Boost for girls football / P. 20
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An edition of the East Valley Tribune
INSIDE
This Week
NEWS ........................ 5 East Valley lawmaker fights for teen mental health help.
SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 19, 2023
Town officials brace for utility billing change BY MARK MORAN Tribune Staff Writer
A
fter more than five years of diligent and detailed planning, painstaking preparation and countless hours of testing, it all comes down to one crucial weekend in early March for Queen Creek officials. A new utility billing system will soon kick off when town utility customers receive a
printed bill in early March that they can’t pay electronically until March 7 when the new system goes live. Town officials worry that could create confusion if people try to pay their bill too soon. “Those will be our dark days,” Kristy Riester, town billing and customer service manager told the Transportation Advisory Committee this month. “At the end of business on March 1, everything will shut down,” she said. “We’ll be
dark on the 2nd, which is a Thursday, obviously through the weekend and then Monday the 6th, we will not be able to take any payments. If we receive anything (in person) we’re just going to keep them in the safe and process them on March 7, when we go live in our system.” The new system is will better meet the needs of Queen Creek’s utility service area, see
UTILITIES page 7
QC Girl Scouts’ garden brightens Mesa hospital COMMUNITY ......... 13 Queen Creek cadet earns DAR medal.
SPORTS .................. 20 Spring Training season is upon us.
COMMUNITY .........................13 BUSINESS................................15 OPINION...................................17 SPORTS......................................20 GET OUT.................................... 23 CLASSIFIEDS............................ 26
BY JOSH ORTEGA Tribune Staff Writer
A
mid the chilly winter December nights and onslaught of the pandemic, seven Queen Creek Girl Scouts began work on a project that will now warm the hearts and spirits of everyone at Mountain Vista Medical Center in East Mesa. Their work led to the recent opening of Mountain Vista’s Sunshine Therapy Garden on its grounds, 1301 S. Crismon Road. During the pandemic, Troop 3632 members Kayla Porter, Madi Roberts, Isabella Ronning, Chloe Copeland, Addie Bernier, and Ally and Lizzy Small spent many days with their families outside of the hospital’s intensive care unit. There, they talked and prayed with pasee
GARDEN page 10
Queen Creek Girl Scout Troop 3632 members who worked with Mountain Vista Medical Center to open a Sunshine Therapy Garden include, from left: Front: Lizzy Small, Ally Small, Kayla Porter, Isabella Ronning, Chloe Copeland, Addie Bernier and Madi Roberts. Back: Darcy Small, Kristie Porter, Rachel Ronning, Erika Copeland, Tara Bernier and Amy Roberts.