Globe Mayor’s Report: February 2025

THANK YOU KIKO RADIO: I want to express my sincere appreciation for the dedicated service that KIKO Radio provided to our community for 66 years. While I am saddened to see them close, I understand the reasons and challenges behind the decision. KIKO Radio began its journey in 1958 with the vision of Willard Shoecraft. The Shoecraft family maintained KIKO Radio until 2008, when the new ownership was announced under the current owner, John Low. 

I truly want to acknowledge the positive impact that KIKO Radio had in our Globe-Miami community. Thank you, JB, for the weekly morning show and for the opportunity to share our information about our city on Open Line. Thank you, Liz Mata, for keeping us up to date on the most current news. Many of us enjoyed the Saturday show and music with the late Willie Powers and hearing where all the yard sales were. And most of all, thank you Lucy Rodriguez for all your dedicated years of service keeping the radio station going. All of you will be missed as part of our everyday routine. 

BUSINESS LICENSE APPLICATIONS: The city has updated their Business License application to a new form in 2025. The new form will help streamline the process with a more professional format and a new program for better record keeping. All businesses within the city limits of Globe are required to have an annual business license to operate legally ensuring compliance with state tax reporting and local laws. There were some concerns and comments about the information being asked to submit. If you look at the old and the new application, nothing has really changed about the information, just a little more professional format. One big concern was having to submit a copy of your driver’s license for proof of identity. Those concerns were heard and the change was made to not keep a hard copy of the driver’s license. If you are applying in person, you will still have to present a driver’s license for identity and license number. If you are applying online, you will have to submit a copy of your license, and once verified, the copy will be destroyed.

FEE SCHEDULE UPDATE: At the January 28 meeting, council had a detailed discussion on the process to review and update the city’s fee schedule. Staff has been researching and working on the long list of the various city fees for service over the past year. These updated fee recommendations will now be presented to the various council work groups for review prior to moving forward to the next step for advertisement and public hearings on the changes. The goal of these updates is for the purpose of cost recovery. 

VISION ZERO PROJECT: At the January 28 meeting, an updated presentation on the Vision Zero project was heard. This project is a component of the Safe Streets 18-month demonstration grant that was awarded to the City of Globe by the Arizona Department of Transportation in the amount of $154,846. Vision Zero is a National Safety Program with a goal to eliminate traffic deaths and life changing injuries by 2040. Vision Zero components focus on reducing automobile speed in the project area with priority areas being intersections, corridors, and crosswalks. The City of Globe project will concentrate on our historic downtown corridor on Broad Street. 

There are many components to the project as we move forward. These include hiring an independent third party to conduct a townhall meeting to create focus groups to get input and ideas from the community. This third party will follow this project for the 18-month period to collect data that will be used to submit for a future grant for the implementation phase that will expand to other streets in our city. 

HILL STREET SCHOOL APARTMENTS AVAILABILITY: The recent report provided to the city by the property manager of the Hill Street Apartments shows that there are 20 units out of 64 still available. They consist of 4-studios, 15-one bedrooms, and 1-three bedroom. These units are all based on income. For more information, contact Debra Espinoza at 928-255-5605.

MICHAELSON BUILDING PROJECT GRANT: Bryan Seppala from Resolution Copper presented the City of Globe with a grant award check in the amount of $150,000 in support of the Michaelson Building project that will foster partnership entrepreneurship and growth in our community. 

FOOD INSECURITIES INITIATIVE PROGRAM GRANT: At the January 28 meeting, Robin Bradford, Huddleston, from Freeport McMoRan presented the City of Globe a grant award in the amount of $28,000 for the Food Insecurities Initiative Program that will be provided by the Globe Library. This program will provide education for the healthy eating and cooking initiative. More information on this program timelines and schedule will be advertised in the future. 

12-INCH WATER LINE REPLACEMENT TO FAIRGROUNDS: At the January 28 meeting, council approved an increase to the city’s procurement authorization to $2 million for Job Order Contracting Construction Services in accordance to A.R.S.Title 34. This approval allows the city to move forward to sign a contract with Apache Underground for the replacement of 1.5 miles of 12-inch water line with Ductile Iron Pipe water line to the Fairgrounds in the amount of $1,471,058. The city was awarded $2.1 million from the United States Army Corps of Engineers 595 Grant Program with a city match of $700,000 for a total amount of $2.8 million. The excess of the grant will used to cover the cost of an environmental assessment of the work areas and for the rehabilitation of Well #4. 

COFFEE WITH THE MAYOR: I want to thank those who attended my first “Coffee With The Mayor” event on January 15. There were lots of questions asked about what is happening in our city that I was able to update them on. These meetings give you the resident the opportunity to get the most recent information for the purpose of transparency. This event will continue every third Wednesday of the month. Thank you to Copper Cities Coffee for hosting this event. The next meeting will be on February 19, at 1 pm at the same location, Copper Cities Coffee, 1100 N. Broad Street, Suite F.