| NEWS | Green from p 16 continue to fork out money year after year to fix damages from extreme weather events.” A second swing at the Build Back Better Act would need to be funded by “taxing billionaires,” Zamora said. She added, “All of that money could be going into these bold climate investments.” Early in her tenure, Sinema was vocal in her opposition to raising the corporate tax rate by even a single percentage point. She refused to budge even after her fellow Senate Democrats spent weeks trying to bring her around. That’s why more than 400 climate activists threw down the gauntlet against Sinema as they slurped down popsicles and huddled under tents to escape the heat of the already scorching, late-spring Arizona sun. Climate Woes That sun is only making Phoenix hotter. Nearly 500 people died of heat-related illnesses in Arizona in 2020, a record number of deaths following the hottest summer ever measured. More than 300 deaths were linked to overheating in Maricopa County that year. That’s a primary concern for U.S. Representative Raúl M. Grijalva, a Democrat from Tucson and chairman of the House Natural Resources Committee, who championed the climate rally. Grijalva helped pass the Build Back Better Act in the House before it died in the Senate. “The natural disasters we see around us — drought, heat, poverty, disease — that affects us today,” Grijalva said at Saturday’s event. “It is important to begin grappling with social justice and equity in climate change.” Two wildfires continue to burn thou- sands of acres of forest near Prescott and Flagstaff, remaining mostly uncontained after several days and forcing thousands of Arizonans to evacuate their homes. Bad from p 14 terminated from the department on April 6, the spokesperson said, less than two weeks before the charges were filed. The agency said it had no further comment on the other POST investigations. Neither Rubio nor Portillo-Chavez could be reached for comment. Arizona POST officials are now deliber- ating on whether to revoke Rubio’s officer certification, and will likely present their final case to the board in the coming months. At its last meeting, the state board also accepted former Phoenix officer Daniel Beau Jones’ relinquishment of his officer certification. In 2019, Jones was the subject of multiple New Times reports over his misconduct, which had spurred four different lawsuits alleging he had abused coworkers and beat a civilian so badly that he was left with brain injuries. Now, three years after he left the depart- ment and after the state board opened a case into his conduct, Jones is banned from law enforcement. During fire events, air quality in some West Coast cities in the U.S. has vitiated to a quality poorer than the most polluted Chinese cities. That empowered Democrats to take minor action. On April 19, the White House Council on Environmental Quality announced it would begin requiring federal agencies to evaluate the climate impact of infrastruc- ture projects like pipelines and roads, an about-face from former President Donald Trump’s weakening of the National Environmental Policy Act. Grijalva called Trump’s changes to NEPA “egregiously wrong.” But for Sinema, his colleague in the Senate chamber next door, the move creates more red tape and ups spending. Her opinion, shared with Manchin, helped quell the Democratic micro- majority that would have brought Build Back Better to fruition. The coalition that protested in Phoenix, however, believes an amended Build Back Better Act can still realistically pass before Election Day. “If we can’t get it done in D.C., we’re going to get it done in every state,” Gaines said. “This is a national push and Arizona is a major part of that push.” Sonja Klinsky, an associate professor at Arizona State University’s Global Institute of Sustainability and Innovation, warned that Washington needs to start taking climate change “deadly seriously” if Arizona is to remain inhabitable for future generations. She has been researching the dangers of a warming planet since 1996. “Back then, if I went to a protest about climate change, I’d be the only one there,” Klinsky said. Arizona State University student volun- teers met at 91st Avenue and Broadway Road in Phoenix the morning of the rally to clean up the Salt River. Local efforts are not enough, Klinsky said. As Biden grapples with low approval ratings in the face of unprecedented infla- tion and exponential hikes in fuel prices, environmental security is becoming “an afterthought to all the other issues we’re facing,” she said. Exacerbated by American intervention in Ukraine as it wards off a Russian inva- sion, Biden’s lack of action on climate issues is jeopardizing the faith of young voters who turned out “in record numbers” to the polls in 2020 to secure Democratic control of Congress. Half the number of voters aged 18-29 cast ballots in 2020, up from 39 percent in 2016, according to the Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement at Tufts University near Boston. In an effort to curb rising gasoline prices, Biden last week tabled his climate agenda and loosened environmental restrictions to allow fossil fuels to flow freely from the pumps in Arizona and across the country. The president released a record amount of oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve in Texas and Louisiana and pledged to increase oil drilling on public lands despite promising his constituents while on the 2020 campaign trail that they wouldn’t see any new oil and gas extrac- tion operations. Young voters in Arizona are ready to turn their backs on Biden. “Civilizations are on the brink of collapse,” Tempe youth climate activist Saiarchana Darira told the crowd of more than 400 in a prepared speech. “Phoenix included.” Speaking at an Earth Day event in Seattle, Biden blamed Republicans for derailing his green agenda. And the U.S. Supreme Court is slated to rule on a case soon that would nix Biden’s ability to place sanctions on manufac- turers and motorists to smother green- house pollution. Biden stands by the Build Back Better Act in the face of bipartisan opposition. Ironically, opponents of the legislation likened it to a weather disaster. “The Senate should kill this bill and pour salt in the sand on its burial site so it never comes back,” The Hill columnist Stephen Moore wrote in November, the month when the House passed it by a 220-213 vote. “More debt, spending and printing of money at this stage of our economic recovery would be the equiva- lent of pouring gasoline on an inflation forest fire.” 18 MAY 5TH– MAY 11TH, 2022 PHOENIX NEW TIMES | MUSIC | CAFE | FILM | CULTURE | NIGHT+DAY | FEATURE | NEWS | OPINION | FEEDBACK | CONTENTS | phoenixnewtimes.com
