PICTURE ROCKS DIGEST

Welcome to the Picture Rocks Digest, a free newsletter about issues and events in the community. The print version of this all-volunteer publication is distributed at area businesses and community sites. If you have calendar events or news items, or if you would like to be added to our email list, please contact us at PictureRocksDigest@comcast.net.

The Picture Rocks Digest is a publication of Citizens for Picture Rocks, Inc., a nonprofit 501(c)(4) civic organization dedicated to improving the quality of life in the community. Citizens for Picture Rocks meets the third Tuesday of each month at 7:00 pm in the Picture Rocks Community Center, 5615 N. Sanders Road. Meetings are free and open to the public. The next meeting is May 19, 2009. Everyone is welcome to attend. Membership not required, but highly recommended. Dues are $20/year for an individual or $25/year for a family.

PICTURE ROCKS PRIDE COMMUNITY FAIRE!

Saturday, May 9, 2:00-6:00 p.m.
Picture Rocks Community Center & Park
5615 N. Sanders Road
Free Fun For All Ages!

Food * Games * Information * Prizes * Jumping Castle
Live Music * Pie-Eating Contest * Face Painting * More!
With a Special Appearance by
Dist. 3 Pima County Supervisor Sharon Bronson at 2:30 p.m.

Sponsored by Citizens for Picture Rocks and the Picture Rocks Community Center
Funded in part by a grant from PRO Neighborhoods
Free and open to the public.

ABOUT CITIZENS FOR PICTURE ROCKS

Citizens for Picture Rocks was founded in 2002 by a group of neighbors concerned with the reputation of our community as a haven for drug dealers and other criminals. Putting individual and political differences aside, C4PR members work together in a wide variety of activities to make our home a better, safer place to live, a community that takes pride in itself.

We meet monthly, publish the Picture Rocks Digest, and maintain a website at www.CitizensforPictureRocks.org. We have adopted three sections of local roads for twice-yearly Adopt-a- Roadway cleanups. We have established a Community Emergency Response Team and a Neighborhood Walk and Watch Program.

Cleaning trash from our roads since 2004

Advocating for park improvements

We have successfully pursued grants to fund cleanup tools, forthcoming safe routes to schools, shade covering for the children's playground, and a directory of local services. We are supporting the Picture Rocks Fire District in an effort to acquire a community electronic sign.

C4PR members have also been instrumental, with the help of Supervisor Sharon Bronson and other County officials, in securing the Ortiz Health Center, Picture Rocks Swimming Pool, Tucson Mountain District Sheriff's Station, and the new BMX-Skate Park (username: Pima, password: skate, case sensitive) expected to be completed by the end of this year.

PLEASE JOIN US!

We meet monthly on the third Tuesday at 7:00 p.m., with Iced Tea Social Time at 6:30 p.m., at Picture Rocks Community Center, 5615 N. Sanders Road.

Meetings are free and open to all neighbors. We host educational forums on local issues and candidates, and often have guest speakers on a variety of subjects of interest to our community. Recent topics have included desert gardening and sustainable living, archaeology, spring wildflowers, home safety and security, and the new library.

Last month's meeting featured Saguaro National Park Ranger Chip Littlefield and a very curious desert tortoise (see next story).

UPCOMING PROGRAMS

May 19: Old Pueblo Archaeologist Allen Dart on the prehistoric rock art of Picture Rocks, "Rock Calendars and Ancient Time Pieces" (supported by Arizona Humanities Council)

June 16: Community Forum on the proposed I-10 Bypass through the Avra Valley, with representatives of the community, Saguaro National Park, Friends of Ironwood Forest National Monument, and invitations extended to the State Transportation Board (who are pursuing the Bypass), and the Tohono O'odham Nation.

July 21: Community Forum on the proposed merger of Picture Rocks and Northwest Fire Districts.

MEMBERSHIP HAS ITS BENEFITS

Dues for an individual are $20 per year, or $25 for family membership, payable in May of each year and pro-rated for joining later. Membership gives you a vote in the affairs of the community, and the opportunity to run for and elect C4PR Board Members to represent our community.

SHARING THE DESERT WITH TORTOISES

Saguaro National Park Ranger Chip Littlefield was the guest speaker at the April 21 Citizens for Picture Rocks meeting. His presentation on desert tortoises was augmented with a several live tortoises, from eight months to 27 years old. A couple of things to remember: Tortoises, if captured, cannot be returned to the wild. They have a specific territory they roam, about the size of two football fields. One tortoise, however, dubbed Thelma, was known to have traveled 20 miles from home and returned safely.

Tortoises are vegetarians, and drink through their nostrils. Handling them can make them void their bladders and then become dehydrated in summer heat. However, if you come across a tortoise at the side of a road, pull over safely, pick the tortoise up, holding it flat, and place it on the other side of the road pointing in the direction it was going.

