Matthew Casey

A pot farm as big as Alien Labs produces an enormous amount of odor, which is still taboo even though weed is legal. The perfume plants release during harvest is unavoidable, and perhaps the most pungent.

Local and federal officials cheered in November when part of the Santa Cruz River in southern Arizona was tagged to be part of a namesake future urban wildlife refuge. Now, a conservation group is injecting $600,000 into the effort.

An attorney for a teen who in 2024 had his chin split open and broke his wrist while Phoenix police arrested him says the officers involved should be fired. A new claim against the city accuses officers of not following state law for handling child abuse allegations.

Phoenix police officers have orders redefining when they may use violence or physical force. The policy taking effect is a win for interim Chief Michael Sullivan as union membership opposes his bid for the permanent role.

A political appointee of former President Joe Biden, Gary Restaino worked for the Justice Department for about 20 years, most of it in Arizona.

University of Arizona researchers say vegetable farmers are more concentrated in Yuma County than car manufacturing is around Detroit. According to their new study, Yuma agriculture and associated businesses contributed $4.4 billion in economic activity to Arizona in 2022.

In less than a week, a new Trump administration is set to take charge of a yearslong civil rights investigation of Phoenix and its police department. There’s been a recent flurry of action involving two other cities reviewed by the U.S. Justice Department during the Biden administration.

Turnover is expected in Arizona’s top-federal-prosecutor job as the Biden administration ends this month and a new Trump administration starts. Biden appointee, Gary Restaino, has been U.S. Attorney for Arizona for about three years.

The catering company for the Waste Management Phoenix Open and other big local events says it hopes to make hundreds of on-the-spot hires this month.

Searing results of a nearly three-year civil rights investigation of the city of Phoenix and its police department were finally made public this year. City leaders started 2024 with a resistance campaign of pushing back against the prospect of independent oversight while pointing to self-imposed reforms.