BUSINESS

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Mesa business helps folks climb to new heights

BY MELODY BIRKETT

Tribune Contributor

Arock climber for 28 years, Joe Czerwinski turned his passion into a business. He opened Focus Climbing Center near Dobson and Broadway roads, Mesa, in 2013 – years after a friend had told him about a rockclimbing facility in Tempe.

“I got into climbing in general by hiking Camelback Mountain every week with a friend,” explained Czerwinski. “My friend asked, ‘I wonder if there’s a company that takes you outside and does this?’ I said, ‘I don’t think that sounds very safe.’ That’s how I left it.”

The following week, Czerwinski’s friend told him about an indoor rock-climbing facility in Tempe.

“‘It’s totally safe. It’s a great place to meet girls,’” Czerwinski recalled. “I said, ‘Let’s go.’ Oddly enough, I ended up meeting my future girlfriend and wife at that facility.”

Czerwinski and his wife have been married for almost 21 years.

Making a business out of his hobby seemed only logical.

“Climbing is an instinctual sport,” Czerwinski said. “Every person has tried to climb. We’ve all have climbed out of our cribs, up the counters towards the cookie jar, on the couch.”

At Focus Climbing, he said, “We offer a variety of accommodating angles, all types for kids, adults, all shapes and sizes. The youngest one who has scaled the full height walls in our gym at 28 feet was 18 months old.”

“What sets us apart is we don’t have any top ropes,” said Czerwinski. “When I was growing up as a climber, a lot of these other gyms I went to in Phoenix had a lot of top ropes with their main style of climbing of vertical walls at full height.

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Joe Czerwinski has been climbing for nearly three decades and decided to turn his passion into a Mesa business in 2013. (Special to the Tribune)

EVP hosting gubernatorial hopefuls this month

TRIBUNE NEWS STAFF

The East Valley’s leading organization of businesses and community leaders is hosting a roundtable discussion by Democratic and Republican candidates for governor.

Candidates will share their views on building on the momentum of the state’s robust economy at a Sept. 30 luncheon hosted by the PHX East Valley Partnership.

Among the participants will be Republicans Steve Gaynor, Kari Lake, Karrin Taylor Robson, Matt Salmon and Kimberly Yee, along with Democrats Katie Hobbs, Aaron Lieberman and Marco Lopez.

Topics of discussion will include continued jobs growth, bolstering small businesses and creating a fertile environment for entrepreneurs, along with expanding the talent pipeline and balancing development with quality of life.

“The event will not be a debate but rather a moderated discussion focused exclusively on the jobs economy,” said Denny Barney, EVP president and CEO. “After all, jobs will remain a key issue regardless of who occupies the governor’s of�ice.”

The event will be held 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. at the Doubletree by Hilton in Gilbert and online. Stacy Derstine, vice president of external affairs at APS, will serve as the program’s moderator.

“We look forward to an illuminating discussion that will help inform public opinion of our state’s next top leader,” Derstine said. APS, Okland Construction and Times Media Group are the event sponsors. The cost to attend is $800 for a table of eight and $125 for single tickets.

For more information and to register, contact Jessica Hubbard at 480-5320641 or jhubbard@phxeastvalley.com.

EVP was established in 1982 as a nonpro�it, nonpartisan coalition of civic, business, education and political leaders dedicated to the economic development and promotion of the East Valley of Greater Phoenix. The Partnership advocates for economic development, education, transportation and infrastructure, health care and other critical areas.

Information: phxeastvalley.com. ■

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JUST A CLICK AWAY

Adam Lowe, MD, FACG Rajan Khosla, MD

We are pleased to announce the opening of SONORAN GASTROENTEROLOGY ASSOCIATES

Dr. Adam Lowe and Dr. Rajan Khosla welcome all patients to their new practice.

• Board Certified Gastroenterologists • Specializing in all gastrointestinal, liver biliary tract, pancreas diseases and related malignancies • Offering colon cancer screening and open access colonoscopy • In-Office and telemedicine appointments available as well as online scheduling and online referrals. • Same day urgent appointments available • Serving the East Valley and Phoenix communities for over 15 years

Chandler Office

3930 South Alma School Road Suite 5, Chandler, Arizona, 85248

Sonoran Gastroenterology Associates is a division of AGA

Phone: (480) 542-7000

Fax: (480) 542-7500 www.sonorangastro.com

“I would always run into people who weren’t climbing or didn’t come in for a couple of weeks because their partner was on a work trip or was sick.”

Instead, the gym offers full-height climbing with auto blades which allow people to climb by themselves.

