Tucson Weekly, Feb. 11, 2021

CURRENTS: STATE CUTS PIMA COUNTY’S VACCINE SUPPLY

JAN. 11 - 17, 2021 • TUCSONWEEKLY.COM • FREE

New Brew Crew

Es Teran and Ayla Kapahi are taking Borderlands Brewing Company to new heights

A Beer Week Special by Austin Counts

TUCSON SALVAGE: A Valentine’s Day Modern Love Story

ARTS: A History of Rancho Linda Vista

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FEB. 11, 2021

FEB. 11, 2021

FEB. 11, 2021 | VOL. 36, NO. 6

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STAFF

CONTENTS

CURRENTS

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County sees fewer positive tests but emerging variant strains concern health officials

THE SKINNY

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Mayor Romero sets March 1 meeting to replace Councilman Durham

CHOW

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Arizona Beer Week: Tucson’s craft beer industry is looking for success in the pandemic’s aluminum lining

CHOW

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Local and state breweries are crafting a special beer that’s designed to support the struggling Arizona Craft Brewers Guild

Just Brew It

ADMINISTRATION Jason Joseph, President/Publisher jjoseph@azlocalmedia.com

EDITOR’S NOTE

Jaime Hood, General Manager, Ext. 12 jaime@tucsonlocalmedia.com Casey Anderson, Ad Director/ Associate Publisher, Ext. 22 casey@tucsonlocalmedia.com Claudine Sowards, Accounting, Ext. 13 claudine@tucsonlocalmedia.com

WITH THIS PANDEMIC WITH US FOR nearly a year now, who couldn’t use a cold beer? Unfortunately, fear of spreading COVID-19 has taken its toll on brewery tasting rooms (as well as restaurants where craft beers are sold), so it’s been a tough year for local breweries. More people are drinking at home instead of going out and small-batch breweries don’t always have the resources to can or bottle beer.

Ahead of Arizona Beer Week, managing editor Austin Counts takes a deep dive into what’s happening with local breweries in this week’s cover story. Counts taps into Rebuild the Guild, a new American IPA being crafted by multiple breweries (sometimes with their own twist) in support of the Arizona Craft Brewers Guild; examines the challenges facing the breweries as they have fewer customers and an aluminum shortage that limits how much they are able to expand their canning operations; and introduces you to the new management at Borderlands Brewing Company. We’ll have more on the local activities for Beer Week in our next edition, but let’s all raise a glass to the small guys who are brewing their best in the face of the pandemic.

Elsewhere in the book this week: Staff

reporter Nicole Ludden brings us the good news that COVID cases are on the decline from their second-wave peak and the bad news that the virus remains widespread and the state has reduced the number of vaccine doses it is sending to Pima County; The Skinny looks at how this year’s City Council races are shaping up (assuming we have City Council races this year); Columnist Brian Smith brings us a Tucson Salvage love story for Valentine’s Day; arts writer Margaret Regan reviews a new book about Rancho Linda Vista, the longtime arts colony up in the Oracle area; and Tucson Weedly columnist David Abbott examines how cannabis testing seems to have fallen by the wayside just as adult rec sales are starting. Plus, there are other tidbits, cartoons, puzzles, horoscopes, a sex column and so much more in our pages.

Stay safe out there!

— Jim Nintzel Executive Editor Hear Nintz talk about the latest on the outbreak and other news at 8:30 Wednesday mornings on The Frank Show on KLPX, 91.1 FM.

RANDOM SHOTS By Rand Carlson

TUCSON SALVAGE

Sheryl Kocher, Receptionist, Ext. 10 sheryl@tucsonlocalmedia.com EDITORIAL Jim Nintzel, Executive Editor, Ext. 38 jimn@tucsonlocalmedia.com Austin Counts, Managing Editor, Ext. 36 austin@tucsonlocalmedia.com Jeff Gardner, Associate Editor, Ext. 43 jeff@tucsonlocalmedia.com Mike Truelsen, Web Editor, Ext. 35 mike@tucsonlocalmedia.com Nicole Ludden, Staff Reporter, Ext. 42 nicolel@tucsonlocalmedia.com Contributors: Rob Brezsny, Max Cannon, Rand Carlson, Tom Danehy, Emily Dieckman, Bob Grimm, Andy Mosier, Linda Ray, Margaret Regan, Will Shortz, Jen Sorensen, Clay Jones, Dan Savage PRODUCTION David Abbott, Production Manager, Ext. 18 david@tucsonlocalmedia.com Ryan Dyson, Graphic Designer, Ext. 26 ryand@tucsonlocalmedia.com Emily Filener, Graphic Designer, Ext. 29 emilyf@tucsonlocalmedia.com CIRCULATION Alex Carrasco, Circulation, Ext. 17, alexc@tucsonlocalmedia.com ADVERTISING Kristin Chester, Account Executive, Ext. 25 kristin@tucsonlocalmedia.com Candace Murray, Account Executive, Ext. 24 candace@tucsonlocalmedia.com Lisa Hopper, Account Executive Ext. 39 lisa@tucsonlocalmedia.com Tyler Vondrak, Account Executive, Ext. 27 tyler@tucsonlocalmedia.com NATIONAL ADVERTISING VMG Advertising, (888) 278-9866 or (212) 475-2529 Tucson Weekly® is published every Thursday by 13 Street Media at 7225 N. Mona Lisa Rd., Ste. 125, Tucson, Arizona. Address all editorial, business and production correspondence to: Tucson Weekly, 7225 N. Mona Lisa Rd., Ste. 125, Tucson, Arizona 85741. Phone: (520) 797-4384, FAX (520) 575-8891. First Class subscriptions, mailed in an envelope, cost $112 yearly/53 issues. Sorry, no refunds on subscriptions.

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COVID, guns and love, I am the day watchperson

ARTS & CULTURE

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A new book tells the history of artist colony Rancho Linda Vista

Cover image by Austin Counts

Copyright: The entire contents of Tucson Weekly are Copyright © 2019 by Thirteenth Street Media.

No portion may be reproduced in whole or part by any means without the express written permission of the Publisher, Tucson Weekly, 7225 N. Mona Lisa Rd., Ste. 125, Tucson, AZ 85741.

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FEB. 11, 2021

CURRENTS

COURTESY PIMA COUNTY HEALTH DEPARTMENT

Pima County Sheriff’s Department Sgt. Michael Moseley gets his COVID vaccination from nurse Donna “Jeanne” Storie.

DECLINING CASES

County sees fewer positive tests but emerging variant strains concern health officials

By Nicole Ludden nicolel@tucsonlocalmedia.com

WHILE PIMA COUNTY LACKS THE vaccine supply to vaccinate enough of the population to reach herd immunity, COVID-19 cases are decreasing across the state. Health experts warn, however, that continued mitigation is needed to maintain the downward trend.

According to the latest report by Dr. Joe Gerald, a University of Arizona professor who creates weekly coronavirus epidemiology reports based on Arizona Department of Health Services data, the week ending Jan. 31 saw a 31% decrease in total COVID-19 cases from the week prior.

In Pima County, coronavirus cases saw a 27% decrease the week ending Jan. 17 from the week before, Gerald

reports.

Data from the Pima County Health Department reflects a similar trend.

The first week of January saw Pima County’s highest weekly number of COVID-19 cases at 8,860, while the following week dropped to 7,052 and the third week to 5,260. Week four reported 2,916 cases, but data from the last 4-7 days are still trickling in.

“I’m cautiously optimistic. So we have 130,000 plus vaccinated.

We have over 103,000 cases, which confers some immunity, at least for that particular 90 days. We do seem to be seeing a decrease in our cases day by day,” said Dr. Theresa Cullen, Pima County’s health department director. “Overall, if we look at what we call the epi curve, we do see that epi curve seems to have hit its peak and is coming down. That is also consistent with what we’re seeing with our hos-

pitalizations. We have more ICU bed availability than we have had for the past eight weeks.”

However, Cullen said the county’s test positivity of 12.5% is still high, and while COVID-19 testing has decreased, it hasn’t corresponded with a decreased positivity rate.

“That means that we still have a lot of COVID transmission occurring in the county,” Cullen said.

While the week ending Jan. 17 remains Arizona’s deadliest at 913 reported COVID-19 deaths, Gerald said deaths will remain high for the next four to eight weeks.

The county health department reports 134 COVID-19 deaths for January’s first week, 125 for the second, 85 for the third and six deaths for the last week of the month.

Across the state, COVID-19 hospitalizations dropped 20% from the week before Feb. 5, while ICU bed usage by coronavirus patients dropped 14%, according to Gerald’s report.

To maintain the reduced spread, Gerald said continued mitigation against COVID-19 is essential.

“One pressing challenge moving forward will be ‘holding the line’ on our public health mitigation practices in the face of improving conditions.

For example, absolute levels of transmission and test positivity remain 3-4X higher than recommended for in-person instructional activities,” Gerald said. “Resumption of high-risk activities before absolute levels further subside would be akin to jumping out of your exit-row seat at 10,000 feet when the pilot announces his initial descent into the airport. It matters little whether you jump out on the way up or way down; it’s going to hurt either way.”

UA DELIVERS VACCINES TO EDUCATORS, HOPES TO RETURN TO LARGER CLASSES LATER THIS MONTH The University of Arizona has delivered 9,866 COVID-19 vaccines at a rate of 800 shots per day, according to UA President Robert C. Robbins.

The UA point of distribution, or POD, is targeted toward educators and childcare providers and has two

vaccination sites: a drive-through location at the University of Arizona Mall and a walk-through clinic at the Ina E. Gittings building.

While operating as a vaccine distribution center, UA is basing its learning structures for students on the prevalence of coronavirus in the community.

Robbins lauded the state for its improvement in COVID-19 transmission.

While Arizona held the highest rate of transmission in the country throughout most of January, it ranked at No. 8 at the start of the week.

If conditions continue to improve, the university will enter stage two of its reentry plan on Feb. 22 with up to 50 students attending classes in person. For now, it remains in stage one with in-person instruction for essential courses only.

From Jan. 28 to Feb. 6, UA administered 18,767 COVID-19 tests and found 127 positive cases for a positivity rating of 0.7%, down from last week’s percent positivity of 1.3%.

