Thousands of students were left angry and frustrated after waiting up to five hours in line to vote in the Undergraduate Student Government Downtown’s uncontested election Tuesday.
The line to vote wrapped around the block in an election with only one ticket running.
In an act students are calling voter suppression, USGD officials chose to change the election process from online voting on MyASU to in-person voting at one location at the Mercado Building. Thousands of students had to walk nearly seven minutes to the location.
“They don’t want us to vote,” said sophomore Ann Otherone. “They don’t want us to have that major key to democracy.”
After waiting several hours in line, some students opted to order pizza, but were told Dominos’ machine could not process their Maroon and Gold dollars. The polling location also ran out of ballots at one point.
Students complained that the long lines and inefficiency of the polling place robbed them of their right to vote.
“We have a voice and a right to elect who we want to represent us,” said junior Meg Lanton. “I want to be able to vote for the person who basically does nothing as USGD president.”
Furthering some students’ theory that the election was fixed, former USGD president and graduating senior Frank “FS3” Smith III was elected as president. Smith said he is considering extending his undergraduate education to serve as president.
“It’s ridiculous,” said freshman Damien Lee. “He doesn’t even go here.”
Smith was projected to win the election by Phoenix Diablo and other major media outlets while students were still in line to vote. Students are calling upon Maricopa County Recorder Helen Purcell to resign over the long wait times and potential voter disenfranchisement.
“Helen Purcell is inept,” said downtown Phoenix resident Peter Perspiration, who is not an ASU student and therefore ineligible to vote. “She should resign.”
Students have started a change.org petition to call for a revote.
City planners have announced that construction on another luxury apartment complex will begin soon, located in the middle of the road in the Third and Roosevelt street intersection.
The new development, Roosevelt Slant, will stand 18 stories high and be located alongside current complex Roosevelt Point.
Abitt Shady, development manager for Roosevelt Slant, is excited to begin the efforts towards bringing life to the downtown Phoenix area.
“Residents at Roosevelt Slant will be given an amazing opportunity to experience the urban culture of downtown,” Shady said. “What better way to experience the intersection of arts and culture than to also live in an intersection, for example, Third and Roosevelt.”
The announcement of the development has caused extreme controversy throughout the downtown community.
Roosevelt Slant representatives, who asked to stay anonymous for safety concerns due of violent backlash from the arts district community members, have cited the lack of available space in the area for the decision to build directly in the road. Representatives have gone as far as calling it, “an innovative use of space” and an “opportunity to think about the pedestrians, for once.”
Residents of the area have raised concerns to the traffic problems that will be created by closing off Third, Fifth and Roosevelt streets. Roosevelt Point resident Ida O’ntcare is concerned about the construction affecting her driving routine.
“What’s the point of illegally exiting off I-10 onto Third Street if I can no longer get to my apartment?” Ontcare said.
Drivers on both Roosevelt and Third streets will need to use Roosevelt Slant’s underground tunnels in order to pass through the intersection. According to Shady, the fifty foot underground highway would be “at least mostly efficient” and would only require a “modest fee” for passing traffic.
Berly Makinit, an advocate for the Roosevelt Row arts district, was “appalled” by the announcement of Roosevelt Slant.
“This complex is dividing the arts scene of downtown,” Makinit said. “This is a terrible idea. They’re literally building an apartment in the middle of the road.”
Makinit continued, as a single tear rolled down his cheek.
“I don’t know if this is legal, but the gentrification is so out of hand. I feel uninspired to fight the good fight anymore. Maybe this is how the local community dies out…”
Construction is set to begin at 4 a.m. on Friday, April 1.
New micro-micro apartments will join the downtown Phoenix skyline, or rather groundline, this spring. Thousands of applicants have already applied.
A new apartment complex called Square One will make its debut this May on the west side of the Arizona Center in downtown Phoenix. Square One will consist of ten one-square foot apartments. There will be five one bedroom and five two bedroom apartments available for rent, with the one bedroom apartments costing $1,500 and the two bedroom apartments costing $2,500. Electricity and water bills are not included in the rent.
“We wanted to keep the prices affordable for college students,” said Sherlock Homes, the manager of the complex. “I guess you could say that just because it’s an apartment complex, it doesn’t have to be complex. You know?”
The new development is already attracting outsized attention from downtown ASU students.
“Finally! An apartment downtown that I can afford,” kinesiology student Monica Cash said. “My last name is Cash, but I’m not made of money.”
Those living in Square One will get to experience free wifi, two puddle-sized luxurious miniature pools and pet-friendly living spaces. Square One will also feature residential activity nights such as an annual competition to see how many people can fit in one apartment.
