♪♪ >> coming up next on arizona horizon: what business leaders hope to see
from the upcoming state legislative session. and we'll hear
about a local company that takes your garbage and turns it into vegetables. those stories next, on arizona horizon. "arizona horizon" is made possible pie by contributions from the friends of arizona pbs.
members of your pbs station. thank you. >> good evening and welcome to arizona horizon, i'm ted simons. this week we're hearing from a variety of leaders
the arizona diamondbacks fired suit over maricopa county saying they are responsible for repairs. the county says the team is responsible for the majority of the stadium's repair and improvement costs. the owner, ken kendricks, said
despite the suit the team is not looking for money and there are no immediate safety concerns for fans. and advocates on their priorities for the upcoming state legislative session which begins“nexâ€
week. we start tonight with the business community, and joining us now is glenn hamer, president and ceo of the arizona chamber of commerce and
industry, todd sanders, president and ceo of the greater phoenix chamber of commerce, farrell quinlan, state director for the ?national
federation of independent business, and lorenzo sierra. vice chair of the arizona hispanic chamber of commerce. thanks for joining us. glenn, starting with you, what are you looking for this year?
>> we have made tremendous progress. it seems every day we have an announcement for a new company moving here or expanding. we have become one of the most competitive states economically. we have done great things with education with three a half
million new money into the k-12 program. the initiative process is a big one and we think in addition to focusing on these areas, we will have to tackle the initiative are reform process. we dodged a bullet on prop 205 thanks to the leadership of the
governor and county attorney, bill montgomery, and sheila pope. we were not so fortunate with prop 206. >> ted: what are you looking for? >> we have made strides and i think the initiative process is
big. we need to stop creating ideas out of state and we need to push the needle on education. the prop from last year was a hail mary pass. i think we need to start looking at this from the standpoint of a gain of interest.
we are 4th and goal on a lot of areas. workforce is a big area. the chambers economic team talked to over 900 businesses. so that we think is a real win that is out there for the arizona business community. >> ted: from the small business
perspective, what are you looking for? >> we are trying to keep things from getting out of hand. you have obamacare hopefully going away and what will that look like afterwards? a lot of other things from the federal rules with the overtime
rules and other human resources type issues that pressure is coming off. then you have on the other hand prop 206 passes and you have the paid time off part of it. how a business actually manages that and is something our members are very concerned
about. then you have certain lawsuit issues concerning the americans with disabilities act we will be working on. what are you hearing? >> education is the big thing. we are looking at a minority, majority k-12 program and why
looking at being the majority. we want to make sure the funding and resources are there so we have the quality workforce we need to continue to drive the businesses coming here. we had a great year in 2016 with people moving headquarters internationally and nationally
over here. if we look at the hispanic entrepreneurship that will be a key to prosperity. >> ted: we know you are against the minimum wage increase, glenn. what is wrong with the initiative process?
i can hear people saying, of course, you don't like the initiative process. something happened that you were not happy with. talk to us about this. >> it a lot more than that. you have these out of state interest that came in and dumped
over four million on prop 206. we believe it strongly violates a state constitutional requirement that voters passed 1 years ago that requires a revenue source to attest to any initiative. what we want to do is we certainly have a great amount of
respect we have a state with referendum. we want to make sure they are abiding by all the laws. >> ted: 68% of arizona voters approved something you describe as crazy. are 68% of arizona voters wrong? >> in terms of the minimum wage
initiative, and you can argue, i think glenn is right. look at the surplus, 26 million. most, if not all, are eaten up by the cost born by the state because of this initiative that should have impacted revenue. i don't know this is necessarily looking at the voters and saying
you made a mistake but it is certainly looking at the process and making sure we do know where the markers are on the road and that people are following the rules appropriately. >> ted: is the state required to pay the extra funds? >> i think they are on the book.
that is the bases of the lawsuit. there is an impact of the general found and as mentioned that is a violation of the constitution. >> ted: are they required, glenn? >> they are going to be required
to pay these additional funds so we could meet our requirements under state and federal law for our most vulnerable arizona residents. proposition 206 was advertised in arizona it will be great and more money for workers. it wasn't disclosed this would
ruin and take away the entire state surplus. it wasn't advertised as something that would literally force some small businesses to close and the jobs going with that. >> it is hijacking the process. >> ted: it wasn't countered as
that either. we had debates on this program and that wasn't brought up once. why didn't we hear this during the campaign? >> it was part of the nuances. there was so much in this we had to wade through and you will not catch it all every time.
going back to the rules addressing the initiatives, that is something they should have known and paid attention to. >> they had a responsibility. they came into our house and decided they will put this amount of money and have this type of experiment.
we did wage a case against it. we didn't have four plus million. the unions made a decision they had the white house and the united states senate in the back. they missed badly and i hope they enjoy the conformation
hearings in the next several weeks. >> ted: the idea of an increase in the minimum wage. it puts more money into people's pockets and they can spend more on the things small businesses make. talk to me about that.