Young desert tortoises are vulnerable to hawk, owl, coyote and bobcat predation, and Littlefield said that only about one of every hundred hatched survive. All tortoises face danger from unleashed and roaming dogs. Ranger Chip said that about 1,000 children are learning about desert tortoises each year through Park programs, and offered a free tortoise-tracking field trip to a Community Faire survey raffle winner.

COMMUNITY NOTES

• Cleanup Volunteers Thank Community: The 18 C4PR volunteers who cleaned up three adopted sections of local roads on April 25 express their Thanks to the community for helping to keep roadways litter-free. At every cleanup less trash is found, which means more pride! Once again, the Minit Mart Subway provided lunch at a generous discount.
  


• Parks and Recreation Budget Cuts Opposed: With budget proposals that would increase fees for kids' programs beyond the means of many neighbors, C4PR President Kaitlin Meadows added the organization's voice to many others in protest. She wrote: "It is absolutely unconscionable to us that in the midst of these very challenging times you would choose fee increase options and foreclosure of vital programs as a problem-solving technique! Please be more creative in your thinking. Hold open forums with affected communities. Do not gut programs, price them out of range of the very folks who need them most, and presume you are meeting the needs of those you promise to serve."
  
  Suggestions from other neighbors included using volunteers to staff centers in the evening, consolidating Parks and Rec departments and offices and renting space, reducing salaries of the highest paid executives -- and NOT gutting children's and senior programs. The Pima County Board of Supervisors rejected some of the proposed cuts, but final action was unclear as we went to press.
  


• Picture Rocks Pool to Open for Third Season: Pima County Natural Resources, Parks and Recreation has announced the opening of pools for the 2009 summer season. Pools will be open from Memorial Day to Labor Day every day except Friday. Adult-only swimming will be on Monday and Wednesday, 11:45 a.m. to 12:45 p.m., with Water Aerobics at those times on Tuesday and Thursday. Open Recreation swimming is 1:00 p.m. to 6:00 p.m. weekdays, and 1:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m. on weekends. Family Swim time is Saturday and Sunday, 5:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m. Swim lessons are available Monday through Thursday, 9:30 a.m. to 10:00 a.m., 10:15 a.m. to 10:45 a.m., and 11:00 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. Call for entry fees and information, 682-7166.
  


• 15 de Mayo Community Center Dinner: A Mexican food platter and live entertainment for only $5 will be served up at Picture Rocks Community Center on Friday, May 15, 6:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m., at 5615 N. Sanders Rd.
  


• BMX-Skate Park Final Input: About 30 people, half of them local youth, attended a meeting at the Community Center on April 25 to give last-minute thoughts about the design of the forthcoming Picture Rocks BMX-Skate Park. A final design will be available at the May 9 Community Faire, according to Brian Moore of Site Design Group. Funding for the park comes from 2004 bond money which Dist. 3 Supervisor Sharon Bronson earmarked for Picture Rocks. C4PR Board Members Karen Zopf, Tom Allen and Greg Mattison have been working with kids, parents, county staff and law enforcement to help make it happen.
  


• I-10 Bypass "Faulty": The State Transportation Board held its regular April meeting in Marana. I-10 Bypass opponents Jim Pethe and Albert Lannon from Picture Rocks were there and extended an invitation to the Board to participate in a June 16 Community Forum on the Bypass. Lannon also told the STB that their study was based on three faulty assumptions: 1) that there would be increased truck traffic from Mexico pursuant to the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), which public pressure has continued to block; 2) that there will be increased Tucson area growth, which the recession has brought to a halt for the foreseeable future; and, 3) that increased visual, noise and air pollution, along with hazardous cargo, are okay to dump on the residents and wildlife of the Avra Valley. "That is a wildly incorrect assumption," he said, urging the STB to reconsider and abandon the Bypass study.
  


• Grad Night Volunteers Needed: Marana High School seniors will have a safe place to party this year on graduation night. Grad Night 2009 will begin on May 20 at 10:00 p.m. and continue until 5:30 a.m. the next morning. Students must buy a ticket to participate. The Marana High PTO has been working very hard to make this a fun night and needs volunteers and donations. If anyone would like to help make this event a success, please email the PTO at mhspto@gmail.com or contact Pam Moseley at 349-0725 or Tina Laulusa at 579-3833.
  


• Learn to Use the Internet: Free classes are being offered at the Wheeler Taft Abbett Library near Silverbell and Cortaro Roads, on Thursday and Friday, June 4 and 5, 8:30 a.m. to 10:00 a.m. Prerequisites are completion of the May computer class, or basic mouse and keyboard skills. Registration is limited to ten people who plan to attend both days. Sign up at the Library, or call 594-5200 starting May 16.
  


• Picture Rocks History: The 8-part series, A Brief History of Picture Rocks will resume in the next issue of the Picture Rocks Digest with "Part Four: The Miners."
  

The Picture Rocks Digest is written by Albert Lannon (email: bluemoon@dakotacom.net; phone: 622-3561). Additional materials and design by Karen J. Zopf.

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