Homes said the idea to create Square One first came to him when his son asked him to build a fort for a sleepover.
“I figured I could make a big profit off of this—or rather a FORTune,” Homes said.
Thousands of applicants have already applied to live in Square One.
“It’s a unique experience, and I can’t wait to hopefully live here one day,” said applicant Chandler House, who is actually an ant. “I ANTicipate great things.”
“Narrowing down the applicants is going to be difficult,” Homes said. “My team and I will look through each application and judge whether or not the applicant is ready to live in such a unique housing environment.”
Homes said some of the things his team is looking for in an applicant are someone who is small enough to live in the complex and quiet, as the walls in the complex will be extremely thin.
Despite the popularity of Square One, some critics have debated over the size of the apartments.
“They need to be smaller,” argued critic Janice Short.
For more information about the apartments and how to apply visit www.SquareOneApartments.blogspot.com.
The sounds, smells and bright lights of Hell breaking through the surface of the Earth to let loose the apocalypse on downtown Phoenix failed to phase some city residents, including ASU students. (Utah Jones/PD)
While many in downtown Phoenix and across the globe were alarmed by yesterday’s apocalypse, some downtown residents were less impacted by the fall of humankind.
Joe Blow, a freshman at ASU’s Downtown Phoenix campus, said he only noticed the end of the majority of the world’s population because of a drop in posts on the anonymous message-board app “YikYak.”
“I thought it was always like this,” Blow said. “I was watching a movie and heard some yelling, so I closed my window.”
When asked about the explosions and roaming bands of cannibalistic survivors, Blow said that he “thought that was that First Friday thing.”
The marauding horde that Blow mistook for one of the major cultural components of the city he now calls home eventually settled down and made its base at an Undergraduate Student Government Downtown meeting. The horde’s attendance made the meeting the largest of the semester, though USGD still lacked a full Senate.
While some students downtown have not yet been affected by the apocalypse, a number of industries are making changes to better cater to the event’s survivors. A local business owner who has started referring to herself exclusively as “Angry Annabelle” said that her store was well-equipped to handle the changes brought about by the destruction of thousands of years of development.
“We figure it’ll be a lot like the slowdown we see in the summer months,” Annabelle said. “Just for the rest of our existence. At least we don’t have to pay to keep the place air-conditioned anymore.”
Annabelle said her store will be stocking up on locally-crafted artisan survival tools, with a small section continuing to provide cactus-laden T-shirts and coffee mugs for confused tourists who believe they’re close to the Grand Canyon.
Despite the destruction of most of the city’s cars and their drivers, damaged roads and the phenomenon of “post-apocalyptic sprawl” have continued to make things difficult for walkers and bikers.
The city of Phoenix has stated that the apocalypse will not change parking hours, although changes to standard business hours and the lack of gasoline and electricity may cause adjustments in the future.
The Devil and his staff have found downtown Phoenix to be the prime location to send the less fortunate into the fiery beyond, building pits on every empty lot with the help of the government. (Sat Antics/PD)
It’s no doubt the arrival of the apocalypse has taken a major toll on humanity and all other living things on Earth. But Hell has also been facing difficulties, as dense cities with plenty of street development and construction block many possibilities to build pits into the burning depths.
Hell’s effort in urban areas to get people into the abyss has been heavily criticized by the national media, exposing major holes in the Devil’s work leading his part of the apocalypse.
But the Devil and his staff have found hope in downtown Phoenix as a prime location to send the less fortunate into the fiery beyond.
That hope, the Devil said at a press conference in Phoenix on Thursday, rests in the area’s vast amount of vacant lots.
“Vacant lots are some of the easiest places to build pits to hell, and in Phoenix we found the jackpot,” the Devil said during his visit to the city.
Since the apocalypse started, construction crews from Hell have been coming downtown to tear down lots and begin pit development. The operations set up fast, construct quickly and move on to the next of many available vacant lots in the area.
“I’m not gonna lie, it’s been tough in some parts of the world to get people down into hell,” said Faust Fieri, spokesperson for the Devil. “New York, Beijing, London, they’re all packed to the brim, and it makes it hard to find vacant land to plunge a hole straight down to Hell. That wasn’t the case at all with Phoenix.”
Once a pit is completed and the lot is activated, Hell updates its online list of Hell-certified places to jump into the netherworld. On its website, Hell has advertised downtown Phoenix as “the place to go in the southwest to meet your doom.”
“I’m happy there’s someone finally doing something with these lots,” said Gittinhaht N. Herre, the owner of a hot-dog stand in front of a pit on Second and McKinley streets. “They’ve been empty for way too long, and it’s nice to see some development.”