“Remember, we’ve tried to shoot for under 5%, and we’ve been significantly under 5% for a long time now. This last number is very, very encouraging,” Robbins said. “These are good signs, however, remain vigilant, continue to cover your face, wash your hands and keep distance from as many people as possible.”

The university began the semester requiring on-campus dorm residents to take two COVID-19 tests a week with at least 48 hours between tests.

Due to improving COVID-19 data, dorm residents or students who attend classes in-person will only have to take one test a week, Robbins announced.

To enforce the testing requirement, university students won’t be able to access the school’s Wi-Fi network until they’ve verified they received a COVID-19 test.

The university’s CART team, a collaboration with the UA and Tucson police departments that looks for noncompliance to COVID-19 precautions, found 12 total incidents the week of Feb. 1. They responded to six events with under 20 attendees, one event with 20-49 people and five events with an unknown number of participants.

CONTINUED ON PAGE 6

FEB. 11, 2021

CURRENTS

SHOT CLOCK

State cuts back on Pima County’s vaccine supply as local officials expand eligibility to anyone 70 or older

By Nicole Ludden nicolel@tucsonlocalmedia.com

WHILE PIMA COUNTY WIDENS vaccine eligibility, it’s receiving a reduced vaccine supply that makes it difficult to keep up with demand.

Last week, the Pima County Health Department announced those over 70 are now eligible to receive COVID-19 vaccines by signing up for appointments beginning this week.

While only the 75+ age group, protective service workers and educators were previously eligible, the health department is expanding its 1B priority group of vaccine recipients to include individuals over 70 after vaccinating more than 130,000 residents over the past six weeks, according to county health department Director Dr. Theresa Cullen.

However, this week’s vaccine allocation has been truncated. Last week, the state allocated Pima County 29,000 doses.

This week, the county will only receive 17,800—a 39% decrease in an already strained vaccine supply.

“Weekly allocations to local jurisdictions are based on population size, which phase a county is currently vaccinating, and the number of doses available for allocation. While Pima County’s allocation this week is lower than in the recent past, in total to date, Pima County has received approximately 14% of the state’s overall allocation,” Holly Poynter, the Arizona Department of Health Services’ public information officer, explained in an email.

2021 Book of Lists

“We have asked the federal government for an increased vaccine allocation, but this has not yet occurred. We are hopeful that the allocation will grow in the coming weeks.”

As of Saturday, Pima County administered 147,229 vaccines out of a total state allocation of 165,950 doses. According to ADHS data, the county has given 26,104 sets of the two doses needed for one to be considered fully immunized.

While doses are taken from the state’s total vaccine allocation from the federal government to send to assisted living facilities, Walgreens, CVS and other store-based pharmacies, Cullen says the health department believes some doses are “taken off the top for other things that we may or may not have insight into.”

As the county expands vaccine eligibility to a wider swath of the population, it still has to ensure second doses are available for individuals who already received their first dose.

“We have worked really closely with our PODs, and we are planning for that inevitable time when we need to expand so people can get their second shot,” Cullen said. “But if the immunization numbers are decreased, we’re in a situation where we’re going to decide whether to do the first or the second shot. The CDC has given institutions the latitude to go to six weeks for a second shot, but not beyond that right now.”

The health director said she has confidence that all those who wish to receive vaccines in Pima County will get a shot when it’s their time to do so. However, the

Available Now!

wait times may be elongated if the county continues to receive a limited vaccine supply.

“We want to look to where we need to go, where the puck is going. When we don’t have the vaccine, it significantly impedes our ability to get there,” Cullen said. “I do believe that we will have the ability to fully vaccinate the community.

What will happen is there will be a slow down at certain points.”

Last week, the state announced it would work toward opening a state-run distribution center in Pima County, but any vaccinations there would come off the top of the county’s allocated vaccine supply, leaving fewer doses for the sites Pima County is now running.

“Our commitment is to accelerate immunization. If we can get a 24/7, or even 18 hours by seven (days) POD, that is a high-efficiency, high-effective POD, everyone in the county, and probably first and foremost the public health department, would be incredibly supportive of that,” Cullen said. “However, if the only way that is done is to take vaccine from the existing PODs, we have a hesitation.”

THOSE WHO CURRENTLY QUALIFY in Pima County’s 1B priority group of eligible vaccine recipients of those 70 and older, educators and protective service workers can register for a vaccine at pima.gov/covid19vaccineregistration or by calling 520-222-0119.

Arizona’s U.S. congressional representatives advocate for more vaccine Both of Arizona’s senators and a group of representatives have appealed to the federal government for an increased vaccine supply.

Gov. Doug Ducey and ADHS Director Dr. Cara Christ submitted a federal resource request for 300,000 doses followed by an additional 300,000 vaccines a week, but the request was denied,

TUCSONWEEKLY.COM

according to Ducey’s office.

Ducey appealed to Arizona’s congressional delegation to advocate for increased vaccine allocation, asking them in a written letter to “engage at every level to help secure additional COVID vaccine doses for the State of Arizona.”

In a Feb. 5 letter to Jeff Zients, the White House’s COVID-19 coordinator, Arizona Senators Kyrsten Sinema and Mark Kelly asked the government to reconsider the denial.

“While we appreciate the recent increase in allocations to states, it was not enough to meet Arizona’s needs or increase availability in our hardest-hit communities,” the senators wrote. “Given the impact of the virus on our state, we ask that Arizona’s request for an immediate 300,000 vaccine doses and an increase of 300,000 doses to our weekly allocation be granted. We stand ready to provide any assistance to help Arizona manage this additional allocation and to meet its vaccination goals, especially in our rural and medically underserved communities.”

Congressman Raúl Grijalva joined U.S. Reps. Ruben Gallego, Tom O’Halleran and Ann Kirkpatrick in writing a joint letter on Feb. 5 to Zients and President Joe Biden also asking for a reconsideration of Arizona’s increased vaccine request.

“We understand that there have been many failures at the state level to embrace and implement policies to effectively control the virus. The crisis the state is facing is not a failure of the current administration, but on behalf of our constituents we are seeking additional support to get out of this crisis as quickly as possible and save lives,” the representatives wrote. “We will continue to support more responsible mitigation activities throughout the state and ask that you consider our unique request for additional vaccinations and support.” ■

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BOOK of Lists 2021

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FEB. 11, 2021

DECLINING CASES CONTINUED FROM PAGE 4

“The people that are demonstrated in these numbers here are people that are taking risks, not only to themselves, but they’re becoming potential vectors of disease. 40 or 50% of people carry this virus and don’t know it,” said Dr. Richard Carmona, UA’s reentry task force director and former U.S. surgeon general. “You may feel well, but you may be spreading it to others.

So it’s extraordinarily important that you keep that social distance, stay away from big groups, until such time that we can do that safely again.”

UA IMMUNOBIOLOGIST DISCUSSES CORONAVIRUS VARIANTS UA Immunobiologist Deepta Bhattacharya joined the university’s press conference today to discuss the efficacy of the current COVID-19 vaccines against growing mutations of COVID-19 throughout the country.

CLAYTOONZ By Clay Jones

Coronavirus variants from the UK, South Africa and Brazil have been discovered in the U.S. In Arizona, at least three test samples have come back positive for the presence of the UK variant, according to the Arizona Department of Health Services.

Bhattacharya also discussed a new variant identified in California.

The immunobiologist said the UK variant, or the B.1.1.7 virus, is of the greatest concern. While all the mutated viruses have a probable chance of increased transmissibility, the UK virus has a 20-50% greater likelihood of transmitting.

Bhattacharya said the UK virus could become the dominant variant in the coming months.

“The key is to actually make sure that the total number of cases is low enough so that even if it does become the dominant variant, it doesn’t cause the levels of problems that it has in the United Kingdom and in Israel,” Bhattacharya said.

The variants first identified in South Africa and Brazil, known as B.1.351 and P.1 respectively, have mutated similarly in terms of their spike

proteins, which allow the virus to infect the body’s host cells. Bhattacharya said these variants aren’t yet prevalent in the U.S. The California variant, called B.1.427/1.429, is widely circulating in the Los Angeles area.

Current COVID-19 vaccines has differing levels of effectiveness against the variant strains.

In early studies, the vaccines are showing promising protection against the UK variant, Bhattacharya said.

The variants from South Africa and Brazil, however, only show partial effectiveness against the vaccines, while the immunity vaccines provide against the California variant is still unknown.

The immunobiologist said the South African variant is showing a nearly six-fold loss against the protective antibodies the vaccines provide.

“This is just a little bit of evidence that we’re going to need some things besides just the vaccines to keep the virus under control,” Bhattacharya said.

However, current vaccines show protection against severe COVID-19

cases.

“Overall, there’s only been one person in any of these trials that have been reported that has had severe disease,” Bhattacharya said. “There’s been only one person that’s had to go to the hospital, there’s been no deaths so far. We’re reasonably confident that even if there is a hit to vaccine efficacy against some of these other variants, the overall efficacy against preventing severe disease is going to be much better.”

Despite the presence of the variants, Bhattacharya stresses the importance of receiving a COVID-19 vaccine to prevent transmission and acute coronavirus cases.

“As far as we can tell, all of [the vaccines] do quite well at keeping you out of the hospital, which is, again, the biggest thing,” he said. “We all get respiratory infections, we all get colds, it’s not that big of a deal. If we can convert it into that—and as far as we can tell, the vaccines are all doing a pretty good job of that—then, really, that’s the most important thing. So get it as soon as you can, get it as soon as it’s your turn in line.” ■

THE SKINNY THREE FOR ALL Mayor Romero sets March 1 meeting to replace Councilman Durham.

Plus, will we have a City Council election this year?

Jim Nintzel jnintzel@tucsonweekly.com TUCSON CITY COUNCILMAN PAUL

Durham threw an unexpected twist into this year’s City Council races when he announced he would be calling it quits in the final year of his first term.

“Representing the constituents of Ward 3 has been a profound privilege,” Durham wrote in his letter of resignation last week. “However, in order to attend to personal matters, I am now compelled to resign from my position as the Ward 3 councilmember prior to the expiration of my term.”

Durham’s last day in office will be March 1.

Durham had previously taken a leave of absence from the council job in September 2020 to focus on caring for his husband, who has been suffering from cancer. He had returned to attend some meetings in December.

