I have to wonder how bad these two were in their schoolyards when they were kids, because now that they are (allegedly) mature adults, they still engage in wantonly selfish and anti-social behavior.
From AZCentral.com -
Arpaio, Thomas seek to stop board from raiding fundsLet's see -
Maricopa County Attorney Andrew Thomas and Sheriff Joe Arpaio on Monday asked a Superior Court judge to issue a temporary restraining order to keep the county Board of Supervisors from raiding special funds set aside for law enforcement.
The supervisors were given one-time legislative authority to lift restrictions on special-revenue funds to make required payments to help balance the state budget. County budget officials believe they can tap $27 million from 26 such funds - including $11 million to $15 million in criminal-justice related accounts.
Schools are closing, state parks are being closed, teachers and other educators are being laid off, cities, counties, and the state are "furloughing" or completely cutting loose employees, human services in Arizona are being all but ended, but the Boris and Natasha of Arizona politics (and no, I'm not making a comment as to which one is most analogous to which cartoon character :) ) are still insisting that they should be exempted from any sort of budget-tightening.
Guess things like trips to Honduras and funnelling money to former employers are more important than balancing the state's and the county's budgets.
Anyway, the suit will be heard by Judge Andrew Klein on Wednesday in Maricopa County Superior Court. It names the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors, the supes individually, the County, and Governor Jan Brewer as defendants.
The most interesting part of this, and it nearly generated a post of its own, is the name of the attorney representing Arpaio and Thomas in the lawsuit.
The court info linked above lists that attorney as "Kerry Martin."
Which happens to be the name of the wife of one of Thomas and Arpaio's main saddle partners, State Treasurer Dean Martin.
Which almost set me off on a riff on the incestuous nature of AZ politics, but since I don't ever remember hearing that Kerry Martin was an attorney, I thought I'd look a little deeper.
Apparently, my instinct for verification was a good one.
Turns out there is an attorney named Kerry Martin in the Phoenix office of the firm of Ogletree Deakins who specializes in employment law.
Now, I don't know for certain that he is the Kerry Martin who is repping the two would-be backwater despots that *are* our County Attorney and Sheriff (it's actually a rather common name), but it seems likely.
Would have been more fun if it was Dean Martin's wife. :)
Update: A phone call to Attorney Martin cleared this up - he *is* the attorney representing Thomas and Arpaio, and he is *not* the Kerry Martin who is married to State Treasurer Dean Martin. :)
End update...
Wednesday will be a busy day, what with the March4Schools rally for education at the State Capitol and the Governor addressing a joint session of the lege, so I won't be able to attend the hearing, but it will be worth checking the news for the outcome.
Later!
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