PHOENIX – It started out as reaction to “The Zone,” an area near downtown Phoenix that was overrun with homeless.
The Zone is gone. But now Republican lawmakers are asking voters to approve a law that would put local governments throughout the state on the financial hook if property owners say they incurred expenses because of the failure to enforce various state and local statutes and ordinances, ranging from illegal camping and loitering to defecating or drinking in public.
Lobbyists for cities and counties tried to talk GOP lawmakers out of putting it on the November ballot. They said communities often had little choice but to allow things like illegal camping because that was the ruling of a federal appeals court…