Herre said the pits have been a boom for his business, if only for a short time.
“Most people want to have a bite before they go in there. It’s a long trip — no one wants to travel on an empty stomach!” he joked. “Unfortunately, I’ve been spending all those earnings at the casino, so it’s only a matter of time before I visit the pits myself.”
So far, Hell has bought 10 vacant lots to build its pits to the inferno, some of which were formerly city-owned. Five pits have been completed downtown, and two more should be finished by Monday, Fieri said.
The city of Phoenix sold most of them at low rates. There was only one request: that none of the City Hall staff would be sent to Hell.
“We brought in Heaven to mediate the negotiations,” Fieri said. “To be frank, I was way too fired up about this deal to let it pass anyway.”
The Hell-pit construction has brought in thousands of visitors, most of them from the California area, who don’t want to face long lines to meet their fate.
“Including the drive, I’m still waiting less time than if I would’ve gone down to the (Los Angeles Memorial) Coliseum,” said Los Angeles resident Helen A. Handbesket, referring to the University of Southern California football stadium. “Go Trojans!”
About 10,000 more Hellbound visitors are expected to arrive downtown today, the Devil said.
“Going to Heaven is easy,” the Devil said. “All you need is to send people to the open sky. Creating the pathways to get to Hell takes a lot more work.”
Despite pressure from the Super Bowl host committee about the fact that there are only 12 residents remaining, Phoenix officials insist on keeping Super Bowl activities in downtown Phoenix. (Francis Hallo/PD)
The apocalypse that recently shook much of downtown Phoenix and the world is not expected to affect Super Bowl festivities, city officials said Friday.
Phoenix Mayor Greg Stanton said he is used to people regarding downtown Phoenix as “boring,” but the apocalypse could even be seen as part of downtown Phoenix’s revitalization efforts.
“We’re currently in the middle of revitalizing downtown, but as we’ve seen before, big events like pre-Super Bowl festivities draw people from outside downtown Phoenix to the area,” Stanton said. “We’re confident that this massive swath of destruction won’t impede on either the revitalization efforts or the Super Bowl festivities.”
Not everyone was as optimistic about the situation as Stanton. Several members of the Super Bowl’s host committee visited downtown Phoenix on Thursday to scout facilities and further plan the festivities, committee member John Smith said. He said he was outraged that the city failed to inform the committee of the apocalypse’s utter ruination of the city.
“If we had known that downtown Phoenix had become more of a desert wasteland, we never, ever would have scheduled the pre-game events here,” Smith said. “We would’ve gone somewhere more vibrant. Like Mesa.”
A major issue with the apocalypse is that there will be no one to operate the venues where the festivities would take place, Smith said, and out-of-state visitors may be turned off by the complete lack of human life in the area. Stanton dismissed the notion.
“We’ve heard this before, that there’s no nightlife in downtown Phoenix, that there’s nothing to do,” Stanton said. “It simply isn’t true. Downtown is a bustling urban core, and it’s ridiculous to think something as insignificant as the complete and utter destruction of the city’s infrastructure would change that.”
City Councilwoman Kate Gallego said keeping the Super Bowl festivities in downtown Phoenix would bring an economic boost to the area and be an exciting experience for the residents as well. According to disaster-relief numbers, downtown Phoenix currently has 12 surviving residents.
“I can’t think of a better way to show visitors to Phoenix the spirit of the urban core than by hosting the Super Bowl parties here,” Gallego said. “I don’t think this widespread annihilation of everything we know and love will affect it at all. If anything, it gives us an opportunity to show visitors how vibrant downtown Phoenix truly is.”
Despite the mayor and councilwoman’s optimism, city records indicate reservations at city-owned facilities, such as the Phoenix Convention Center and the Sheraton Phoenix Downtown Hotel, have taken a nosedive, with less than 2 percent of each venue scheduled to be occupied during the Super Bowl.
Former downtown Phoenix resident Scott Johnson, who relocated to Mesa prior to the apocalypse, said it would be better for the Super Bowl festivities to take place in another city.
“This is the city once again not giving the downtown community, dead or alive, a voice,” Johnson said. “You know things are bad when the Super Bowl host committee wants to host events in Mesa, of all places.”
A survivor applies ash to her face in order to keep up with the latest fashion trends of the ever-changing post-apocalyptic world. The use of scavenged materials has been all the rage lately. (Whatta Ware/PD)
I realize that with everything catching fire, clouds of disease floating through town and all of us making peace with our impending deaths, outfit inspiration has a hit a real low. So, I’ve made a quick list of DIY looks to help you make it through the end of days in style!
