January 29, 2023 | www.santansun.com
Relentlessly local coverage of Southern Chandler
An edition of the East Valley Tribune
Residents confront developer on Landings apartments BY KEN SAIN Managing Editor
The controversial Landings On Ocotillo affordable housing project has two new names, but it still faces the same entrenched opposition from residents who live in the neighborhood. That much was clear after a nearly three-hour public meeting the lead developer, Dominium Apartments, staged at Hamilton High School’s auditorium on Jan. 25. About 150 people attended, including at least five City Council members. However, the interaction with neighbors might have led to some changes being made to the project proposed for on Ocotillo Road, about a quarter of a mile east of Arizona Avenue. “I think one of the things I heard, for example, is we need more senior affordable housing, so we’re going to go look and see if we can maybe shift some more into more senior and less work-
Real estate attorney Ed Bull addressed homeowners during Dominium Apartments’ neighborhood meeting about its controversial proposed affordable housing in Chandler Jan. 25. (David Minton/Staff Photographer)
force housing,” said Owen Metz, a senior vice president and project partner with Dominium’s Mountain West Region. The developer currently proposes 336
units for families and 182 for seniors. Dominium rebranded the project after being threatened with a lawsuit for using “Ocotillo,” in its name. Metz said
a lawsuit would have no merit, but that they decided to change the name because they already face enough opposition. The new names are Paseo Crossings for the family side and Sonoran Landings for the senior living component. No matter what it’s called, the neighbors were clear in their opposition to it. They contended it doesn’t fit in the city’s general plan, that it would increase traffic in an already congested area, that schools are over capacity and can’t handle 800 more residents with kids, and that there’s not enough water. They also pointed to the city officials’ opposition, including City Council’s unanimous proclamation against it. The county does not require a public meeting, but the developer decided to hold one anyway because of the strong opposition and what they See
LANDINGSon Page 12
Chandler braces for challenges in local economy Experts give overview of Valley, Chandler economy. Page 27
BY KEN SAIN Managing Editor
The days of Chandler being a large manufacturing magnet are pretty much over. And the office space business is dead, killed by COVID with no clear picture if it’s ever coming back. Those were two of the takeaways from a city council work session on the state of economic development in Chandler and the Valley. Vice Mayor Matt Orlando asked the
head of the city’s Economic Development Department staff during a Jan. 23 work session if they’re trying to bring any automobile manufacturing plants to Chandler. “We’re not going to be competitive. We don’t have the building and land size to compete for those projects,” Micah Miranda told Orlando. “They need 80, 100 acres of land for their manufacturing facilities. We are out of it.” Both Casa Grande and Mesa have become homes to electric vehicle and truck manufacturing plants that employ thousands of people.
Chandler has built out more than 93% of its available land, leaving only small plots scattered about the city. There is no large space like Intel’s campus for new large companies. But there remains room for smaller companies. Miranda said the city still goes after larger ones, hoping they’ll bring their engineers to Chandler. “We really focus on the automotive tech engineering,” Miranda said. “So like you mentioned, GM Innovation Center, Maxim Integrated, all of the back-end engineering that goes into your product are the automotive tech companies
we’re targeting.” There has been a huge drop in demand for commercial office space since the pandemic began, as many companies shifted to letting employees work from home. So far, it appears they are not shifting back. “We don’t anticipate office coming back in any substantial form anytime soon,” Miranda said. Miranda and Chris Camacho, who is president and CEO of the Greater Phoenix Economic Council, briefed the See
ECONon Page 14
Chandler ups the ante to fill police vacancies BY KEN SAIN Managing Editor
Despite offering thousands of dollars in bonuses, the Chandler Police Department is still not able to fill all its positions and so City Council appears likely to spend $381,000 to broaden its recruitment efforts. “The Police Department [has] been averaging about 30 police officer vacancies per month for the last 18 months,” Chief Sean Duggan told Council at the Jan. 23 study session. “The reality is that we need to do more than we’re doing presently.” The item before Council was a oneyear contract to ad agency Davidson Belluso for a digital marketing campaign to recruit new officers from outside Arizona. “There are roughly 1,000 police officer vacancies in the Valley,” Duggan said.
“So, we are competing with every other agency in the Valley, and that pool of talented and qualified people that are still willing to be police officers has been depleted. So we need to set our sights outside of Arizona if we’re going to fill our ranks.” Duggan said Chandler is targeting officers in the states around Arizona, the Pacific Northwest and Illinois. Councilman Angel Encinas asked why Illinois? “Why are we looking at those areas? Just anecdotally, the officers, the recruits, but especially with the laterals that we’ve hired from those states have been stellar,” Duggan said. Matt Burdick, city communications and public affairs director, said the two states that have supplied most of the lateral officers Chandler has hired are California and Illinois.
“They are neck and neck,” Burdick said. The contract with Davidson Belluso is not just for police. About $200,000 will be used to recruit talent for development services, information technology, public works and utilities and other professional-level positions. But $181,000 is reserved just for the police force. This would be the second year of working with Davidson Belluso. The original one-year contract was approved in February 2022 and allowed for
up to four renewals. In a two-month period, Chandler ads were seen 4.6 million times and generated more than 34,000 clicks to the “Join Team Chandler” website. The final vote to approve the deal was scheduled for Jan. 26, after the deadline for this newspaper. In other Council action on Jan. 23, there was some debate about a citizen
F E AT U R E D STO R I E S City hits the street to count the unsheltered. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . News Page 6 Chandler CEO's app aims for teen mental health. . . . . . . . . Business Page 25 Sun Lakes post looks at veterans and suicide. . . . . . . . . . . Neighbors Page 37 Irish banjo band coming to Chandler Arts Center.. . . . . . . . . GetOut Page 41
See
COUNCILon Page 11
More
Business . . . . . . . 24 Clip-It . . . . . . . . . .31 Sports . . . . . . . . . 32 Neighbors . . . . . 34 Faith. . . . . . . . . . . 40 GetOut. . . . . . . . .41 Classifieds . . . . . 45