Data centers are coming to Pima County, whether residents like it or not.
The Pima County Board of Supervisors has approved a new data center despite major community opposition and no end user formally lined up.
Amazon was outed earlier this summer as the longtime, unofficial end user lined up for the 290-acre data center, Project Blue, but the e-commerce giant reportedly backed out around the beginning of this month after the developer, Beale Infrastructure, nixed water cooling in favor of the more electricity-dependent air cooling process.
Amazon’s departure was uncovered during the Arizona Corporation Commission (ACC) hearing earlier this month by sources first reported on by the Arizona Daily Star. ACC approved, 4-1, a decade-long Energy Supply Agreement between Tucson Electric Power (TEP) and the developer to power Project Blue.
Beale Infrastructure made the cooling process switch after the Tucson City Council voted unanimously to deny access to their reclaimed water system back in August. Tucson Mayor Regina Romero also pledged to place limits on future data centers.
The days leading up to the council vote were filled with contentious community information meetings on the project.
Per 13 News, multiple unnamed sources told Pima County Supervisor and Tucson City Councilman Paul Cunningham that up to eight other companies expressed interest in taking Amazon’s place. Sources conflicted on whether one of the companies is Meta, or whether Meta had already backed out as Amazon had.
Project Blue’s developer, Beale Infrastructure, presented the proposed data center as both an economic driver and environmentally friendly operator: “no risks or financial burdens [will be] passed on to other customers,” their representatives promised in their presentations during the community information meetings.
Opponents argue these data centers will further strain an already stressed water supply and electric grid, ultimately leading to scarcity as well as higher fiscal and health costs for the consumer.
It was the promised economic benefits that won over the 3-2 majority of Pima County supervisors. The two supervisors against the data center, Andres Cano and Jen Allen, expressed concerns over the long-term unknown impacts on the environment and community health.
Pima County’s vote came several weeks after ACC approved Beale Infrastructure’s application for Project Blue.
Data centers are the powerhouse for platforms covering virtually every aspect of modern life online: government, streaming, remote work, cloud storage, e-commerce, education, finance, and healthcare.
An independent Economic Impact Study on Project Blue projects a $3.6 billion total capital investment, $250 million in tax revenues, 180 new jobs by 2029, and over 3,000 direct construction jobs during the building phase.
The project will be located north of Pima County Fairgrounds, at the I-10 and Houghton interchange. The development site is over a mile away from the nearest resident, located within an unincorporated area that’s part of the Southeast Employment & Logistics Center.
Beale Infrastructure is also moving on another, equally controversial data center development in Marana totaling 600 acres. Two rezoning applications were filed recently for potential data center development: Luckett North and Luckett South. Earlier this month, the town’s planning commission recommended rezoning for development.
As with Project Blue, the closest resident lives about a mile away from the proposed data center campus. It will also be an air-cooled facility.
In preparation for consideration of the data center, town officials produced two podcast episodes on the town’s data center ordinance and potential for development.
Marana Town Council is scheduled to consider the data center project on Jan. 6, 2026. Progress on the project is available for viewing on the town’s development projects and activity portal.
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The company behind the mass surveillance cameras used throughout Arizona was compromised.
The impacted cameras were operated by Flock Safety, an Atlanta, Georgia-based company, as revealed by 404 Media. Their investigative reporting discovered over 70 cameras across the nation, at least, were accessible to the public for viewing and, allegedly, even certain modifications.
404 Media disclosed that they were not able to geolocate every camera they discovered that was left unprotected.
Flock Safety offers cameras with different surveillance capabilities. Their standard cameras provide license plate recognition technology only, but certain lines of their cameras also provide facial recognition technology. Both camera types feed their recorded material into an AI-powered system with a searchable database archived for 30 days at least.
Ethical hackers that partnered with 404 Media reported that a majority of the compromised cameras were equipped with facial recognition technology. These cameras also have the ability to zoom in on faces as well as items surrounding a person, like cell phones.
Following reports on the compromised cameras, Flock Safety issued a statement dismissing concerns about public access and control over the camera feeds.
“This interface does not allow camera control, cloud access, customer account access, or use of search or analytics features. The only content visible was live or recorded video comparable to what can be observed from a public roadway,” said Flock Safety. “No sensitive or confidential information was accessed or accessible. While recent third-party coverage characterized the issue as more extensive, this was an isolated configuration issue and not indicative of a broader or ongoing concern.”
Flock Safety’s characterization of the breach conflicted with what 404 Media’s team found in their investigation. 404 Media claimed their team was able to use Flock Safety feeds to identify and pull personally identifying information on individuals featured on camera.
Flock Safety founder and CEO Garrett Langley told CNN earlier this month that the answer to rising crime and insecurity over public safety was through mass surveillance.
“I think we run a risk today as a country that a generation of people will not believe America works for them because they don’t feel safe, because in some communities you don’t feel safe,” said Langley.
I'm incredibly proud that Flock Safety played a key role in working with first responders to find the suspect in the Brown and MIT murders.
