A number of significant positive and negative economic impacts could result from Pima County's SDCP and related programs, according to an analysis of existing research on large-scale conservation planning undertaken to provide a framework for community decision-making. This report offers no final verdict on the net economic impact of Pima County's current, ambitious initiatives in habitat conservation and growth management. However, it does provide a framework for future assessment and decision-making.

The Jaguar Conservation Agreement provides opportunities and incentives for interested parties to become involved with conservation activities. These activities include collection of biological information (to provide a sound scientific basis for decisions); consideration of relevant cultural, economic, and political factors; design and implementation of a comprehensive approach to conservation (including public education); and monitoring, evaluation, and feedback. This summary will focus on the mapping efforts and make recommendations to the Jaguar Conservation Team on conservation measures for potential jaguar habitat.

In March 1997, the Arizona Game and Fish Department and New Mexico Department of Game and Fish entered into a Conservation Agreement with other state, local, and federal cooperators, with voluntary participation by many private individuals, to conserve the jaguar (Panthera onca) along borderlands of Arizona and New Mexico and to stimulate parallel efforts in Mexico. Under the Conservation Agreement, an annual evaluation and progress report must be submitted to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The first of these reports was completed in July 1998 and the second in June 2000. This third report is a comprehensive review of all Jaguar Conservation Agreement activities from March 1997 through December 2003. We compiled the information herein with assistance from members of the Jaguar Conservation Team and Jaguar Working Group, to help ensure that objectives outlined in the Conservation Agreement are being accomplished and that any deficiencies identified are addressed and corrective measures are implemented. In this report, we will identify progress, or lack thereof, in accomplishing the goals and objectives set forth by and for the JAGCT for the last 6 years.

This report follows The Coming of Age report produced in 2002 by some of the principals involved in this project, and published by St. Luke’s Health Initiatives. That research showed that Arizona had much to do to get ready for the baby boomer age wave. The results of Unlocking Resilience from new survey data, interviews, and secondary research indicates Arizona still has much to do to prepare for aging and must make concrete policy decisions about aging.

Though the Great Recession may be officially over, all is not well in Arizona. Three years after the collapse of a massive real estate “bubble,” the deepest economic downturn in memory exposed and exacerbated one of the nation’s most profound state fiscal crises, with disturbing implications for Arizona citizens and the state’s long-term economic health.

This brief takes a careful look at the Grand Canyon State’s fiscal situation, examining both Arizona’s serious cyclical budget shortfall—the one resulting from a temporary collapse of revenue due to the recession—as well as the chronic, longer-term, and massive structural imbalances that have developed largely due to policy choices made in better times. This primer employs a unique methodology to estimate the size of the state’s structural deficit and then explores the mix of forces, including the large permanent tax reductions, that created them. It also highlights some of the dramatic impacts these fiscal challenges are having on service-delivery as well as on local governments. The brief suggests some of the steps state policymakers must take to close their budget gaps over the short and longer term. First, it urges better policymaking, and prods leaders to broaden, balance, and diversify the state’s revenue base while looking to assure a long-haul balance of taxing and spending. And second, it recommends that Arizona improve the information-sharing and budgeting processes through which fiscal problems are understood—so they may ultimately be averted.

In February of 1998, the Pima County Board of Supervisors launched what has evolved into the Sonoran Desert Conservation Plan (SDCP) -- a comprehensive effort to protect the Sonoran Desert, guide growth and rationalize land development in the metropolitan Tucson region. Proponents of this planning process maintained that the project would reconcile conflicts between human activities and conservation, providing benefits for both wildlife and economic development. Critics, however, have increasingly alleged that implementing such an initiative will adversely affect land and housing markets, increase taxes and create problems of housing affordability. Over time a pressing need has consequently grown for objective information about the possible fiscal and economic impacts of the conservation programs being assembled by Pima County. This report addresses that need. It is a tool in the form of an impartial framework for assessment that government officials, environmentalists, business people and the general public can use for debate and decision-making.