Jeff Rogers, chairman of the Pima County Democratic Party, tells us he's preparing to roll out several proposed changes to the City of Tucson charter at the Monday meeting of Democrats of Greater Tucson.

Rogers, who calls the program "Strong Voter," will advocate for a public election to create a "strong mayor" form of government, which would mean the mayor would essentially take over the job of the Tucson city manager.

"I think it addresses the need for accountability," Rogers says. "You have a strong mayor, you pay him a real wage—maybe not as much as a city manager, but there's probably somebody who would be willing to do it for $90,000 or something."

Rogers would also like to see ward-only elections; the city now is now in court fighting a new state law that mandates both ward-only and non-partisan elections. (Rogers wants the city to keep partisan elections.)

Finally, Rogers would like to scrap the current staggered elections every two years and elect the entire council for four-year terms in the same year.

Rogers says he hopes the City Council agrees to put the charter changes on the November ballot this year, but he says an initiative campaign is not out of the question.

Sandy Bahr of the Sierra Club has sent out her weekly bulletin from the Arizona Legislature. Our favorite part:

HB2538 federal mandates; proof of constitutionality (Gowan, Burges, Lesko, et al) states that the legislature cannot enact any statute that appropriates state monies pursuant to a federal mandate or that complies with a federal mandate unless the federal mandate contains a report or document prescribing reasonable and logical arguments based on United States constitutional law that the federal mandate is a function of the federal government and will pass a constitutional challenge if contested in a court of law. Who among them would even recognize reasonable and logical arguments? Those words appear to be extremely out of place in this bill. It is hard to know if it is even worth wasting breath on an argument on this one.

Here's the whole missive:

Hi everyone! Thanks to all who helped rally for parks at environmental day at the Capitol. We had over 200 people there and hundreds more wrote, called, and emailed their legislators. Bills to address future parks funding issues will be heard in the coming weeks, but in the meantime we need to keep the pressure on to support parks and reinstate dollars for operations. Please continue to contact legislators, write letters-to-the-editor, and tell your friends and neighbors about what is happening to our parks.

This week everyone at the Legislature was feeling really special again as the Governor called

A City Council adoption of the Phase II study of water principles and policies endorsed in the Feb. 4 Weekly Guest Commentary may be in serious trouble.

Scuttlebutt heard around the Tucson Water building recently was that the council is leaning toward "accepting" the report, not "adopting" it.

If true, this could mean a couple of things. First, if a majority of the council has already decided on how it will proceed, the public hearing on the Phase II report scheduled for Feb. 9 will be a sham. Second, the Phase III work that is needed to move the process forward wouldn’t be implemented.

Instead, the whole concept of the process would simply be allowed to die a quiet political death.

Are you ready to do your taxes? Arizona Illustrated, seen every night at 6:30 p.m. on Channel 6, will be having its annual week of tax tips next week. Here are the details:

Arizona Public Media is teaming with The Arizona Society of Certified Public Accountants and the National Bank of Arizona to answer viewers' tax questions free of charge for Arizona Illustrated's annual "Tax Tips Week" beginning Monday, Feb. 8 and running until Thursday, Feb. 11.

During this special week a team of volunteer Arizona CPAs are answering tax questions at the National Bank of Arizona from Arizona Illustrated viewers. The hotline number is 520-584-6220 and is available from 6:30 to 7:30 p.m., Monday through Thursday. Viewers are also invited to post their questions for the CPAs on the Arizona Public Media Facebook page at www.Facebook.com/azpublicmedia

Arizona Illustrated Tax Tips Week also features

"Flirt," by Catherine Eyde, is among the works in Sweet Love, which continues through Wednesday, March 10, at Hotel Congress, 311 E. Congress St. Come to the artist's reception, featuring a performance by local cowpunk Al Perry, from 6 to 8 p.m. tonight.

State lawmakers have finally agreed to ask voters to hike the sales tax by one cent per dollar.

