, they probably are. These disclaimers appear in a bill passed by the Legislature Wednesday that Gov.