Mayor Regina Romero has called a March 1 special council meeting and proposed appointing former Ward 3 Councilmember Karin Uhlich to the job.

Uhlich served three terms on the council between 2005 and 2017, when she decided against seeking reelection.

“Karin has previously been elected by the residents of Ward 3, knows the neighborhoods, understands city government, and can step into the role without a learning curve, which is particularly valuable during these unprecedented times,” Romero said in a prepared statement.

Durham said he was on board with

the plan.

“Karin knows the issues facing Ward 3, and will be able to step in and work with my staff to ensure the continuity of services,” Durham said.

Uhlich moved out of Ward 3 during her final term in office, but she said last week that she has since moved back into the ward.

Uhlich told the Weekly she would not seek election to the Ward 3 seat later this year.

But not every council member is on board with the plan to hand the office to Uhlich. Councilman Steve Kozachik says he’s heard from other people who may be interested in the gig and thinks the city should follow its previous practice of accepting applications for the job.

Former Ward 3 Councilman Michael Crawford, an attorney who held the Ward 3 seat for a couple of years in the 1990s, told the Weekly he would be interested in the job, assuming the council opens the door to applications as it has in the past.

Crawford said he wouldn’t seek to run for the job later this year.

Community activist Bonnie Poulos, who has been active with the Campus Farm Neighborhood Association as well as serving on a variety of city boards such as the Charter Review Committee and Tucson Planning Commission, is also interested in being appointed to serve out Durham’s term, but said she would not run for the seat.

“The move to appoint past Ward 3 councilmember Karin Uhlich is understandable, but I think it would

FEB. 11, 2021

be refreshing to have new ideas from someone who does not have future political aspirations,” Poulos said.

“And someone who has spent time and energy learning why we make the decisions that we do and being a part of the citizen voice in those decisions.

Meanwhile, a couple of Democrats are interested in running for the job later this year.

Kevin Dahl, the senior program manager for the National Parks Conservation Association, filed paperwork earlier this week to run for the seat.

“Paul has been an excellent Council representative for the residents of Ward 3,” Dahl said. “I supported him when he sought the seat, and now I am supporting him in the difficult decision that he has made to step down.”

Dahl, who has also headed up the Tucson Audubon Society and Native Seeds/SEARCH, has already lined up an endorsement from Congressman Raul Grijalva and local environmental queenpin Carolyn Campbell.

He said he’d also be interested in an appointment to the seat, but he understands that council members may be looking for someone who isn’t going to run for the seat and if that’s the case, he’s more interested in campaigning for a full term.

Meanwhile, Juan Padres, who ran unsuccessfully against Pima County Supervisor Sharon Bronson in the 2020 primary, announced on Facebook that he’s launching a campaign for the job.

“I fully understand the problems and challenges that Ward 3 faces, and look forward to working tirelessly to address them,” Padres said. “My campaign platform will be very similar to the one I ran on last time, making poverty the number one issue that needs to be addressed in our community, especially in the wake of this devastating pandemic.”

A primary election for the Ward 3 seat was already set for Aug. 3, with the general election to follow on Nov. 2.

Besides Ward 3, Ward 6’s Kozachik and Ward 5 Councilman Richard Fimbres are also up for reelection this year.

Fimbres filed paperwork indicating he was seeking a fourth term last

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month. Last week, he sent around an email announcing his intention and laying out a number of his accomplishments.

Kozachik told the Weekly he was holding off on making an announcement until he learned whether the city will actually be having an election this year.

The question of this year’s election remains up in the air because state lawmakers are still trying to force the city of Tucson to move its election to the same even-year cycle that most elections in Arizona take place. If that happens, city elections would take place the same years as presidential and midterm elections.

Republicans in the Arizona Legislature have been trying without success for some time to force the city to move its election cycle. The latest effort involved a law requiring the city to move its election if the percentage of voters participating in an odd-year city election was significantly less than the percentage who participate in even-year presidential and midterm elections.

Attorneys for the city and the state recently argued before the Arizona Supreme Court whether the state could force the city to move its election. That decision is expected soon, according to City Attorney Mike Rankin.

If the election happens this year, it remains to be seen whether Republicans can stir up candidates to run for any of the council seats. Candidates for council seats must file their nominating petitions by April 5, so the clock is ticking. So far, we haven’t heard any rumors of GOP candidates and new Pima County Republican Party chair Shelley Kais did not respond to our email asking if she was aware of anyone planning a campaign this year.

But Pima County isn’t exactly friendly territory to GOP candidates these days. Only one Republican won countywide last year, Treasurer Beth Ford, who was first elected in 2000.

The city of Tucson is even more hostile territory for Republicans, with roughly 136,000 registered Democrats and 64,000 registered Republicans, with about 91,000 voters registered outside the two big parties. ■

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FEB. 11, 2021

Arizona Beer Week Canned Conundrum Tucson’s craft beer industry is looking for success in the pandemic’s aluminum lining, but industry shortages present new challenges for our local brewing community

By Austin Counts austin@tucsonlocalmedia.com

CRAFT BEER FANS IN THE OLD Pueblo certainly have noticed their local bottle shop is now sporting larger selections of 4-packs and 6-packs from a variety of local and national breweries these days.

Independently owned beer and wine shops like Tucson Hop Shop, Arizona Beer House and Tap & Bottle are updating their beer selections on a weekly basis to keep up with the public’s demand for new brews.

“We’ve been getting so many breweries that we never had access to before. They’re all canning and packing more now that their taprooms are closed,” said Tap & Bottle owner Rebecca Safford. “People are constantly wanting new releases and we’re even seeing Pueblo Vida releasing new beers every few weeks.’”

Safford said both of her locations have been able to survive the pandemic by pivoting to online, to-go and delivery sales while their taprooms remain closed. While the unexpected renaissance of canned craft beer is keeping customers coming back, it still doesn’t replace lost profits from draft beer sales, she said.

“Our bottle shops have kept us going and our sales numbers still look strong during the pandemic, but what’s different is people are drinking at home,” Safford said. “Profits from draft beer sales are a lot higher than what you make off a can of beer.”

Closed taprooms, coupled with decreasing on-premise sales, have kept brewery owners coast-to-coast busy canning smallbatch, limited-run beers typically reserved for their local clientele in an attempt to recover lost profits.

Finley Distributing’s craft brand manager Matt McCullagh said many Tucson breweries are still experiencing huge declines in local on-premise beer sales,

while having trouble keeping up with off-premise demand. His top-selling local craft brand, Dragoon Brewing Company, has suffered massive losses of on-premise sales during the pandemic, he said.

On-premise sales are adult beverage sales made through wholesale distribution to bars and restaurants. Off-premise sales are retail sales of canned or bottled adult beverages to be enjoyed at home.

“Dragoon has been hit pretty hard by the fact that their IPA was our No. 1 tap handle in the whole Tucson area. We had more Dragoon tap handles than we had Miller Light or Blue Moon handles,” McCullagh said. “The biggest challenge that our local breweries have is that 50% to 70% of their sales come from on-premise sales. When you rely so much on your on-premise market, that loss has a huge impact.”

McCullagh said while local beer off-premise sales at grocery stores have gone up since the pandemic, it doesn’t balance out the loss local breweries have suffered by low on-premise sales.

“What we’ve seen this past year is that the hardcore craft beer drinker will go to the supermarket and buy a couple of sixpacks of craft beer,” McCullagh said. “But they’re also buying a 30 pack of something cheap to drink it at home, whereas previously they would stop by the local bar a few times a week.”

McCullagh pointed out regional and national breweries are also feeling the sting of dwindling on-premise sales, but they’re better equipped to adapt to changes brought on by the pandemic.

“The regional brands can pivot a lot easier and say, ‘We’re not going to send out kegs, but we’ll send out more cans,’ local breweries can’t do that quite as easily,” MacCullagh said. “[Local breweries] are really struggling to meet the demand in sales for packaged products. It’s not easy for them to suddenly decide to take a batch

AUSTIN COUNTS

Dragoon head brewer and co-founder Eric Greene said his company able to get 16 oz cans with no problem from his distributor, Ball Co. due to having a previous multi-buying relationship, but 12 oz cans are much harder to find during the shortage.

of beer and throw it into cans. Especially now that there’s a shortage.”

The nation is facing an aluminum can shortage due to the number of quarantining Americans buying canned beer, canned wine, hard seltzer, seltzer water, soft drinks, energy drinks and even canned hard-alcohol mixed drinks throughout 2020. Aluminum cans of all sizes are on backorder at national supply companies like Ball Corp. and the Coca-Cola Company recently decided to hold off canning certain products such as Coke Zero in the face of the shortage.

McCullagh has seen sales of hard seltzer brands like White Claw and Truly grow nearly 250% over the past year, he said.

“All the sudden we have an additional 50% demand on aluminum because everybody has to buy their products from supermarkets instead of getting from local bars,” McCullagh said. “When you see an increase in sales like that, those supply companies can’t just all the sudden find another two to three million cans.”

Button Brew House owner Erika Button said she saw the rush on aluminum early in the pandemic when the northwest side brewery quickly sold out of a pallet of 32-ounce aluminum crowler cans that would usually take 10 months to sell through.

“We actually finished a whole pallet in five weeks because we had support from our regular customers,” Button said. “We

used to get the crowlers within two weeks, but now I’m hearing it’s more like five to six [weeks].”

Button said the company recently purchased a canning line last October with funds from their Economic Injury Disaster Loan and said the brewery is now using a lot more aluminum than it previously did.

While it may take several weeks to get an order of 16-ounce aluminum cans, Button said they have plenty in stock to keep up with the brewery’s self-distribution and it’s helping stay afloat after losing 80% of their on-premise sales since the pandemic’s start last March.

“We’ve been able to maintain the retail side as much as we can, but it still doesn’t make up for the wholesale side,” Button said. “It’s a struggle.”

Firetruck Brewing CEO Taylor Carter said his brewery was lucky to have purchased in bulk last February before the coronavirus and the aluminum shortage.

His brewery’s on-premise sales have taken a 40% percent hit from where they were last year, he said. But Carter said the recent opening of their Oro Valley location and off-premise sales have helped during the hard times.