“Auto blades is a device that allows you to climb a full height wall without a partner,” Czerwinski said. “There’s some fancy technology in this device that sits at the top of the wall and if you happen to fall or slip off the wall, it’ll lower you down to the ground at the same rate as if you’re walking across the ground at a regular pace.

“It’s a very comfortable control of descent as you get down to the ground. Then you start all over again.”

Each auto blade gives climbers access to about eight routes for a total of 64. The 6,500-square-foot gym also has a bouldering area with 3,000 square feet of seamless landing area.

Bouldering has become increasingly popular over the past 10 years, Czerwinski said.

“Saying I’m a climber is as general as saying I’m a car racer. With climbing you can be a big wall climber, you can be an Alpinist climber, you can be a sport climber, tread climber, boulder climber or someone who just goes to the gym. All of those give you a different experience.”

Czerwinski said indoor rock climbing has both similarities to and major differences from outdoor climbing.

“You’re moving the same way but outside, things might be a little sharper or a little tougher to reach for shorter people and crunchy for taller people. It just depends. I could ride my exercise bike for 12 miles in my house and peddle it but it’s different when I get on the street even though I’m still riding my bike.”

Indoors, climbers have handles to grab.

“Most of the people coming in here do some form of bouldering or sport climbing,” said Czerwinski. “Those are the two most popular and easiest.” For �irst-time climbers, Czerwinski recommends starting indoors. “It’s de�initely much more useful. You end up having a much more positive user experience when you go outside. When you’re inside, you know what to expect a little bit more.

“If you frequent an indoor climbing gym for at least a couple of months, you’re going to build up a little more muscular endurance, you’re going to be more con�ident, you’re going to know what to expect a little bit more than, ‘I’ve never climbed before. Let’s go outside.’”

While it’s not necessary to be physically

Bouldering is an increasingly popular activity for climbers and Focus Climbing Center in Mesa is equipped to cater to this trend. (Special to

the Tribune)

�it, it’s helpful. Nor is climbing just for young. Czerwinski said he many climbers older than 55 and one who is in his early 70s. We o er a variety of accommodating angles, “As you get older as a climber, your body doesn’t bounce all types for kids, adults, back,” Czerwinski all shapes and sizes. The explained. “The imyoungest one who has scaled the full height walls in our gym pact of bouldering can be pretty hard on your body. The at 28 feet was 18 months old. pad system we have - Joe Czerwinski here is very unique. In our orientation, we show everyone how to fall in the bouldering area. It really limits the amount of impact on the body.” Most climbers at Focus purchase a day pass for $20 and usually spend up to 2 1/2 hours. Discounts are given to colHAVE BUSINESS NEWS? lege students, frontline medical workers and teachers. Czerwinski said climbers have the opSEND YOUR BUSINESS NEWS TO PMARYNIAK@ TIMESPUBLICATIONS.COM tion of leaving and returning on the same day. Some like to leave for lunch and come back. Rental gear such as shoes and a harness is also available. Both are needed for the bouldering area and auto blades.

“One of the other big things we do here is make sure we have enough A/C power on the roof,” explained Czerwinski. “Many of the other competitors in the Valley don’t run their A/C very well or they don’t even have air conditioning. That is a dealbreaker in the summer.”

The gym also offers parties for kids and summer camps with the emphasis being on climbing, not babysitting. The gym is open every day from 10 am10 pm on weekdays and 10 am-7 pm on weekends. Right now, due to the pandemic, there’s a limited capacity of 50 with masks required.

Information: focusclimbingcenter.

com ■

Focus Climbing Center

Hours of Operation Mon - Fri: 10am - 10pm Sat - Sun: 10am - 7pm

2150 W Broadway Rd #103 Mesa, AZ, 85202 (map)

THE MESA TRIBUNE | SEPTEMBER 12, 2021

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20 years later, th e �ight for our freedom continues