1. Ash as makeup
So your entire city is burning. All your worldly possessions are gone, including your trusty makeup kit (even your Naked palettes!). Well, silver lining, look at what’s around you! What do you see? Ash, soot, dirt, whatever you want to call it, these leftovers from the Great Fire have similar properties to your favorite powders!
Grab a container and fill it up with this stuff in between escaping the Hell beasts. I recommend using some fur scraps from your latest kill as a brush to apply some ash as a contour for a real avant-garde survivor’s look. You’ll really harken back to all those Hunger Games-inspired trends, so retro!
2. Layer, layer, layer!
With temperatures fluctuating between -50 and 150 degrees Fahrenheit, your daily look has to be able to meet the ever-changing demands of the Final Storm. Luckily, the rags that are left over from your once-impeccable wardrobe or found in the crumbling remains of civilization are perfect for the latest layered trend!
See if you can vary between shades of brown, gray and beige as well as textures to really highlight the different pieces of your look. If you’re feeling really ambitious, dried blood splatter can add a splash of color and really sends a “Don’t mess with me” vibe to roving murderous bandits.
3. Making jewelry from diamonds in the rough
Accessorizing when you’re facing death by starvation, disease, mauling by demon, fire or botched rapture is hard. However, taking those extra few minutes after returning from foraging empty-handed to bump your outfit to the next level can really make a difference in your ensemble.
I know just two weeks ago you were telling everyone over brunch how much you wanted to make and sell your own jewelry on Etsy. So, why not now? Grab a small strip of scrap metal, heat it up a bit over one of those pits to Hell, and bend it into a basic ring shape. Then, grab any one of those rocks lying around and stick it in while the metal’s still hot and bendy. Ta-da, your very own rock ring!
That’s all for now! If we’re all still alive next week, check back in for my next post: the ideal hunting and foraging ensembles.
Pizza restaurants used to abound in downtown Phoenix. Now, all that’s left is a recording of one man’s search for pizza in the final days of our community. (Photo found alongside recorder)
As the apocalypse continues to draw on, we’ve got the latest updates on how it’s affecting the average citizen. One of our reporters salvaged this exclusive footage from a recorder found in the street. A leader of a small group of survivors used the recorder to document his quest to find pizza.
It’s a harrowing reminder of what we took for granted the most in pre-apocalyptic times — the wide selection of pizza places in downtown Phoenix. It’s such a shame we don’t have that luxury anymore.
Wanda Menzel’s play “Happy in America,” which is being performed at the Herberger Theater Center, tried too hard to convey emotional turmoil through the metaphor of physical destruction. (Thea T. Re/PD)
The question of happiness in upper-crust America has been one we’ve dealt with in this country for years. With money, wealth and power, what more could a person want, and why do so many of us feel dissatisfied?
Wanda Menzel’s new play, “Happy in America,” which opened this weekend at the Herberger Theater Center, deals with this question. The show takes a look at a regular high-income family living in California to explore the trials they face.
The first half of the play set up the characters and outlined their plight. Peter Goodman, played by Robert Menton, faces marital troubles with his wife, Annie, played by Alissa Cooper. Their son, Harold, played by Henry Grimes, is struggling with his classes at Stanford and has come home for the weekend for his parents’ support — only to find himself thrown into a tumultuous home rife with arguments.
Cooper gave the standout performance of the first half of the play, illustrating Annie’s character with nuanced action and excellent body language. As a mother, we see her demeanor change and soften; as a wife, she stands rigid, asserting her needs.
As the play progressed, however, the plot took a sudden twist, leaving many thematic elements unaddressed and loose ends untied. The entire performance, too, took a 180-degree turn — it simply wasn’t convincing.
During the second act, as Annie is sitting down with Harold to discuss whether a new car might help improve his grades and is preparing to tell him about her impending divorce from Peter, the stage began to shake. While the scale of the effect was impressive, it failed to seem realistic.
As stage left began to crumble away, rapidly advancing toward Annie and Harold, I found myself questioning the purpose and efficacy of this move. In the middle of a performance filled with subtleties, why now take on such grand and theatrical effects?
I felt as though I had been transported into a cheesy B-level horror film. The shaking seemed choppy and overwrought, and the floor breaking into pieces and descending into a vast hole of nothingness just took everything one step too far. For a theater company to accurately illustrate disaster, they should do so with taste and simplicity, or it will begin to feel too over-staged and unrealistic. That’s what happened with “Happy in America.”