“With restaurants and bars shutting down, it’s taken a toll on our distribution,” Carter said. “But we’re slowly climbing out of the hole. It’s starting to pick back up again, people are starting to go out again.

Things are looking better.” ■

FEB. 11, 2021

CHOW

AUSTIN COUNTS

Dragoon Brewery’s prototype of the Rebuild the Guild Hazy IPA is available for purchase at the brewery’s taproom. All proceeds from their version will go toward helping the Arizona Craft Brewers Guild with their financial shortfalls during the pandemic.

GUILD GOODNESS

Local and state breweries are crafting a special beer that’s designed to support the struggling Arizona Craft Brewers Guild

By Austin Counts austin@tucsonlocalmedia.com THIS YEAR HAS BEEN A STRUGGLE for Arizona’s craft brewers. Not only have they witnessed their wholesale profits drop as bars and restaurants shut down and then reopen to low capacity, but they’re also watching retail profits stall due to a national aluminum can shortage.

While this community is finding new ways to survive the pandemic, the Arizona Craft Brewers Guild has suffered immensely by not being able to hold events and festivals over the past year— their main source of revenue.

But when the brewing gets tough, the tough brew Rebuild the Guild Hazy IPA. The guild’s executive director Rob Fullmer is asking the state’s local craft breweries to brew their adaptation of a tried and true guild recipe, sell it to their customers and donate a portion of the proceeds back to the guild.

“We want to try to avoid having to dig ourselves out of a hole when it’s 115-degrees and we’re trying to get to a point where we can get back to somewhat normal operations,” said Fullmer.

“The idea is we’re going to leverage what our breweries do best and that is making beer.”

To help offset production cost,

Fullmer said he has made deals with suppliers to offer participating breweries discounted raw materials to make the brew.

“With help from some of our partners, we’ve got the base grains priced at what the largest brewery in Arizona would get,” Fullmer said. “It’s an opportunity for a small brewery to make more money on grain savings, even with sharing some proceeds. It’s a win-win.”

The recipe was written by Dragoon Brewing Company’s co-founder and head brewer Eric Greene, who is also the guild’s technical committee chairman. He said the committee had made a variation of the brew three years ago and it was a big hit among the guild community. Greene has made a few tweaks to the previous recipe by bumping up the amount of hops used, but it’s very similar, he said.

“It seemed obvious that we should use a throwback recipe that has roots with the guild and ties in something we’ve done in the past...and it’s a great beer,” Greene said. “Other breweries and causes have been doing the same type of thing where everybody bands together as one label to raise awareness on an issue and this is our version of that.”

Dragoon recently released their prototype for the Rebuild the Guild Hazy IPA, available in 16oz cans at their taproom’s entrance and on draft

at select establishments in Tucson.

This American IPA weighs in at 7% ABV and 30 IBU, giving it a taste of the hops without too much bitterness on the backend. Greene said they brewed a 30-barrel batch of Rebuild the Guild and split it between 16-ounce cans and kegs.

Dragoon plans on giving the proceeds made to the brewers guild, according to Greene.

“We adapted it to become an IPA and it turned out to be a slam dunk,” Greene said. “The guild does so much for us in legislative efforts, legal advice and events that we need to keep it working.”

But Greene said he doesn’t expect all of the participating breweries to follow the exact recipe. In fact, he and the guild welcome brewers to create their own variation of it to create a one-of-a-kind experience for the state’s beer-loving community.

Local craft breweries like 1912 Brewing Company and Crooked Tooth Brewing Company have signed on to produce their version of the beer. Crooked Tooth owner Ben Vernon said they’re planning on adding “a Crooked Tooth layer” to Greene’s recipe that would give heart palpitations to the writers of the 1516 Reinheitsgbot beer purity law.

TUCSONWEEKLY.COM

“We’re coming up on the time of year where we like to add mango to things, so we’re planning on working with a mango and vanilla hazy IPA,” Vernon said. “Anytime we’ve added vanilla and fruit to an IPA, it goes quick and that’s the idea behind this batch. Turn it and burn it so we can make as much money as possible as we can for the guild.”

Crooked Tooth has not announced a release date on when their version will be available at this time.

The Arizona Brewers Guild has plans to promote the brew over the next year and hopes to raise upwards of $80,000 from the proceeds, said Fullmer. Now that more than 20 breweries statewide have joined the cause, Fullmer said he hopes beer lovers from across the state will seek out the different variations and attempt to try them all.

“When you’ve had one of these, you’re probably going to want to try another brewery’s take on it,” Fullmer said.

“It could be a lot of fun if we could get some retailers and restaurants to serve them side by side.” ■ To find out more about the Rebuild the Guild recipe, who’s brewing it across the state and where you can purchase it, check out chooseazbrew.com.

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FEB. 11, 2021

NEW BREW CREW

Big changes at Borderlands Brewing have propelled the once-struggling company to new heights as one of Southern Arizona’s top beer producers.

By Austin Counts austin@tucsonlocalmedia.com

IT’S EASY TO SENSE SOMETHING has changed at Borderlands Brewing Company when walking through their doors these days. It’s not that the brewing equipment moved to a new facility a few years back and created more space in their taproom or that they’ve added a barbershop to the floor plan. It’s not even that they’ve redesigned their patio to create a more socially-distanced environment.

What has changed—and for the better, I might add—is the quality and consistency of their beer while building upon the brewery’s brand.

Borderlands has always made a good product and had a loyal following for over the past decade, but in 2021 the beer and the brand are on another level.

Just ask the folks at the Tucson City of Gastronomy who manages our city’s UNESCO designation. The non-profit certified Borderlands as one of Tucson’s beverage artisans earlier this month.

Much of the company’s recent success over the past few years is due mainly to Borderlands CEO Es Teran and Director of Production Ayla Kapahi striving to create innovative brews while building their regional distribution reach.

Teran said one of the biggest changes the brewery made after former owners Mike Mallozzi and Myles Stone left the company was installing a seven-member board of directors and running the brewery like a corporation. Originally a silent investor and patron, Teran took over as Borderlands CEO shortly after the original owners’ departure, he said.

“Once we established the board, we created different departments and outlined their operations and duties.

AUSTIN COUNTS

Borderlands Director of Production Ayla Kapahi and CEO Es Teran smile after learning their brewery received their beverage artisan certification from the Tucson City of Gastronomy organization.

Each department has a department head and a manager,” Teran said. “It’s more structured than before and now that everything runs through a department, it’s easier to manage.”

Teran said his company is now looking to expand and open new locations in the near future. While the pandemic has taken its toll on the brewery, Teran said he sees it as an opportunity to learn how to adapt to new challenges. The brewery has retained the majority of its staff during the pandemic and even hired new employees to help implement the new direction.

“When we closed for five months because of the pandemic last year we had to keep busy. So, we started focusing on deliveries, our branding and social media. We worked on our patio while we were closed,” Teran said. “Once we reopened, we adapted a more restaurant-type environment with table service and we’ll probably keep it for a while. I think that’s the key to our success.”

Nearly three years ago, Kapahi received an out-of-the-blue phone call from former owner Mallozzi to see if she could temporarily fill in while the company searched for a new brewer.

She had previous experience brewing at now-shuttered Public Brewhouse’s small system, but had never used a commercial set-up as Borderlands had, she said.

“When I got that phone call from Mike, it was like this light bulb went

off and I saw this [brewing] could be a career for me,” Kapahi said. “But, I was also thinking that since Borderlands was such a large scale operation, isn’t there someone else better qualified?”

Kapahi took the opportunity to turn her passion for brewing into a career. She had previously been studying for her PhD, but decided to leave school and try her hand at the beer industry, she said.

“Six years ago I started learning how to brew commercially. I love having a physically and cognitively demanding and challenging job,” Kapahi said.

“There has always been something that has attracted me to the craft industry.

The community is very supportive and excited about what you’re brewing.”

Kapahi is an advocate for supporting women and minorities in the craft brewing industry and even employs an all-female brewing staff. Last January, she and other local female brewers made history by collaborating with female brewers in Mexico to create Las Hermanas, Arizona and Sonora’s first all-female brewed beer. She said experiences like that make the long hours spent brewing over the past six years worth every minute.

“I believe in brewing beers for a purpose,” Kapahi said. “For me, beer is more than what’s in a glass. It’s about making something to share with the Tucson community and celebrating our local people.”■

FEB. 11, 2021

TUCSONWEEKLY.COM 11

Story & photos by Brian Smith

COVID, guns and love, I am the day watchperson SHE IS STANDING IN FRONT OF the blue and silver Bank of America, the word “security” emblazoned in large block letters on the back of her clean, white shirt. She cuts a foreboding presence in her uniform, a palpable aura of protection. She is middle-aged, solid, armed, wraparound mirror shades ornamented with a Dallas Cowboys star on either side. She has never pulled her weapon on the job.

No bank robberies or serious conflicts in her 14 years working for a security company.

Pulls her mask down, discretely spits a bit of chew into a water bottle she keeps pocketed in her security pants below her gun, lifts the mask back into place and says, “If I can turn kindness, I will.”

A long moment passes, the chilled breeze carries a mix of car fumes and customer perfumes, a motorcycle judders by at insane volume, and the sun is out.

From this parking lot, Bett Helseth’s walkabout post, she sees the fixed grid of Campbell Avenue and its ad hoc trimmings, the utilitarian discomfort of the Bank of America lot, the Albertson’s grocery and blocky plaza across the street, the arched ’70sShaffer dry cleaners sign framed by the northern end of the snow-capped Catalina Mountains, its light-scattered blue. The mess of electrical wires from multiple directions collected at the corner pole. The eternal traffic.

In the time it takes to blink twice, her world takes weighty pitch: The exact gait of a war vet trudging up the avenue whose back is bent under the weight of god knows what, the grace of

an African Islamic woman in a colorful hijab whose flowing blue and turquoise dress shifts color in the breeze as she falls in the bank’s outdoor line. In front of her, the precise tribal leg etchings of the man-bunned white dude in long black shorts playing air drums to discernable earbud beats. The gent in the tailored blue suit and polished shoes, his air of punch-clock hurry. Helseth says, “See, it’s a beautiful day.”

Bett Helseth at her security detail.

