Los Arcos memories
Posted inPhoenix Phoenix 101: History

Los Arcos memories

Los_Arcos

The interior of Los Arcos Mall, at Scottsdale Road and McDowell Road.

I was recently interviewed by a graduate student at Arizona State University, who is writing on the history and prospects for the area of south Scottsdale around the former Los Arcos mall. Zonies might find the exchange of some interest:

What are your memories of Los Arcos growing up?

I lived about half a mile away during high school, from 1970 to 1974. We had moved there from central Phoenix. It was very much a cohesive neighborhood. Like most of Phoenix then, it was very lush with grass, trees and landscaping. It was homogeneous: middle-class Anglo families, many of whose fathers worked at Motorola.

It was fairly new, and much of McDowell didn’t even have sidewalks. You could still see farming going on a quarter mile north of Thomas Road. Scottsdale Road was barely developed; we have a stunning view of the buttes out the back of our house. Scottsdale itself was still partly rural, with a rustic/touristy downtown. There was not much north of Chaparral Road.

The neighborhood was centered on Coronado High School, which then was a very fine school, including one of the best fine arts departments in the country.

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Posted inPhoenix

The crime against children in Arizona

As far as I can tell, the Arizona Republic devoted a mere four paragraphs to the latest evidence of the state’s dismal school system. Here they are:

Arizona spends less on educating its kids than almost any state in the
union, according to a U.S. Census Bureau report released Wednesday.

In 2006, the state spent $6,472 per student, or $2,666 less than the
national average. Only Idaho and Utah spent less. The report has ranked
Arizona second or third from the bottom in per-student spending dating
to 2000.

The state Legislature caps the amount of money schools can receive from
the general fund and in property taxes, said Chuck Essigs of the
Arizona Association of School Business Officials. That formula is more
restrictive than the majority of states’, he said.

Arizona also ranks in the bottom three when tallying money spent on
instruction, including teacher pay and benefits. Administrative costs
can’t be blamed for eating up the money, either. Arizona ranked second
from the bottom on money spent on administration of individual schools.

So that’s that. We can go back to the ever-desperate "everything’s fine!" Of course, it’s not.

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