In general, we support the idea because the fiscal situation is so very dire. But it's hard to get too enthusiastic about the plan when Republicans in the House have already passed a whole new set of tax cuts that will continue to cripple state revenues once the sales tax money starts coming in. It's an utterly irresponsible act because the tax cuts won't even take affect for a few years, which means the people voting on them could be long gone before they need to deal with the consequences. Why not wait a few years to see if we can actually afford those tax cuts? Because then lawmakers couldn't claim that they cut taxes when they campaign. And these days, campaigning takes precedence over governing.

So now it's up to Democrats and what few responsible Republicans are left to stop the tax cuts in the Senate, because if they don't, Gov. Jan Brewer will surely have to sign the package to survive the GOP primary.

The system is very, very broken.

Dan Shearer of the Green Valley News, with help from a hardworking UA journalism student on assignment at the state Capitol, continues to follow the news that Republican leaders at the Legislature are pimping on behalf of the Rosemont Mine, much to the dismay of state Sen. Jonathan Paton, who is well aware that the mine is unpopular among his Green Valley constituents.

Shearer's latest update:

Arizona Senate and House leaders praised the proposed Rosemont Copper mine as “a tremendous economic opportunity” in a letter to a federal official this week, saying they were writing “on behalf of the Arizona State Senate and House of Representatives.”

But after a day filled with criticism from Southern Arizona lawmakers, they backpedaled, saying the issue was "not as simple as we first thought."

Making it even more politically touchy: Democratic Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, who has been working to thwart the mine, also weighed in on the letter from state lawmakers:

U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, whose Congressional District 8 includes the proposed mine site, criticized the letter in a statement Thursday, saying, “The legislators’ new-found interest in this open-pit mine neglects to address the serious and intractable economic, quality-of-life and environmental problems that would result if it were to go into operation.”

Hey, barkeep! Did you hear that Tucson was declared the ninth-drunkest city in America by Men's Health?

USA Today has the news.

We're still trying to figure out how Boston got ranked the "least drunk."

The Wall Street Journal takes note of J.D. Hayworth's challenge to Sen. John McCain:

It is the kind of intramural dodgeball playing out around the country as establishment-backed Republicans find themselves pelted by anti-big government, anti-spending, anti-tax populists. Among the battlegrounds are Senate primaries in Florida, where conservative darling Marco Rubio, a former state lawmaker, is taking on Gov. Charlie Crist, and in California, where Chuck Devore, a conservative state assemblyman, is challenging the establishment choices, ex-congressman Tom Campbell and former Hewlett-Packard Co. Chief Executive Carly Fiorina.

"Arizona's Republicans deserve a choice and an alternative to Mr. McCain's moderate record on taxes, social issues, the border and bailing out the banks," Mr. Hayworth said in a robo-call his campaign said it would place to tens of thousands of Arizona Republicans.

Arizona political analysts say Mr. Hayworth may be able to capture the energy of the small-government conservatives, as well as anti-immigration voters. They are also the people most likely to show up at a primary held in the heat of the Arizona summer, Mr. Rasmussen said.

"Anybody who doesn't take J.D.'s race against McCain seriously is crazy," said Bruce Merrill, professor emeritus of mass communication at Arizona State University, and a former teacher of Mr. Hayworth. He predicted, though, that Mr. McCain will prevail.

A report from Roll Call:

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) was eager to eulogize ex-Rep. Jim Kolbe (R-Ariz.) — until, that is, he realized Kolbe wasn’t dead.

Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.) proposed a measure Wednesday on the floor to name a post office after the 11-term former Congressman. She waxed so eloquent that Hoyer apparently thought the chamber was paying tribute to a fallen comrade. In somber tones, Hoyer wound up for a heartfelt tribute. “I had not heard of the death of my friend and colleague,” he began.

Almost immediately, someone gave him a sign that Kolbe was still alive. “Oh,” Hoyer said. “You’re naming a post office? I withdraw my remarks.”