Cooper and Grimes also demonstrated a lack of preparedness for the scene. Their responses to the crumbling metaphorical and physical worlds around Annie and Harold were slow and ill-timed. Perhaps the most grating part of the whole show was the distinct change in Cooper’s performance: The scream she gave as Annie responding to the floor beneath her feet crumbling away into an endless, empty void was clearly fake and actually pulled me out of the scene. I found myself wondering how long this would last before we could get back to the compelling issues of how Annie and Peter would divide their joint belongings after the divorce.
After such a gripping and believable performance from Cooper and Grimes, their acting in this scene was simply inexcusable. Their actions were thin and fake, failing to convey the emotional complexity of the characters of the Goodman family. As the floor falls beneath her, for example, Annie reaches for Harold in a panic, but instead of using this moment to demonstrate a moment of tenderness between mother and son, Grimes brusquely grabbed Cooper’s arm and yanked her, almost violently, back onto the stage.
The two started to run from the yawning hole of absolute darkness but fell in. The audience could hear their screams for at least half a minute after they had fallen — far too long to allow the moment, which should be traumatizing, to develop any sort of emotional response at all.
You’d think that would be melodramatic, unrealistic and exaggerated enough, but the floor only continued to crumble. Theater seats on either side of the stage collapsed into the pitch-black, bottomless pit. They even recruited extras to appear as usual theatergoers, who were sucked from their chairs into the infinite darkness.
Finally — after far too long, in my opinion — the shaking stopped. And with that, so ended the play, which was utterly disappointing. The more I think about it, the more disgusted I am. In an act of complete arrogance, the actors also failed to enter for curtain call, leaving the audience with too many questions and a sense of business forever left unfinished.
When I turned around to see if anyone knew what was happening, I realized I was alone in the theater. I can therefore attest to the horrifying failure of this play by the fact that of all the audience members for the opening-night show, I was the only one with the fortitude to stick around for the final scene.
“Happy in America” will be playing at the Herberger Theater Center through Nov. 16. Tickets range from $35-$65.
Remaining downtown survivors could soon enjoy running water, spotty electricity and a private sinkhole as Megacorp develops another luxury apartment complex on top of Phoenix’s last art gallery. (Sir V. Ivor/PD)
Megacorp announced Tuesday its plans to purchase downtown Phoenix’s last remaining art gallery and construct a luxury apartment complex.
Stalk Opshun, a Megacorp spokesman, said the company had been eyeing the land for development since the apocalypse that decimated the Phoenix area. Megacorp is finalizing its plans to buy the land that currently houses Art Box, the only gallery to survive the end of days, for 13 million ration cards, 12 rifles and several crates of ammunition.
“This parcel’s close proximity to what used to be the light rail makes it the perfect place for our new luxury development,” Opshun said. “The downtown core has been on the rise since the roving bands of mutants and barbarians were driven away, and Megacorp wants to be part of that revitalization.”
Opshun said the apartments will include luxury amenities such as running water, occasional electricity and a bed roll. Tenants will also have access to a private sinkhole and the option to barricade their doors if rioting starts.
Iyam Legend, a local resident, self-identified scavenger and aspiring actor, said he would consider living in the apartments only if they allowed pets. Fluffy, his zombie dog, is his top concern, Legend said.
“Fluffy’s a sweet girl, really,” he said. “It’s just sometimes she needs to feed on human flesh, and I’d need to check with management before I sign the lease.”
The project will be financed in part through a Government Property Lease Excess Rations agreement, which provides free food, water and electricity to giant corporations in exchange for building empty, ostentatious skyscrapers on historic or culturally relevant sites.
The GPLER agreement for Megacorp’s new apartment complex is slated to last until the next apocalypse, which has drawn concerns from residents living inside the downtown Phoenix quarantine zone.
Some community members have said the government is getting the supplies it needs to finance GPLER projects by reducing rations and conscripting residents to hunt for food in the barren wasteland.
Marshall Laws, public-information officer with the interim government, said there is no cause for concern and reminded residents they should report any signs of unrest or dissent to the interim government’s Office of Information and Correction.
“GPLER agreements are the best way to offer incentives to encourage growth and development downtown,” Laws said. “GPLER agreements attract companies that truly understand the needs of downtown and believe in what Phoenix can become. Through GPLER and the efforts of our glorious leaders, the new Republic of Phoenix can rise from this hellish wasteland and become the only shining city on the hill that isn’t on fire.”
Laws’ concerns about unrest are not without basis. Recently, a secret organization called the Downtown Whispers Coalition has been leaving pamphlets and spray-painting their insignia throughout the quarantine zone.
An anonymous and very intimidating source with knowledge of the situation said if residents would like to sit down with a group of like-minded individuals to politely discuss ways to improve and change the interim government, they may or may not find a secret meeting of the DWC somewhere in the abandoned Roosevelt District.