A guy pulls up in his work truck and steps out. Unshaven, slender, all blue-collar and workday tired, outdied eight years ago on Christmas door-dirty mask and jeans. Helseth day, a freak blood clot, and her dad informs him to wait, until a customdied a few weeks later, complications er exits the bank. His impatience is from alcoholism, in a VA hospital. exposed, but she stays on him until he laughs. When she opens the bank door Minutes pass, she stops to perform a COVID-safety count on the number for him, she adds, “Here you go, sir.” of customers inside the bank and the Turn kindness. Yes, she does. This is several waiting to enter. She returns, a woman who arrives at work 45 minsays matter-of-factly, “it was all devutes early to work nearly every day to astating, knowing I’m the last person ensure bank-employee safety as they standing in my family. Especially at enter. “It’s how you approach people,” Christmastime.”

Helseth says. “‘Have a good day,’ that’s One woman, Mary Heist, appears, all it takes.” greets Helseth as an old buddy. “I’ve Maybe her outward benevolence been bugging her for months,” Heist reveals a deeper flaw, some twist laughs. “Look, she’s what you would beneath her armor, or a sense that call an icon, an historical figure here.” some torment had once consumed her and she escaped it, arriving at the other The two exchange laughs, even talk gun-cleaning. Others approach Helseth end opening doors for banking custoday, some tell of chocolates and tomers with a considerate, almost subcookies they gift her at Christmas. servient deportment. When she talks Too, grim-faced COVID deniers forher own life, her voice is free of inflecever open to hateful atmospheres have tion in smart intuitive quips, when she talks with others of their lives, there are insulted her after refusing a request to mask up. “‘Bitch, cunt, motherfucker,’ lilts and laughs.

I’ve heard it all,” she says. “Make peoHelseth’s brother died this past ple stand in line, some get mad. It’s not year, his jeep flipped and exploded. my fault, it’s not the bank’s fault. With They had just put their mother into a COVID I’ve embraced masks, distanchome, dementia. Her younger sister

ing. So I don’t take it to heart. But you know what? I smile and say, ‘Have a nice day.’”

Should the bank get robbed, Helseth would follow work protocols, which she declines to specify. “But,” she says, “It’s always in the back of my head, somebody carrying a concealed weapon.

Look, I’m a deterrent factor.”

What emerges here is a limitless patience to Helseth and her work, speaks to a personal acceptance and informs her outward contentedness, like she is finally living in the version of her future self. Hers is a rather extraordinary inner peace. “I really don’t have aspirations,” she says. “I spend lots of time with my dog Paige. I rescued her and she rescued me.”

After several hours out here, the afternoon begins it slow slog, the local orbits and jarring distortion of traffic begin to soothe. She doesn’t get tired, more lulled by the work and scenery, while never exhausting her attentive air. Helseth offers to the folks in line, “Who all is looking forward to the weekend. I know I am.”

CONTINUED ON PAGE 12

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FEB. 11, 2021

TUCSON SALVAGE

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 11

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The old Latina fronting the six-person queue, laughs, shakes her head, says, “At my age, there is nothing to go out and do this weekend.”

She compliments a man for his hat, turns to me and begins talking her upbringing: Dad was a military man, a mechanic, and a Nam vet with a weakness for booze. He was strict. (“It was ‘yes ma’am, no sir’ and I thank him for it.”) About how he taught good work ethics, “The only good thing he taught me.” The family moved around, the states, overseas.

She graduated from high school in Suffolk, England and the family soon moved from the UK to Phoenix, and she moved back and forth to Tucson.

She married a military man at 19, had a son. The marriage ended after the three moved to England (hubby was stationed there). She left with her son and returned to Tucson. Husband returned, they divorced. She gave up her son so the boy could have a better life in Delaware.

“There were a lot of hard decisions,” she says with enough resignation and sadness to about snap her work poise. “I had to sacrifice so my son could have a better life. I didn’t want to move back in with my parents to raise my son, him growing up around an alcoholic, me bagging groceries. I did it for him, he had a military dad and home stability, all the things a child needs.” She misses her son (and grandson) terribly. They don’t talk much now, but she is working on it.

She first bagged groceries in England. In Phoenix, worked years at a McDonalds. (“You don’t know how hard people work at fast-food places.”) To meliorate her life she earned an associate’s degree in auto mechanics, taking night classes while working fulltime as a delivery person for a transmission company. She was passed over in the job market for men. (“It was sexist, yes, but try to prove that.”) Left a potential mechanic life behind, disillusioned. She has spent a total of six months unemployed since

she was 16 years old. “My options were to play sports or have money.”

She began work with the Arizona Department of Corrections (ADC) working the Lewis prison in Buckeye, Arizona. Left that and logged three years with the Maricopa County Sheriff’s department. Six months headhunted by the security company she works for now, which saw her everywhere from a Tolleson, Arizona slaughterhouse (“A cow-disassembly plant, it wasn’t pretty”) to security for hurricane victims in the Virgin Islands.

“Security is underrated, how it’s portrayed in TV shows. I put in my time.

I’m blessed I have this job. I see different people every day, all walks of life.

Stay in one place long enough you see things change.”

She arrived back in Tucson from Phoenix for good in 2013. “I’m going to retire here,” says the fan of oldschool country music. “I like it here.

Tucson is big, but it is small. It keeps its core concept.”

There is also a remarkable love story humming beneath the surface.

IT IS A TRAILER PARK IN THE old-school sense on Tucson’s far southeast side; a guard gate whose attendant takes your license plate number, golf-carts slotted outside doors, well-kept grounds and cared-for plants. Mostly old folks receding from external-world forces.

“It’s quiet here,” Helseth says at her home entrance, looking unrecognizable out of uniform in a dark blue T-shirt and faded jeans. “People 55-and-over don’t party.”

Hers is a small four-room place with covered parking, enclosed patio and outdoor shed. Inside it is comforting yet foreign, like visiting a live-alone aunt in another state. The tidy domesticity and smell of clean laundry, the muted colors and diffuse but melancholy daylight, the bowling trophy and tiny arched candle arrangement, a pair of plush lay-about couches in the main room. Paige’s barks recede quickly and the least anxious Chihuahua on earth relaxes atop a doggie bed outfitted with a Dallas Cowboys blanket.

FEB. 11, 2021

“Mom knew the names of all the Cowboys’ players,” Helseth says, “It sort of grew on me.”

A framed childhood picture of Helseth and her two siblings preserves a sadder significance, she nods to it, says, “My brother was my protector, my sister was my best friend.” A large hanging photo of that younger deceased sister, Donna, is a living-room centerpiece, a flower affixed to the glass. “That’s my hero right there,” she adds. “She was more grown than I was. She saved my life.” Helseth explains that when she was wrestling with life-threatening personal demons, it was her sister who intervened, and so she is eternally grateful.

With Helseth at home today is Dotty Huntley, hardy in matching tan jacket, cap and trousers, black cowboy boots, husky voice and lover of guns. They eschew the word “partners” or “couple,” preferring instead comforting actions to substitute: “We compliment one another’s lives.” Whatever they say it is difficult not to miss a love.

The two reconnected months ago on the Plenty of Fish lesbian dating app,

unaware they’d had a short relationship 27 years ago, and were shocked when they discovered. “We did not recognize one another,” Huntley laughs, taking a seat on the couch, leaning into Helseth.

“She didn’t have gray hair then, I didn’t have wrinkles. Been going strong ever since.” She pauses, adds, “It is a strange universe,” and Helseth nods in agreement Helseth was discovering who she was after the divorce, guardedly stepping out of the closet yet surprised to receive support from most of her family, who told her, “It’s about time.” Huntley too was coming out. She offers a tricky grin, adding, “My husband wanted threesomes but he didn’t do dudes. Back then I thought I was bisexual.” She laughs, “It came back to bite him in the ass!

I left him for women.” Huntley utters something randy relating to the couple’s intimacy and a flush of color rushes Helseth’s cheeks.

The two prefer living alone, the fixed deterrent of sharing space with another person means one can’t indulge in one’s more proscribed CONTINUED ON PAGE 14

Helseth and Dotty Huntley in Helseth’s home.

TUCSONWEEKLY.COM 13

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CONTINUED FROM PAGE 13

ways. “I can wake up in my boxers and walk around all day and no one will see me,” Helseth says.

Huntley lives on a plot of land outside Prescott, Arizona, and the two visit each other often.

In those 27 years, their lives took a remarkably similar trajectory. For instance, they can talk fourpoint violent-prisoner restraints, or the old brutal “horseshoe,” the Maricopa County jail in downtown Phoenix (which this writer remembers well, having spent a night or two in there, the cruel, crammed holding tanks, the bloody knuckles, bruised faces and junkie kicks). Huntley and Helseth each worked for both the ADC and the Maricopa County Sheriff, the prisoner intakes, the yards, even the psyche wards, at different times. Huntley, is also an ex-rangemaster who did firearms instruction for the ADC. She now works freelance as a kind of social worker, supervising visitation for parents and children.

But working the jails, Huntley agrees when Helseth says, “Emotionally it never disappears, it really stays with you.” The two can spend hours sharing horror stories. Huntley talks of a trick she learned, playing music to calm distraught prisoners.

Huntley left the sheriff’s office in 2014 and bought a pawnshop in Cottonwood, Arizona, christened it Sarge’s (her nickname), and it may have lasted if her partner of 21 years didn’t die of cancer, in their home. That personal devastation flattened Helseth and pretty much ended the pawnshop. She couldn’t carry on. The other problem, Huntley adds, “was everybody needed money but nobody had money to buy.” She takes comfort in the fact former prisoners

Huntley reads Dotty her poem.

from her jailer days would come in to spend time with her.

They talk how the arms of the other comfort, and in the next sentence guns and shooting, the winning sounds of a shotgun being chambered.

“We fire,” Huntley says. “There’s a group of gals in Tucson we get together with. I bring a bunch of guns down, assault rifles, an AK-47, sport rifles.” She pauses, adds, as a pattern of logic, “Listen, they are not assault rifles because they never assaulted anyone.”

“Indoor ranges,” Helseth says, “not the desert. If I hit an animal playing behind a target that would kill me.” Huntley keeps a short-barreled shotgun in a sleeve that looks “innocent enough” in her truck, and Helseth feels naked without her sidearm.

