As the commercialism of Christmas becomes more overwhelming it is easy to forget the true spirit of the Holiday season. The focus on marathon gift shopping for friends, family, and co-workers can overshadow the importance of giving back to our community and those less fortunate.

Looking for unique handcrafted gifts rather than tired Mall fare? In Prescott, several Holiday Bazaars provide the perfect way to meld gift shopping with charity. Your purchases contribute much-needed support to local non-profit organizations and charities from the Prescott area.

Despite overwhelming public opposition, a ghost town booms again

In mid-November, the view looking east from the Old Highway 89 bridge across Hell Canyon seven miles north of Paulden is of chaparral—green, yellow and splashed with red this time of year—creeping along the base of the canyon and clinging to the steep, protruding red-brown walls. A sandy path, gold and brown and sculpted with ripples and creases left from the last flood winds through the tangled shrubs on the canyon floor. Out of this natural landscape, the 106-year-old steel Santa Fe railway bridge rises nearly 200 feet from the ground, paralleling the horizon. A hundred years ago the children living in the now-ghost town of Drake used to walk across the bridge on their way to and from the schoolhouse, which was on the other side of the canyon in another now-ghost town called Puntenney. Their teacher had a train schedule for the line and told them when it was safe to cross.

or, Are You Adequate?

This is the story of a piece of legislation. Can you feel your eyes glazing over at that abstract, Latin-rooted word? But sadly, these arcane, abstruse, icky-picky matters matter in our lives, and this is water legislation.

So let’s try to splash a little charisma on it – make it a real Tale, with Defenders and Attackers, with those the Legislation aims to protect and those who believe it will hurt them, with Why You Should Care. We can start right there, because this law would empower rural communities to block subdivisions when there’s not enough water. There’s nothing to stop them now.

… you’d better hope the folks who have your back have some backbone

Last July, Ann Davis sent a card to Prescott Councilman Bob Luzius. On the front was a picture of a Great Dane bending its massive head down to scrutinize a tiny fluffball of doghood. Ann lives in Prescott Canyon Estates, and from her front porch she gazes across the remaining pine-juniper assemblage directly at the towering bank of fill, the acres of parking lot, and the carved-out hillside of her new neighbor – Lowe's.

Some Prescott Canyon Estates residents call the Lowe's site retaining wall the "Great Wall of Prescott."

"Lowe's" is the name Ann wrote next to the Great Dane on the card. Next to the tiny fluffball, she wrote “us.”

In July, concerned about effects of the construction, some residents called Luzius. He’s not their representative, since Prescott Canyon Estates is in the county, but he had expressed concern about the plans for developing the commercial site from the beginning and had been dropping by weekly, the only council member ever to come by. While he was there on July 23, Monsoon let fly with a ripsnorter, dropping around two inches of rain. In under an hour, a few thousand tons of water hurtled down.

Four years ago Chino Valley citizens decided they didn’t want “progress” in the form of a private airstrip on a nearby 1,100-acre parcel owned by Perkins Ranch, Inc. And especially not if Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University flight students used the airstrip for incessant “touch-and-go” landings. Though deterred by public opposition, the airstrip hasn't gone away; instead, like those eager flight students in their blue and white airplanes, the airstrip has come around again for yet another approach.

ERAU withdrew its interest after the private airstrip plan failed to fly with Chino Valley residents in 2003, when the Town of Chino Valley formally denied the Perkins Ranch request to rezone 3,840 acres of the 8,300-acre ranch because of Perkins’ failure to provide a list of non-conforming uses and a development plan. But they said the rancher-cum-developer, Tom Perkins, Sr., could reapply if he corrected his paperwork deficiencies.

There aren’t too many congressmen who have low environmental scores on the national level but who score high with environmental groups at home. Rick Renzi (R-AZ) is one of the few.

 “I’m glad to hear he’s a better steward in his own district,” said Tiernan Sittenfeld.

Sittenfeld, the legislative director for the League of Conservation Voters in Washington D.C., said Renzi has a terrible rating on national environmental issues. The League identifies itself as is a bipartisan organization working for clean air, clean water and a safe future; it ranks politicians on a zero to100 scale on their performance on environmental issues. Renzi has an extremely low 7 percent score since entering Congress and a rock-bottom 3 percent for last year’s session. Compare that with the environmental scores for others in the Arizona delegation: Sen. John McCain scores 41 percent; Sen. Jon Kyl, 11 percent; Rep. Ed Pastor, 92 percent and Rep. Raul Grijalva, 100 percent.

Sittenfeld said Renzi seems more concerned with the oil and gas industry rather than with his constituents, and she points to Renzi’s votes against clean air, clean water and global warming solutions. Sittenfeld said in 2005 Renzi voted against clean air when he voted for the Gasoline for America’s Security Act of 2005. She said his vote gave unnecessary extensions for cleanups.

“This put people’s health at risk and delayed the use of cleaner fuels,” she said.