“I want you to put me under your shade tree

Please get me out of the sun.”

From Shade Tree Mechanic by Henry Oden

What do palo verde trees have to do with the mayor’s race in Mesa?

Let’s find some shade and I’ll tell you.

Well, it all started on Wednesday in T.C. Eggington’s restaurant where mayoral candidate Scott Smith and I spent an hour or so getting to know each other.

This wasn’t our first meeting, but it was the first meeting at which he made an impact on my thinking and at which I began to understand what he has to offer.

In prior meetings at the Tribune, he came up short in articulating a message other than to say he would lead change. Who in politics isn’t saying that these days? I thought at the time.

But here is a little of what I learned:

Smith has a remarkable story about how he made his money in business. While getting his law degree (He also has an MBA and his CPA), he got a job working for a local housing development business whose principals got in trouble with the law over their fundraising activities in Germany. As a result, the business’s board turned to Smith to run the business.

To make a long story short, after battling German shareholders who wanted to liquidate the company, Smith said he found other investors, signed a $60 million IOU to buy the company, turned it around and was eventually bought out in the middle of the Valley’s housing boom by K. Hovnanian Homes.

Talk about risk and reward. Not much beats that kind of experience in the trenches. Now we know how he can afford to finance his campaign.

He thinks city leadership should never have pulled its financial support from the MLK Day activities and the Veterans’ Day parade, and shortened library hours after failure of the property tax ballot issue. Savings were so small in the scheme of things that it came across as punishment meted out by the city because the vote didn’t go the way the city wanted.

I couldn’t help but remember how national parks were shut down as the result of a budget battle between U.S. House speaker, Newt Gingrich and President Bill Clinton. Voters didn’t like being the pawn in a political battle, blamed Gingrich, and taught the House’s Republican majority a hard lesson at the polls.

Then there are the palo verde trees on Main street in downtown Mesa.

Palo verde trees were planted because city staff noted they didn’t use much water and we live in a hot, dry desert, Smith said.

What city staff didn’t note was that we live in a hot, dry desert and pedestrians from time to time need a little shade to rest under.

So the point, Smith said, is if your overall goal is to bring foot traffic downtown, you do it with trees that welcome pedestrians.

While Smith has been guarded about his position on an expected property tax vote for police and fire facilities, he is not guarded in criticizing the process. Years ago his father was superintendent of Mesa schools and once told him he never presented a bond issue to voters. His father explained that the citizens presented the bond issue proposals to him. In other words it started at the grass roots.

The proposed police and fire bond issue for next November’s ballot is coming out of City Hall and to the voters. That’s not how it should work, Smith said.

It took three meetings, but Scott Smith is making sense to me. But will he make sense to the voters?

If he shapes and sharpens his message, with or without shade trees, this could be a hot mayoral race.

Who makes sense to you in this race? Why?

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