>> one of the things we have heard a lot about is the fake news. this living wave fiction as if people are living on the minimum wage. it is not a working wage. you have people who are going to be kicked out of their jobs, you
will have people who no longer have jobs. are they going to be able to point directly to minimum wage why they don't have the job anymore? probably not. the person does get a little extra money in the paycheck says
hey, great. that is the whole problem. whole sectors of the economy don't exist. when was the last time you saw a bus boy at a restaurant? they don't exist. you will see more automation and people who never get that first
job. my members, small businesses, have them take a chance on them when they don't have work experience or anything like that that would say yes, this is a good employee. how are people going to get that first job if they are priced out
of the market. >> ted: may not have been meant to be a living wage but in certain economic situations it a living wage for some. again, is this going to be a bad thing for arizona businesses? >> at the hispanic chamber of commerce we didn't take an
initial stance on this. our approach is wait and see. we know people in the hispanic community are lower-wage earners and we would like to see what is going to happen when those people have a little extra money to put into the economy and let's see what happens once it
starts rolling in. i think a lot of what is happening nationally and locally is a lot of wait and see. a lot of us are on edge from a business community standpoint and other communities waiting to see what happens over the year. >> instead of boxing people in
the minimum wage, in arizona, there are 8500 cybersecurity jobs we cannot fill and they pay an average of $48,000. imagine that $26 million going into the job training. think about the difference that would make in the lives of people.
that is a living wage, $48,000. maybe looking at this differently with the idea to empower people with knowledge and skills they can develop so we don't have 8500 open cybersecurity jobs in arizona. >> ted: there are those that say with the corporate tax cuts
close to $8 million over the next three years on the way. they are saying there you go. you can pay for a little of that through this. >> let's talk about tax policy. >> are you kidding? that would be the craziest thing to do.
you are saying we are waging cost, not just in terms of wages and benefits, and here is a tax increase? no way. that would be terrible economic policy. if anything, we need to look at further things we can do reduce
the tax and regulatory burden on business. thankfully it looks like in washington we are going to have that opportunity to do some huge things on regulatory and tax reform. >> ted: how do you balance collecting revenue for essential
services against ensuring economic vitally? >> we have been doing it in a way that is balanced and phased in. look at the results. we are creating jobs. i want to bounce off something todd said because it is right on
the mark. all of the chambers in the state, we want to see people do well. we want them to earn high wages. i started flipping burgers. i wasn't flipping burgers actually. i was the guy that put the buns
in the machine. that was my first job at my local burger king. i would be priced out of the market. two thirds of people that start at minimum wage are getting a raise. it is an entry level wage to get
into the workforce. >> ted: when you hear about the corporate tax cuts that is great. what about small businesses? >> most of them, 78% of small businesses, pay at the individual rate so that is higher than one of our highest
corporate tax rates in the year; the american tax rate. so those need to come down. i think what we have to start looking at is instead of trying to cut up an shrinking or esstatic pie we need to grow. the budget issues will take care of themselves and instead we
will fight about who is taking the surplus. will it be programs like we did somewhat in the last decade which was to put temporary funds towards ongoing things or do you do it on a way that is more sustainable? that is the kind of discussion
we want to have instead of having this one where we have this austerity mindedness where it is zero sum gain. it doesn't have to be that way and shouldn't be that way. i think the federal situation is proving to the point where all the wet blankets pea be it the
epa or department of labor, you name it, obamacare, hopefully those are lifting and people will peak out and say i can now invest. >> ted: do you see obamacare and the affordable care act as a wet blanket? >> one of things that before
obamacare came, one of the big things that was a big sticking point for our members of the hip chamber, was access to quality healthcare. now that is there, there is going to be a lot of tweaking on obamacare. once it comes down to brass task
and people say are we repealing it. the person who has children on it isn't going to want it repealed. the person with the pre-existing condition isn't wanting the appeal. i don't think we will hit the
gavel on the first day of session and obamacare is gone an hour later. there is going to be a lot more to that. >> ted: in terms of arizona, should the restoration be preserved? >> we believe so.
as far as the affordable care act, it is pretty clear no one is going to come in on day one and eliminate this thing. the idea is there are parts of this that can work. but certainly, i spent seven years at the state legislature, i would have been embarrassed to
have staffed something that was this poorly crafted as this legislation which was an open checkbook and all of these fill-in-the-blank spaces. there are things we can do to make it better but i don't think we need to throw the whole thing out.
