You can search high and low for vision in Mesa and sometimes you catch a glimpse of it and sometimes you’re just not sure. But there was no doubt in my mind by the time a group of Tribune journalists ended a meeting with members of the Mesa Grande Neighborhood Alliance on Tuesday. This is as determined a group of neighbors as I’ve ever met who weren’t in our office to try to stop something from happening in their backyard. Tanya Collins, Bob Meyer, Dave Richins and Bob Parker are all about making something happen in their backyard of West Mesa. Right now they’re focused on bringing the Waveyard water theme park to the Riverview Park area across the street from where the impresive Bass Pro building is taking shape. They can tell you the exact number of restaurants going in at the Riverview shopping center and name them if you want them to. They’re also keeping a watchful eye (no, make that a hard stare) on what Banner Health System will do with Mesa General Hospital and on developments around the Fiesta Mall where one the owner of one rundown piece of property seems content to let it lay fallow unless the city wants to pitch in $2 million. A light rail stop is coming to West Mesa, the old Motorola plant site is now the bustling Broadway 101 commerce park. It would be outlandish to credit all these developments to the neighborhood alliance. But neighborhood groups can kill progress. This is one grassroots group determined to turn one of the city’s oldest areas into a happening place. They made a believer out of me. Makes you wonder if it’s possible to bundle them up and run them in the coming mayoral election on the can-do ticket.
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