Later, Helseth talks about her mother, the dementia. She is content that mom is well cared-for in a home, and she visits her often. Coming of age with a mother married to her alcoholic dad wasn’t exactly openhearted, the abortion of unhappy ways to see the world.

Her voice softens. “She put thoughts in my head growing up, telling me people are my friends because they feel sorry for me, and that I’m stupid, and that I would never look as good as she does so don’t even try. Now she doesn’t recognize me at all.

It is sad. I know in my heart who she is, and she is my mother and I love her. I’m good with that. I forgive her.”

She pauses, adds, “You can’t carry hate, you can’t carry grudges, that takes away room for love.”

The winter day begins its wane and we’re out on Helseth’s porch. Huntley, who minutes ago hit an app on her phone to show her dogs talking ridiculous human phrases, lights a smoke and reads a poem aloud, a verse she wrote to Helseth 27 years ago. Helseth, having moved so many times, somehow hung on to the work. Paige offers a yap, neighbors barbeque on the porch next door, and Huntley’s words sort of hang in the air. A solemn testimony to coming out, to showing tenderness, a dedication to a strength gleaned from another human being. ■

FEB. 11, 2021

lush desert plants, blue skies and dramatic mountains on its 80 acres have lured some 100 artists over the years, by Gold’s calculation. But the opportunity to live in a community of artists, with shared interests, has been almost as A new book tells the history of artist colony Rancho Linda Vista beguiling as the gorgeous landscape.

“The shared intend of making art in a beautiful place is what led artists over

By Margaret Regan painter Bruce McGrew lived just a few fifty years ago to Rancho Linda Vista…” tucsonweekly@tucsonlocalmedia.com steps away. He was deeply attached to as Gold puts it. a distinctive bend in the wash, and he Many communes were created in the BELOW THE SLOPES OF THE painted it again and again. rebellious ’60s, but not many survived.

Catalinas’ north face, the Bachman The bend was McGrew’s favorite Gold’s book examines not only the Wash twists its way through thickets of painting spot, and author Paul Gold exhilarating art that came out of this mesquite and creosote. honored the painter and the place lovely place, but the ways the ranch Given a German name loosely trans- by naming his new book Bend in the residents managed to stay together. lated as “man by the brook,” the beloved Wash: The Rancho Linda Vista Artist Plenty of important Tucson artists wash snakes through the Rancho Linda Community. (including McGrew, Joy Fox McGrew, Vista artist colony in Oracle. It’s an Gold reports that McGrew once told James Davis, Charles Littler and arroyo both sandy and rocky, and it arts writer Kathleen Allen, “I go out of changes with the seasons. Sometimes my house every day and look at the des- Andrew Rush, all profiled in this book) have lived and worked at the ranch, it’s a raging creek, sometimes a bed of ert, and every day is new and exciting.” wildflowers, sometimes a parched and That nearly sums up the reason d’être influencing each other, arguing about desperate gulch. for the Rancho Linda Vista—the ranch of art, laughing, bickering and drinking together. Luckily for the survival of the For 38 years, from 1968, when the the beautiful view—an arts community art community, the artists and their famranch got started, to 1999 when he died, still going strong after 53 years. The ilies can keep their privacy by living in one of the ranch’s 21 separate houses, all of them modest and eccentric.

The ranch has often been profiled in magazines and newspapers, but Gold’s welcome tome is apparently the first book on RLV. It’s a beautiful volume, chockablock with color photos of artworks and black-and-whites from the early days, featuring ranch kids and their then-youthful parents.

An art lover who studied art at the UA but didn’t pursue it as a career, Gold is an unapologetic fan of RLV and its artists. He spent 15 years on the project, conducting in-person interviews, with artists as well as spouses, grown children and friends; researching the archives; and even staying at the ranch’s guest house. Musing about his magical time waking up at the ranch, he writes, “…this day, every day, begins perfectly, laid out in beauty…”

Gold briskly lays out the interesting history of the place, including the legendary episode when an Andy Warhol film shoot on the property ended with an FBI raid. More prosaically, the Wilson family ran cattle on the land from 1911 until 1957. The next owners turned it into a dude ranch, adding a pool that would later become a cherished gathering place for the artists, who preferred to swim au naturel.

ARTS & CULTURE

MEANWHILE, BACK AT THE RANCH…

TUCSONWEEKLY.COM 15

Bend in the Wash: The Rancho Linda Vista Artist Community A book by Paul Gold Hardback, large format, 256 pages, many color photos of the art and the artists. Limited edition of 250 copies.

Self-published as Tubecat LLC Available at the Museum Shop at the Tucson Museum of Art, 140 N. Main Ave., 624-2333; at Deadwood Framing, 2530 E. Sixth St., 8820505, appointment only; and online via Paypal. Contact author for links at tubecatllc@gmail.com. $90 plus tax, shipping and handling

It was a time of rebellion, and when the ranch property went up for sale, Littler rounded up a likely bunch of nonconformists eager to live on the land.

Ten families—31 people—signed on in 1968. Five of them, including Littler and McGrew, were UA professors. They paid for shares, not houses, so there was no individual ownership of property. By the time the artists moved in, the old dude ranch was “in a condition that was good for the price but would require its new inhabitants to be handy with a hammer,” Gold writes.

Rush joined up the next year, 1969, and Davis followed in 1970 when he got hired at the UA. The five artists Gold highlights all thrived at the rancho, though just two of them are still alive.

Joy Fox McGrew, Bruce’s widow, the only artist from the founding 1968 crew still living there, is admired for ceramic sculptures, half animal, half human, made from the clay that she pulls from the earth. So is Andrew Rush, known for exquisite prints and drawings, teaching and founder of The Drawing Studio, a school in Tucson. Both artists are still busy having exhibitions, Rush at Tohono Chul last year, and McGrew at Davis Dominguez until it closed down last year.

CONTINUED ON PAGE 21

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TUCSONWEEKLY.COM

FEB. 11, 2021

SMOKE SCREENING

In the wake of recreational sales kickoff, industry advocates face off over testing

By David Abbott david@tucsonlocalmedia.com AS PATIENTS AND ADULT-USE customers jockey for position in the long lines outside cannabis dispensaries throughout the state, dispensary owners and testing labs are struggling to adjust to the new realities of a market that saw a massive increase in its customer base overnight.

The early, surprise rollout of adultuse recreational marijuana sales has resonated throughout the industry, resulting in massive crowds and threats of product shortages and higher prices

as a potentially $1 billion industry seeks to find equilibrium.

Uncertainty has plagued the testing aspect, as the new reality of the marketplace has led to a wild-west interpretation of rules set in place last year, threatening the viability of labs that have invested millions of dollars in their facilities.

Finding a balance between adequate testing and sufficient supplies has industry advocates facing off over testing, with the Arizona Dispensary Association advocating for tighter testing turnaround times and the Arizona Cannabis Lab Association push-

ing the Arizona Department of Health Services to enforce existing laws.

Senate Bill 1646, presented by Thomas “TJ” Shope (R-Dist. 8), would replace the current regulations and is intended to streamline the process and reduce wait times for results.

The bill is supported by the ADA and while it would allow third-party labs to use a single certification as an umbrella for multiple locations, it would also penalize the lab if it did not process samples within seven business days.

Should the lab miss that window, it would be required to “remit the amount paid for the test by the nonprofit medical marijuana dispensary to the [AZDHS] for deposit in the medical marijuana fund,” which would wipe out any profit made in the transaction.

There are currently four fully accredited labs in the state—out of 10 listed on the AZDHS website—with the majority in the Phoenix metro area and one in Navajo County.

Moe Asnani, owner of Downtown and D2 dispensaries in Tucson, is a board member of the ADA who has

been advocating for changes and the passage of SB1646.

Asnani says the imbalance in testing site distribution puts Southern Arizona dispensaries at a disadvantage, due in part to the amount of time it takes just to get samples to the labs.

“If you’re in Maricopa County, you’re OK, you just send a driver on a 20-minute drive: In southern Arizona, we need two or three labs,” he said.

“We’re at the point where AZDHS has to look at it.”

Testing times were already long prior to the passage of Prop 207.

Asnani said for his dispensaries, test results could take weeks if not a couple of months to get back. Testing has added huge operational costs as well, since individual tests can cost $800 to $1,000 each and add $20,000 to $50,000 in expenses per month.

While the COVID pandemic and AZDHS’s responsibility to deal with the public health crisis have caused difficulties with cannabis regulation, the sudden rollout of recreational sales CONTINUED ON PAGE 18

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has added to the problems.

According to Ryan Treacy, co-founder of the Arizona Cannabis Lab Association and owner of C4 Laboratories in Scottsdale, the months since the testing program began have been nothing less than a roller coaster.

After a lackadaisical beginning in November, business spiked when dispensaries were getting up to speed.

But since January, business has bottomed out.

“It’s been pins and needles,” he said. “In November and the beginning of December, we felt on top of the world that there’s plenty of volume,” he said. “It was an exciting time for the business. And here we are, six weeks later and I feel like the rug was pulled out from underneath us because the market is just flat.”

Treacy said that at the moment, a seven-day turnaround is not feasible and that C4 has to retest as much as 25% of the samples it is handling.

“In the beginning, certainly, the main part of it was just a tidal wave of samples; a pure data challenge,” he said. “We’re also seeing a significant amount of failures. And those failures have to have secondary confirmation, which means we’re rerunning 25% of

our samples.”

The failure rate is particularly high in concentrates, where pesticide residues or chemical contaminants can be seen in higher levels due to the nature of the process.

As to the root of the current crisis, Treacy does not think COVID has had as much of an effect on testing as what has happened in the wake of legalization.

“It may have limited the resources that DHS could dedicate internally,” he said. “As to our ability to do the things we needed to do to get ready, I don’t know that COVID was to us what it is to restaurants and outdoor venues, and things like that.”

Treacy believes that as the market matures, everything will work itself out, but in the interim he believes the solution for his side of the business is for AZDHS to enforce rules he thinks are being circumvented.

