The State of the System Report is a compilation of the physical inventory and status of the Maricopa County Department of Transportation’s infrastructure. It addresses roadway congestion, traffic safety, low volume road paving, bridges, and pavement conditions. Also, included are recommendations for future improvements within each of the infrastructure categories. The SOS report has been produced annually since 1998.

In the early 1990s, the criminal justice debate in America was dominated by phrases like “three strikes and you’re out,” “juveniles who commit adult crime should serve adult time,” and “lock ’em up and throw away the key.” In the latter half of the 1990s, however, the dialogue has shifted. Recognizing the enormous social and capital costs associated with locking people up and “throwing away the key,” many – including some of the strongest get-tough-on-crime advocates just a few years ago – have turned to a different concept: prevention.

Many of the influential voices in Greater Phoenix have come to believe in the power of prevention. In late 1996, a diverse coalition of local leadership from the business community, law enforcement, city and county government, academia, and the court system came together to create the Phoenix Violence Prevention Initiative.

Believing that voters might support transit if they felt like an integral part of the transit proposal decision-making process, the Phoenix Chamber of Commerce's Valleywide Transit Task Force set out in early 1995 to initiate a bottom-up process which would enable people to say, "here's what we want." The Task Force agreed that the first step in the process was to initiate a new dialogue. the Morrison Institute for Public Policy was asked to write a briefing paper, which would re-invigorate the transit debate. The resulting report, "Transit in the Valley: Where Do We Go From Here?" painted a bleak picture of the Valley's existing transit system and challenged many long-held conventional wisdoms. The dialogue had begun. The report was then presented to the citizens of 17 Valley cities and towns for their consideration in 16 public meetings sponsored by cities and their local Chambers of Commerce. In community forums conducted between October 1996 and February 1997, more than 500 Valley residents discussed the Valley's transit future. This document summarizes the questionnaire responses by 501 people who attended the forums.