America cannot tolerate tragedies like what we saw at Brown and MIT this past week. The single best way to curb crime is to make sure…
Top funders behind Flock Safety over the years have included Andreessen Horowitz, Founders Fund (founded by Peter Thiel), Matrix (formerly Matrix Partners, founded by Paul Ferri), Bedrock (founded by Geoff Lewis), and Initialized Capital (founded by Garry Tan and Alexis Ohanian).
Around 30 municipalities in Arizona, at least, have Flock’s license plate recognition cameras per the Electronic Freedom Foundation’s Atlas of Surveillance database: Apache Junction, Benson, Buckeye, Casa Grande, Coconino County, El Mirage, Eloy, Cottonwood, Gilbert, Goodyear, La Paz County, Litchfield Park, Mohave County, Maricopa County, Oro Valley, Parker, Payson, Peoria, Prescott, Queen Creek, Graham, San Luis, Scottsdale, Somerton, St. Johns, Tolleson, Tucson, Winslow, and Youngtown.
That’s not including the local communities that voluntarily install Flock cameras.
Deflock, a website dedicated to mapping Flock camera locations, lists nearly 1,400 Flock cameras across the state. A majority of the cameras are concentrated around Phoenix, Chandler, and Tucson.
Flagstaff and Sedona did have Flock cameras — around 30 of them. However, mounting privacy concerns from the public pushed both city councils to cancel their contracts this year. In Sedona’s case, the police department contracted with Flock Safety without notifying the city council.
All three public universities have Flock cameras as well.
About 10 other municipalities in the state, at least, have automatic license plate readers from different vendors.
Over 5,000 communities spanning over 4,500 law enforcement agencies across 49 states use Flock cameras.
Flock cameras played a pivotal role in the recent discovery of the Brown University shooter’s identity following a public tip.
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Arizona’s legislative leaders issued a statement of support for a federal action establishing a new level of parental rights to access their children’s medical records.
The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) announced earlier this month further protections for parental rights in healthcare. HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., cited an incident in which a Midwestern school allegedly ignored a religious exemption and vaccinated a child without parental consent.
That school remains under investigation by the HHS Office for Civil Rights (OCR) for potential violation of the Vaccines for Children Program (VFC), which requires providers of vaccines received federally to comply with state laws on religious and other exemptions.
In addition to Kennedy’s announcement, the Health Resources and Service Administration (HRSA) issued an advisement to its health center grant recipients of their required compliance with federal and state laws on parental rights. OCR also issued a letter to healthcare providers advising of their duty to provide parental access to children’s medical records.
“If a provider is standing between you and your child, HHS is going to step in,” said Kennedy in an announcement video.
House Majority Whip Julie Willoughby (R-LD13) published a statement expressing gratitude for the HHS action to assist parents in Arizona and nationwide.
“Arizona parents know this problem because they’ve lived it. Families have been locked out of online medical portals and forced to fight for access to records needed to schedule appointments, refill prescriptions, and communicate with doctors,” said Willoughby. “Parents should not need a lawyer or a lawsuit to see their child’s medical records. This problem was identified years ago. It’s time for the state to stand with parents.”
Republican lawmakers attempted to offer a similar remedy last year (House Bill 2183) and this year (House Bill 2126), but Governor Katie Hobbs vetoed both.
Both bills would have required health care entities to provide parents with access to any electronic portal and delivery platform of their child’s medical records, even in cases where the medical treatment given didn’t require parental consent.
Hobbs cited health, safety, and privacy rights as reasons for vetoing the bills.
“The measure as written could put the health and safety of vulnerable Arizonans at risk,” said Hobbs in her House Bill 2183 denial letter.
“Patient privacy is a longstanding tenet of American healthcare and this bill would create legal ambiguity for healthcare providers who have existing obligations to patient privacy,” said Hobbs in her House Bill 2126 denial letter.
The only community member to speak on the latest vetoed bill during its House committee hearing was a representative of the ACLU of Arizona and Planned Parenthood Advocates of Arizona, Marilyn Rodriguez with Creosote Partners.
The two activist organizations argued the existence of a distinct class of children — “mature minors” — which should be exempt from parental oversight in their medical care. Rodriguez claimed the bill would be “impacting mature minors’ confidentiality when accessing critical care.”
There is no statutory language that distinguishes “mature minors.” Rodriguez further argued that medical providers should decide whether a minor qualifies as a “mature minor,” not the legislature.
On behalf of Planned Parenthood Advocates of Arizona specifically, Rodriguez argued that minors should have the ability to access abortions without their parents knowing or consenting.
Again, during the Senate committee hearing on the bill, only a representative of Planned Parenthood was present to speak against the bill. Aven Kelley, a policy analyst with Planned Parenthood Advocates of Arizona, argued that minors should have autonomy and privacy when it comes to obtaining abortions.
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The federal government will no longer subsidize transgender procedures for either adults or children.
On Thursday, Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. issued a declaration prohibiting gender transition procedures as valid treatments for addressing gender dysphoria.
“Sex-rejecting procedures for children and adolescents are neither safe nor effective as a treatment modality for gender dysphoria, gender incongruence, or other related disorders in minors, and therefore, fail to meet professional recognized standards of health care. For the purposes of this declaration, ‘sex-rejecting procedures’ means pharmaceutical or surgical interventions, including puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and surgeries such as mastectomies, vaginoplasties, and other procedures, that attempt to align an individual’s physical appearance or body with an asserted identity that differs from the individual’s sex.”