BY DAVID LEIBOWITZ Tribune Columnist

The �irst plane, American Airlines Flight 11, hit the North Tower at 5:46 a.m. our time. I was at my desk, sifting through topics for a radio talk show that would never air. Seventeen minutes later, United Airlines Flight 175 cored the South Tower. By 7:30, the World Trade Center was a pile of rubble, twisted steel and lost humanity. On the radio and in public conversations, there would be no other topic for months. Somehow, 20 years have passed since September 11, 2001. This anniversary was a day for remembrance and a day to inventory all we have lost. It was also a day that begs a question: If Al Qaeda delivered this evil in an attempt to defeat a mortal enemy, to claim victory over us, did they in fact win? As a boy in New York, those twin towers were perpetually present, forever jutting 1,300 feet into the sky. As a young man, I rode the elevator to the 106th �loor for dinner at Windows on the World. I was wearing a borrowed sport coat too short in the sleeves, but still I felt like a million bucks eating off the white linen tablecloths. Human beings have a limited capacity to pay attention: We catalogue things in the background of our consciousness, taking them for granted until they’re uprooted from their customary place. It’s one way terrorists shake us: They carve out a hunk of the ordinary, stealing something we may not notice every day, but that’s no less a part of us. Striking the Twin Towers was a subtraction like that: If they could knock down skyscrapers before our very eyes, strike at the heart of the world’s �inancial markets, what else could they do? America’s response to the attack revealed the best of us and the worst. Flags �lew everywhere, people stood in line for hours to donate blood. The Phoenix Fire Department sent the best urban search and rescue team in the world to comb the wreckage. Partisan politics gave way to national unity, a heartening respite that felt like it should last forever, but didn’t. As for the worst, four days after the attacks, Frank Roque took his .380 pistol to the Mesa Chevron station owned by Balbir Singh Sodhi, an immigrant from Punjab, India. Roque had been ranting for days that he wanted to “shoot some towel-heads.” Sodhi wore a turban and beard in keeping with his Sikh religion. Roque, primed to shoot anyone whom he adjudged Muslim, killed Sodhi with �ive bullets in the �irst hate crime of the 9/11 era. Roque’s death sentence was later commuted to life. In what I can only brand a shame, Roque is still with us, living out his days at the Lewis prison in Buckeye. His disciplinary record shows 36 violations during his time incarcerated, everything from disorderly conduct to assaulting staffers to manufacturing a weapon. Some people never learn. Maybe we haven’t learned either. The terrorists lured us into a 20-year war that we exited disastrously only weeks ago. American unity has never seemed like more of an oxymoron, the Civil War excepted. We killed Osama Bin Laden, but new enemies of freedom are minted every day in far-off places like Iran, Syria and Afghanistan. The terrorists stole some valuable things from us on 9/11, including almost 3,000 sons and daughters, �ire�ighters and would-be rescuers. Even so, I would estimate we have fought them to a draw in the 20 years since. This remains the most free nation on earth. The �ight to defend those freedoms continues. ■

Correction

A column by David Leibowitz about school boards erroneously stated that at an August meeting of the Scottsdale Uni�ied Governing Board, a mother had falsely accused a district employee of distributing a neo-Nazi comic book on some campuses. The mother did not make such an accusation.

SRP shouldn’t rush billion-dollar decision

BY DIANE BROWN Tribune Guest Writer

Abillion dollars is a lot of money even for Salt River Project. And keep in mind SRP’s money is really our money – money from payments you and I make to SRP on our monthly electric bills. Typically, when a corporation or a utility considers making a million-dollar expense – let alone spending almost a billion dollars – they weigh the upfront and ongoing costs and bene�its, and seek competitive bids. While SRP likely considered various factors related to their proposal to build 16 gas units at a cost of almost $1 billion, the lack of available information and time for stakeholders and customers to provide input is very disconcerting. Here are our top concerns: At the price tag of nearly $1 billion, the cost to build 16 gas plants is exorbitant. Particularly disturbing is the lack of public information that exists about the total projected cost including fuel and maintenance; total estimated groundwater consumption – which could affect availability and increase water costs for farmers, businesses, and consumers; and impact on the monthly electricity bills of SRP customers and over what period of time. The need for more power capacity may be overstated while the options to increase energy ef�iciency, and renewable resources, such as solar, may be understated. Without SRP adequately and publicly providing information, it is hard to know the various factors and scenarios they contemplated and whether their forecasts are realistic. However, due in part to its negative contribution to climate change, we know that new gas builds are becoming obsolete, which means gas plants and units may be left stranded with SRP customers needing to absorb the cost. And we know that SRP did not request competitive proposals from industry that might have led to a more climate-friendly resource at less cost to SRP ratepayers. A rushed decision on an item of this magnitude is likely to result in a �lawed decision. SRP’s 2035 Sustainability Advisory Group consisted of business, academic, governmental, environmental, and consumer leaders and was arguably one of most robust, data-driven, comprehensive stakeholder processes in which I’ve been involved. However, the widely-acclaimed and inclusive process that advanced overall sustainability goals has since reversed course. A stakeholder meeting where minimal information was �irst presented about the proposed purchase of additional gas units ���BROWN ���� 30