>> the law is a disaster. we can use semantics of repeal and replace. i think everybody agrees those most in need, we need to find a way to provide coverage. right before the election, the obamacare markets were surging all over the country with
arizona leading the price increase. i heard from a lot of people that suffered because of that. not just rising premium prices but deductibles and things like this is something the new congress and president have to tackle.
>> ted: you will hear from hospitals if this is repealed and not replaced with something that will ease the burden on uncompensated care. >> the uncompensated care remains a real issue. the key is to craft something to take the place of obamacare.
but the law itself has not worked well as all. >> we have a question to answer and that is do we want to have more government involvement in health care? take us down the road the va if we like that. or do we want to back the
government out, give people some of their own choices. if they want to keep the doctor they had, keep the doctor they had. it comes done to a financing issue when it comes to -- >> ted: uncompensated care? >> no, the pre-existing
conditions. there are many different ways of taking care of that. you can have risk pools or a number of things you can do that don't cost multi trillions that we have already spent on this whole apparatus. >> you know, before obamacare,
health insurance increases were double digit increases year over year. this was sustainable for a long time. now did obamacare stop that? there was some bit they were showing momentum toward that. now, we are going to get back to
the point where we are businesses are going what are we going to do? we have 15-20 percent increases again and we will be back in the same spot. >> okay. we have to stop it right there. great discussion.
thank you for joining us. >> composting is the original form of recycling. and though it's been around for thousands of years, composting is making a comeback. producer allysa
adams and photographer robmcjannet introduce us to recycle city, a phoenix-based company that's determined to get us all composting, one potato peel at a time.
>> every morning, as the sun comes up, the owners and operators of recycled city set out to change some minds. one bin of food waste at a time. >> this is the biggest impact any individual can make; by changing how they consume resources.
>> reporter: when hill starteded the company a few years ago this goal was simple but lofty. >> i wanted to make an impact on my own ecological impact and agriculture is the best way. >> reporter: he fifrg -- recycled city works like a
municipal trash company. you get a bucket, fill it up with food waste and it gets picked up every week right from the curb. but that waste doesn't go to a landfill. >> we compost it and mix it up with wood chips we get from
local landscapers and over the course of 6-9 months of turning and watering that raw material of wood chip and food waste turns into compost. >> reporter: now, composting can seem a little messy to some people but hill says they took care of the two biggest
problems. there is the critters like that rotting food. >> fruit flies can start to populate when air and oxygen flow into the bin. when the bin is sealed there is zero chance for fruit flies to exist.
there is only one trick to the system and that is keeping the lid sealed. >> reporter: then there is the smell. each of their 750 residential customers gets a bag of grain with the bin that helps absorb the smell and breakdown the
waste. recycled city makes theirs from spent brewers grain they get for free from local breweries. residential composting is just part of recycled cities game plan. their biggest clients are commercial.
restaurants like the pomegranate cafe produce a lot of waste. when they heard about this, it fit their ethos. >> we wanted to change our corner and make it good here. we are always looking for ways to be more environmentally friendly.
>> they don't get compost back. we are providing them a service and they save money on trash and recycling bills when they utilize us correctly. >> reporter: they have to make it cost effective and easy for commercial businesses to compost or they will not buy in.
>> we have a reminder on every trash can we compost and so many things can be composted. we put a bin on every trash can and they scrape the waste, and paper towels and straws even. that reminder there didn't take much. >> from here to the end.
>> reporter: the commercial waste doesn't go to other urban farms or gardens. it comes here to recycled cities farm. they grow specific crops for local restaurants made from their own scraps. pomegranate gets sunflower
sprouts. >> the quality of the sunflower sprouts is a big reason why we use them. they are super fresh, never going bad, they are super juicy and green and exactly how they should look. >> it is part of the vision that
keeps jb getting up early every day and picking up a pitch fork. >> my vision is to be a large agricultural company full circle where we take food and landscape waste out of the waste stream and turn it into an organic, high quality compost used specifically for farming.
>> reporter: and every time you clean off your plate or sip your coffee hill wants you to pause and think about something: >> where does your food come from? how is it grown? where is it going when you don't eat it?
or the tops of the tomatoes going? lettuce, tomatoes. >> reporter: and rise again and again. >> oranges, pumpkins, leeks. >> residential customers can get free compost for
their own gardens, or they can pay extra for a weekly delivery of vegetables from recycled city's farm. that is it for now.
obamacare and the affordable care act,i am ted simons. you have a good evening.
possible by contributions from the friends of arizona pbs.