The declaration cited the HHS evidence review on pediatric gender dysphoria care published in May as justification for the cessation of funds. As part of this evidence review, HHS invited peer reviews from other major medical associations. Among those invited, the American Academy of Pediatrics and Endocrine Society declined to participate. However, the American Psychiatric Association and eight other peer reviewers submitted their own reviews, which HHS published along with their own responses last month.
Further justification for the declaration came from evidence reviews and consensus by other European nations: the United Kingdom, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Norway, Italy, Brazil, and Australia.
Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) will also be proposing new rules barring hospitals which participate in Medicare and Medicaid from performing gender transition procedures, and prohibiting Medicaid from paying for those procedures.
The FDA issued warnings to around a dozen manufacturers of breast binders to cease marketing to children for gender dysphoria. Noncompliance would result in enforcement actions, including product seizures.
HHS will also be reversing the Biden administration’s efforts to make gender dysphoria a protected class within the federal definition of “disability.”
In a press conference on the declaration, Kennedy said medical professionals supportive of transgenderism had “betrayed” their oath and “moral obligation” to do no harm.
“This is not medicine, it is malpractice. We’re done with junk science driven by ideological pursuits, not the well-being of children,” said Kennedy. “Sex-rejecting procedures rob children of their futures.”
One report cited by HHS estimated that 2023 revenue for gender-transitioning drugs and surgeries exceeded $4.4 billion, a figure which is on track to exceed $7 billion by 2030.
CMS Administrator Mehmet Oz said children were sold a “dishonest narrative” about gender transitions as healthcare.
“You know what you get when you mix politics and medicine? Politics. There is no medicine left,” said Oz.
53 percent of children are in Medicaid or CHIP programs.
Oz offered a non-comprehensive list of recurring health problems within gender transition patients: puberty blockers associated with reduced bone density, altered brain development, lifelong disrupted sexual dysfunction; cross-sex hormones associated with infertility, loss of sexual function, cardiovascular issues, and long-term endocrine problems; and gender transition surgeries associated with disfiguration, pain, and mental health troubles.
Oz pointed out the high costs of the gender transition surgeries, offering examples of a vaginoplasty ($60,000) and phalloplasty ($150,000).
HHS estimates these bans will result in $250 million in savings for the taxpayer.
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The federal government has watched over the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office (MCSO) for well over a decade.
The Maricopa County Board of Supervisors says it’s no longer warranted.
The board filed a motion with the U.S. District Court for the District of Arizona to cease federal oversight of MCSO.
Chairman Thomas Galvin explained in a video announcing the court filing that the MCSO has not had an issue with racial profiling for years — the allegation at the heart of Melendres v. Arpaio which resulted in a federal court ruling against MCSO.
“After 14 years, four sheriffs, and hundreds of millions of spent tax dollars, it is essential to defend taxpayer money if federal oversight is no longer warranted,” said Galvin.
The county has spent over $300 million to comply with federal court orders; over $30 million in fees on a court-appointed monitor. That means every year, the county has spent around $25 million for federal oversight.
The Melendres case was a class action complaint alleging racially motivated detentions under former MCSO Sheriff Joe Arpaio. Under Arpaio, law enforcement would conduct sweeps targeting individuals suspected of being illegal immigrants, often in areas where day laborers abounded. The lead plaintiff in the class action complaint, Ortega Melendres, was detained despite having lawful presence. Other plaintiffs alleged they were stopped and questioned by law enforcement because they were Latino.
Galvin said the MCSO is “100 percent in compliance” with court-ordered policy changes, and has no evidence of ongoing civil rights violations.
The motion cited results from multiple periodic reviews, such as the Traffic Study Annual Reports from the last two years which found “no statistically significant differences between white drivers and [Hispanic drivers].”
The motion argued that MCSO hasn’t been able to devote full energy to public safety and “countless” other priorities due to the significant diversion of resources required to fund federal oversight.
“MCSO’s current practices do not violate federal law. But continued federal oversight diverts resources that could be used to serve the people of Maricopa County,” stated the motion. “It also upsets the democratic process and America’s federalist structure by making local officials accountable to a federal court — based on the conduct of a former Sheriff who has been out of office for eight years.”
Chairman Galvin characterized the county’s petition as a defense of federalism by restoring the power of accountability to voters.
“All that’s left to enforce are matters unrelated to discriminatory policing which should be left to the sheriff who was elected by you: the Maricopa County residents,” said Galvin. “In our federalist system, elected officials are accountable to voters.”
In a separate statement, Galvin said the MCSO was a “completely different agency” than when the Melendres ruling was handed down nearly 15 years ago.
“The voters held the responsible parties accountable and voted them out. Since then, MCSO disbanded immigration-related units, implemented new policies and anti-bias trainings, and is a law enforcement agency we can be proud of. Further federal oversight is unnecessary and only serves to divert taxpayer dollars away from true public safety needs,” said Galvin.
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