“It kind of feels like in general, certain people throughout the market have almost thrown their hands up and said, ‘Well, the turnaround times don’t work for me and for my business, and they’re putting a stress on my business,’” he said. “I understand and have empathy and understanding for the stress and problems, but you can’t solve it by ignoring the law, that’s for sure.” ■

FEB. 11, 2021

NEWS NUGGETS AZDHS denies licenses, faces lawsuit

By David Abbott david@tucsonlocalmedia.com A LAWSUIT WORKING ITS WAY through the Arizona court system is challenging Arizona Department of Health Services’ denial of four dispensary licenses in rural Arizona counties, as a Phoenix-based company attempts to fill empty spaces in the cannabis landscape and increase patient access where there currently is none.

The lawsuit pits four LLCs—Joshua Tree, Cactus Wren, Saguaro and Desert Tortoise health centers—against AZDHS, challenging the denial of applications for dispensary licenses in Apache, Greenlee, La Paz and Santa Cruz counties.

The initial complaint was filed in July 2020 and alleges that AZDHS denied the applications despite a ruling by the Arizona Supreme Court stating the Arizona Medical Marijuana Act “requires that ADHS issue registration certificates, and necessarily open the application process, under two distinct circumstances: (1) if the allocation of dispensary certificates is below the one-in-ten ratio [of dispensaries to pharmacies] or (2) a county does not have a dispensary.”

According to the AMMA rules put in place in 2010, the number of medical dispensaries cannot exceed 10% of the number of pharmacies—think CVS or Walgreens—in the state, but may exceed that number to ensure every county has at least one.

ARS 36-2804(C) states, “the department may issue nonprofit medical marijuana dispensary registration

certificates in excess of this limit if necessary to ensure that the department issues at least one nonprofit medical marijuana dispensary registration certificate in each county in which an application has been approved.”

On Jan. 12, 2021, Maricopa Superior Court Judge Joseph Mikitish ruled against AZDHS’ motion to dismiss the complaint. In its answer, AZDHS admitted that there are no dispensaries in the four counties, and that since at least 2017—the last time there was an assessment—there has been less than one dispensary for every 10 pharmacies.

The LLC that filed the lawsuit is controlled by Mason Cave, founder and CEO of the Arizona Cannabis Chamber of Commerce.

Cave said his LLC applied for the licenses on multiple occasions.

“We tried in 2019 for the empty counties, and then we tried to apply in 2020 again,” he said. “The judge came through and said there’s something here. So basically, we’re moving forward with the case, and [the judge] basically said they do have an obligation to fill the counties.”

Cave has no idea how long the case may take or what might happen even if judgment comes down in his favor, whether he might have a leg up on the competition, or if AZDHS will open up the process for any applicants.

“It seems to me like they should just be following the rules that are in place, and they’re not exactly doing that, especially if the Supreme Court told them that they have to fill all those extra spaces,” he said. “I don’t know the rationale for not issuing the licenses other than trying to diminish patient access for some reason, which doesn’t make any sense.”

Should he get the licenses, his LLC is ready to pull the trigger on a least one dispensary for Springerville, in Apache County.

“Those guys in Springville, they have to drive to drive like two hours [to get to a dispensary],” he said. “Our Springerville building actually was a dispensary before so it’s ready to roll, so we’re literally waiting. We [could] be up and running in 30 to 60 days.” ■

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FREE WILL ASTROLOGY

By Rob Brezsny. Go to RealAstrology.com to check out Rob Brezsny’s EXPANDED WEEKLY HOROSCOPE 1-877-873-4888 or 1-900-950-7700 $1.99 per minute. 18 and over. Touchtone phone required.

ARIES (March 21-April 19): Author Anton Chekhov made a radical proposal: ”Perhaps the feelings we experience when we are in love represent a normal state. Being in love shows people who they should be.” In accordance with astrological potentials, my beloved Aries darling, I invite you to act as if Chekhov’s proposal were absolutely true for at least the next two weeks. Be animated by a generous lust for life. Assume that your intelligence will reach a peak as you express excited kindness and affectionate compassion. Be a fount of fond feelings and cheerful empathy and nourishing ardor.

TAURUS (April 20-May 20): Poet and filmmaker Jean Cocteau told the following story about Taurus composer Erik Satie (1866–1925). When Satie died, his old friends, many of whom were highly accomplished people, came to visit his apartment. There they discovered that all the letters they had sent him over the years were unopened. Satie had never read them! How sad that he missed out on all that lively exchange. I beg you not to do anything that even remotely resembles such a lack of receptivity during the coming weeks, Taurus. In fact, please do just the opposite: Make yourself as open as possible to engagement and influence. I understand that the pandemic somewhat limits your social interactions. Just do the best you can.

GEMINI (May 21-June 20): On behalf of the cosmic omens, I demand that the important people in your life be reliable and generous toward you in the coming weeks. You can tell them I said so. Tell them that you are doing pretty well, but that in order to transform pretty well into very well, you need them to boost their support and encouragement. Read them the following words from author Alan Cohen: “Those who love you are not fooled by mistakes you have made or dark images you hold about yourself. They remember your beauty when you feel ugly; your wholeness when you are broken; your innocence when you feel guilty; and your purpose when you are confused.”

CANCER (June 21-July 22): For a while, poet Alfred de Musset (1810–1857) was the sexual partner of Cancerian novelist George Sand (1804–1876), also known as Aurore Dupin. He said that after intense love-making sessions, he would fall asleep and wake up to find her sitting at her desk, engrossed in working on her next book. Maybe the erotic exchange inspired her creativity? In accordance with current astrological potentials, I recommend Sand’s approach to you. Vigorous pleasure will coordinate well with hard work. As will deep release with strong focus. As will tender intimacy with clear thinking. (PS: I know your options for pleasure and intimacy may be somewhat limited because of the pandemic. Call on your ingenuity and resourcefulness to work the best magic possible.)

LEO (July 23-Aug. 22): Leo poet Warsan Shire suggests, “Document the moments you feel most in love with yourself—what you’re wearing, who you’re around, what you’re doing. Recreate and repeat.”

This would be an excellent exercise for you to carry out during this Valentine season. You’re in a phase when you’re likely to enhance your lovability and attract extra support simply by intensifying and refining the affectionate compassion you feel and express toward yourself.

VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22): I wish the pandemic would give us a short break so we could celebrate the Valentine season with maximum sensual revelry and extravagant displays of joyful tenderness.

I wish we could rip off our masks and forget about social-distancing and hug and kiss everyone who wants to be hugged and kissed. But that’s not going to happen. If we hope to be free to indulge in a Lush Love and Lust Festival by Valentine Season in 2022, we’ve got to be cautious and controlled now. And we are all counting on you Virgos to show us how to be as wildly, lyrically romantic as possible while still observing the necessary limitations. That’s your special task.

SAVAGE LOVE TOY BOY

By Dan Savage, mail@savagelove.net

I’m positive you’ve written something about this in the past. I have searched your archives but have only managed to find people arguing in the comments about this topic when what I want is your advice. My 16-year-old son is stealing our sex toys. My son took my husband’s handheld toy a several months ago. I found it where it shouldn’t have been and let my husband know. He talked to our son and told him these are personal items, like a toothbrush, and that he needed to stop taking them. A few weeks ago I noticed my dildo was missing. I thought I had misplaced it or that my husband hid it

somewhere. As it turns out, our son took it. We talked with him again and stressed that these are personal items and not something to be shared. I want to get him his own toy so he stops taking ours. My husband is squicked out about it and I agree it’s weird to have your parents buy a toy for you but he clearly wants one. I don’t want to pick it out. I want to give him a prepaid gift card and have him pick out what he wants from the website of a reputable shop. Is there a better way to handle this?

—Mama In Houston

LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22): Author Raymond Carver wrote, “It ought to make us feel ashamed when we talk like we know what we’re talking about when we talk about love.” That seems like a harsh oversimplification to me. Personally, I think it’s fun and interesting to pretend we know what we’re talking about when we talk about love. And I think that will be especially true for you in the coming weeks.

In my astrological opinion, you should be discussing love extensively and boldly and imaginatively.

You should redefine what love means to you. You should re-evaluate how you express it and reconfigure the way it works in your life.

to you. Be inspired by what poet Clementine von Radics wrote to the man she was dating, telling him why she thought they could start living together. Here’s her note: “Because you texted me a haiku about the moon when you were drunk.

Because you cried at the end of the movie Die Hard on Christmas eve. Because when I’m sick you bring me fruit, kiss me on the mouth, and hold me even though I’m gross. Because you bring me flowers for no reason but on Valentine’s Day you gave me a bouquet of Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups.

Because every time I show you a poem I love you’ve read it already.”

SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21): I’m turning over this horoscope to psychologist John Welwood. His words are the medicine you need at this juncture in the evolution of intimacy. Study the following quote and interpret it in ways that help illuminate your relationship with togetherness: “A soul connection is a resonance between two people who respond to the essential beauty of each other’s individual natures, behind their facades, and who connect on this deeper level. This kind of mutual recognition provides the catalyst for a potent alchemy. It is a sacred alliance whose purpose is to help both partners discover and realize their deepest potentials.”

AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18): I’ve adopted some lines from poet Walt Whitman for you to use in composing a love note. Send it to a person you know and love, or to a person you want to know and love, or a person you will know and love in the future. Here it is: “We are oaks growing in the openings side by side. We are two fishes swimming together. We are two predatory hawks, soaring above and looking down. We are two clouds driving overhead. We are seas mingling, two cheerful waves rolling over each other. We are snow, rain, cold, darkness. We circle and circle till arriving home again, voiding all but freedom and our own joy.”

SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21): Transform yourself with the sweetest challenge you can dream up.

Give yourself a blessing that will compel you to get smarter and wilder. Dazzle yourself as you dare to graduate from your history. Rile yourself up with a push to become your better self, your best self, your amazingly fulfilled and masterful self. Ask yourself to leap over the threshold of ordinary magic and into the realm of spooky good magic. And if all that works out well, Sagittarius, direct similar energy toward someone you care about. In other words, transform them with the sweetest challenge you can dream up. Dare them to graduate from their history. And so on.

PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20): “To heal is to touch with love that which was previously touched by fear,” wrote author Stephen Levine. I propose you make this theme a keynote for your best relationships in the coming days. What can you do to alleviate the anxiety and agitation of the people you care for? How might they do the same for you?

