While taking questions Thursday in Yuma, Gov. Janet Napolitano said immigration, the hot topic in Yuma and Arizona throughout 2006, might not be as much of a focus in 2007.
Napolitano said immigration "hijacked" discussion in the Arizona Legislature last year, but this year she felt the session's dominant theme would be growth, another issue that is obviously at the forefront in Yuma.
"I'm not sensing the same kind of drive for a huge omnibus immigration bill with $100 million of appropriations associated with it that I saw last year," Napolitano said while speaking to invited guests at the Yuma Golf & Country Club. She delivered a shortened version of the State of the State Address she gave Monday to the Legislature and also took questions from the audience.
Yuma County Sheriff Ralph Ogden said he liked the priorities Napolitano mentioned in her speech, but he didn't want the state to lose sight of immigration and border security. "I would hope that it's still an issue," he said. "I hope (legislators) approach it from an individual basis. Last year, they threw everything together in an omnibus bill and nobody liked it."
Napolitano expects an effort will be made to pass an employer sanctions bill at the state level, but there were still many questions about what a final draft would look like and how it could affect Yuma's agricultural industry.
A bill with sponsors from both parties has been introduced in the U.S. Senate that would give "blue cards" to temporary workers to allow them in the country. That is one step, but Napolitano said she still advocates comprehensive immigration reform and that President George W. Bush wants to make that happen.
"We are suffering not just at the state level, but at the federal level from a lack of effective action," she said of efforts to reach an immigration solution.
Napolitano's speech explained her One Arizona Plan, which focuses on education, foundation and innovation. She said the projects she is proposing can all be paid for without raising taxes or touching the state's rainy day fund.
She said more roads can get built by freeing up more money by refinancing the current 20-year transportation bonds to 30-year bonds. The biggest laugh of the morning came when Napolitano said, "I look forward to someday, perhaps, in our lifetimes, in the winter being able to make a left turn in Yuma."
Yuma City Administrator Mark Watson said if that extra funding becomes available, Yuma could have projects on the horizon to take advantage of it.