If you play along with the cosmic rhythms, you will have extraordinary power to chase away fear with love. ■

CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19): I invite you to compose a message to a person you’d like to be closer to and whom you’re sure would like to be closer

Teenagers. Going into their rooms for even a second—even just to leave clean and folded laundry on their beds—is an unforgiveable invasion of their privacy, a world-historical crime on a par with the Nazi invasion of Poland, an atrocity that should land mom and dad in a cell in the Hague. But that same kid will tear their parents’ bedroom apart looking for mom and dad’s sex toys, any cash mom and dad have at home, mom and dad’s secret stash of pot, etc. Because while they’re entitled to absolute privacy, mom and dad—or dad and dad or mom and mom— aren’t entitled to any privacy at all. (And your son may never forgive you for the embarrassment you caused him when you asked him not to steal—and not to use—your dildo.)

Homework: How has the pandemic changed your approach to getting and giving love? How have the restrictions on our ability to mingle with each other altered the ways you seek intimacy?

FreeWillAstrology.com

How do you handle this?

You could forbid him to go into your bedroom. You could even put a lock on your bedroom door. But you’ll forget to lock it one day or one day he’ll learn to pick the lock and before you know it he’ll be back in your bedroom picking through your sex toys.

You could run out the clock. Your son is 16 years old and he’ll hopefully be out of the house in less time than it took to get him out of diapers. Twenty-four short months, hundreds of millions of COVID vaccinations, and a few college applications are all that stand between you and having your house all to yourselves again. At that point you and your husband won’t have to worry about your

FEB. 11, 2021

son stealing your sex toys—hell, at that point you can make a lovely centerpiece out of them for the dining room table. But while running out the clock allows you to avoid some squickiness, you’re still gonna have to worry about him swiping your sex toys or—even worse—swiping one, using it and then putting it back without cleaning it properly. Most 16-year-old boys can’t clean themselves properly; the odds that your son is capable of sterilizing your dildo after using it on himself are very, very low. (The odds that your son can make you wanna jump in a time machine and go back 17 years and sterilize yourself? Very, very high.)

You could buy him some sex toys. I think this is the best option. Get your son a gift card that he can blow on some toys for himself at a reputable sex toy shop. Or you could pick out a few for him—you already have a pretty handle on the type of sex toys he finds appealing—and leave those toys for him on his bed next to his clean and folded laundry. Having a few sex toys of his own won’t necessarily stop him from tearing your bedroom apart— there’s still your pot and cash to find— but it will make him less likely to tear your bedroom apart looking sex toys.

And perhaps most importantly, buying your son some sex toys will allow you to suspend your disbelief and pretend your son isn’t looking through your sex toys long enough to help him fill out those college applications.

A few weeks ago in your column, you were responding to a guy who was unsure about his relationship because his boyfriend’s kinks didn’t match up with his own. You said that kinks are “hard-wired” and that, for someone who has them, acting on their kinks is necessary for them to have a fulfilling sex life. Wow. That leapt off the page at me.

This is something I’ve struggled with most of my life and that made things so crystal clear. From the time I was first sexually aware, I knew I was gay and that I was attracted to BDSM. I am five years out of a 20-year relationship. My partner and I dabbled in BDSM but I never felt like he was really into it. He was just doing it for me. When I asked what I could do for him, he’d always say “nothing.” That made it even more disappointing. The relationship didn’t end over his stuff, but I regret sticking with it, and an unfulfilling sex life, for

so long. The kink stuff started so early for me. Hard-wired doesn’t even begin to describe it. Pre-puberty I was fascinated when I saw guys getting tied up on TV, in comics, and in movies.

But now here I am, single and 63 years old.

I haven’t dated anyone since my relationship ended.

I don’t want to date purely vanilla people or people with kinks that aren’t compatible with mine. I’m just not sure what to do. Any advice?

—I’ve No Clever Acronym In the column where I described kinks as hard-wired—which they are for most people, INCA, although some folks do manage to acquire them—I didn’t advise kinky people to date only other kinky people. So long as a kinky person isn’t 1. being shamed and 2. is allowed to enjoy their kinks with others who share them, a mixed kink/ vanilla relationship can work. So don’t limit yourself to dating only guys who are into BDSM. Date vanilla guys you meet through mainstream dating apps but be open about your kinks from the start and be clear about your intent to enjoy your kinks with guys who share them. And date kinky guys you meet on kink dating apps—there are plenty of guys your age on Recon, the biggest personals site for kinky gay and bi men, and guys of all ages who are into guys your age. Good luck.

Gay boy here with a new boyfriend.

We’ve been together for almost two months and I TOLD HIM that I want an open relationship but I AM NOT comfortable with him dating other men. I MADE THAT CLEAR. A week ago he oh-so-casually drops that he’s been meeting up with a guy for EIGHT FUCKING YEARS! I told him he had to STOP this but my he REFUSES to stop it. He says they aren’t “dating” so he didn’t betray me. I looked at their text messages—GOING BACK YEARS—and this guy will send him a message once

every few months and my boyfriend hurries over to his house to blow him.

My boyfriend thinks it shouldn’t matter that he’s “servicing” this one other person since we both fuck around. My problem is the “ONE OTHER PERSON” part of the equation!

I am NOT interested in monogamy but I am STRONGLY opposed to MY BOYFRIEND having an ONGOING THING with another man! If our ages matter: I am in my mid-twenties and VGL, my boyfriend is in his mid-thirties and VGL, and this guy is in his LATE forties and TOTALLY AVERAGE LOOKING. I do not see why my boyfriend won’t GIVE UP this man for me.

—Really Angry Guy Into No Games I can almost see why your boyfriend wouldn’t want to give up this guy for you, RAGING. I mean, if I squint I can almost make it out…

Look, your boyfriend has been servicing this guy for almost a decade. If they wanted to date, they’d be dating.

If they wanted to be together, they’d be together. And if you force your boyfriend to choose between the DEMANDING INSECURE CAPS BOY he’s known for a little less than two months—that would be you—and the guy he’s been servicing for a little less than a decade, you’re going to lose. If you wanna be with your VGL boyfriend, RAGING, offer to grandfather the average guy in, i.e. agree to him continuing to service this impossibly old fart on the condition that your boyfriend doesn’t add any new “regulars” to his rotation. But the off chance your boyfriend also reads my column: OMG, DUDE, RUN. ■ mail@savagelove.net Follow Dan on Twitter @FakeDanSavage. savagelovecast.com

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BEND IN THE WASH

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 15

The late Bruce McGrew was a matchless master of watercolor. Davis, who died in 2016, was a painter of edgy urban scenes—and subtle homages to the ranch of the beautiful view. His haunting work found its way to the Metropolitan Museum of Art and other lofty venues. Littler, who died suddenly in 1991, originally worked for abstract expressionist Hans Hoffman. He was a talented painter but he eventually moved away from the idea of art as product.

Working with his second wife Pat Dolan, he made the desert itself into art, turning twigs and other debris into ephemeral constructions. The ranch, he would say, was his finest work of art.

Certainly life at the ranch was not always idyllic. Littler and Bruce could knock heads about what art is or should be. They were the “most polarized,” Rush told author Gold. McGrew loved grand paintings and he revered the art history tradition. Littler was the visionary and trailblazer. “The ranch was a performance piece to Charles,” Rush said. “…

Bruce was the keeper of the tabernacle when it came to art.”

There was plenty of drinking, drug using and extramarital sex in the old days, and the legendary parties were outright debauches. Broken marriages abounded. Gold doesn’t shy away from detailing the behavior of the male artists. He cites their “flamboyant lifestyle,” but in these very different #MeToo times, the ranch’s women might call it something far worse.

The children of the artists had extraordinary childhoods: they played undisturbed in nature with a crew of readily available friends and they watched a whole colony of serious artists at work.

But some of these free-range kids felt abandoned. One now-grown offspring told Gold that he felt like he had no parents, but he also said the independence he was given strengthened his character.

Tellingly, many of the children who grew up there, as second-generation RLV’ers, left for a time as adults. But eventually they came back so that their own kids, the third generation, could grow up among artists and live an unconventional life near the bend in the wash. ■

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We mov to a NEWed LOCATIO N

Tucson AZ 85705

342-4042

ACROSS 1 Java server 4 Drum typically played

with one hand 9 Outfit rarely worn out, for short 12 Migration formation 13 Big wheels 15 Quick haircut 16 Cocktail specification 18 Top of the line 19 Chip in, in a way 20 “Get your negative energy outta here” 22 Bitter criticism 26 Symbol of freshness 27 Brian in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame 28 Rare blood type, for short 30 Worked in a wood shop, say 33 “Thanks for noticing me” character of kid-lit 35 Volcanologist’s study

36 2007 black comedy

directed by Frank Oz Grain-shaped pasta 42 Wetlands waders 43 Twiddles one’s thumbs, say 45 Whole lot 46 What an electrolyte produces 49 Partner of fast 52 Magazine with the annual Black Women in Hollywood Awards 54 Fedoras, e.g.

57 Makes a scene?

58 Et ___ 59 Words of correction … or a hint to 16-, 20-, 36and 54-Across 63 “Let’s go already!”

64 One whose work is on the books?

65 New Year’s ___ 66 Whole lot 67 Test, as ore 68 Main 41

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4 Texter’s message of

appreciation

5 Kind of TV cable: Abbr.

6 “Ultimate driving

machine,” in ads

7 Poet who said “Let

others praise ancient times. I am glad I was born in these” 8 Do a landscaper’s job on 9 Conflict waged on behalf of superpowers

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Bring bad luck Disney henchman with long, white sideburns 14 Italian stratovolcano 15 Results of some foreclosures 17 Gen ___ 21 They follow the nus 23 Animal also called a steinbock 24 Dark rock 25 Pope whose pontificate lasted less than one month in 1605 29 Apt rhyme of “nabs” 31 Actress Mendes 32 Indian lentil dish 33 Harmful bacterial secretion 34 Return online?

36 Blue-chip index 37 K’s help it 11

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38 More than can be

imagined

39 Exercises 40 What’s happening 44 Beantown team 46 Marks of a ruler 47

A to A, say

48 Brand with a three-

leaved logo 50 Annual Austin festival, familiarly 51 What’s more 53 Chow down 54 Bit of trivia 55 Resident at 123 Sesame Street 56 Hindu honorifics 60 Often-mispunctuated word 61 Mauna ___ 62 Suffix with brew or quack

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