From April 5-14, volunteers from NAU will be busy working behind the scenes at the Northern Arizona Book Festival, which hosts more than 40 events in downtown Flagstaff featuring bestselling authors, Pulitzer Prize winners and local writers, publishers, editors and event organizers. These events—and those that the organization supports throughout the year—foster a vibrant literary community in the Southwest and ensure that the Colorado Plateau is recognized as a bona fide place of literature.
COCONINO COUNTY — As the snow melts and the weather warms up, a variety of organizations are busy planning and presenting a number of health, welfare and education fairs throughout Northern Arizona.
The Coalition opened its outreach season on March 28 by staffing the Family Health Fair at Star School in Leupp. The event, presented by Star School and the Winslow Indian Health Care Center, featured a number of information tables for parents staffed by representatives from the Coconino County Health & Human Services, Coconino County Parks & Recreation, Native Americans for Community Action (NACA), North Country HealthCare, the University of Arizona Cooperative Extension — Coconino County and the Winslow Indian Health Care Center and Youth Wellness.
Celebrate Sedona engages the local community while celebrating and
featuring local and regional arts, food and drink! Held at Sedona Arts Center,
Celebrate Sedona is a celebration of the beauty and diversity of our
community’s music, food, drink, and artistry.
Spring is in the air, even if we have a couple second or third winters. Our spring season is packed with opportunities to learn, explore, and connect!
This Giving Day, how will you spread Axe of Kindness? NAU’s sixth annual fundraising event takes place Wednesday, April 3, and we’ve rounded up just a few of the day’s many exciting happenings. Win “bus bucks” on the shuttle, stay warm with limited-edition socks, drink beer for a good cause at Mother Road Brewing Company or join student organizations for an afternoon of music, food and games in the Union Fieldhouse. When it comes to supporting the Lumberjacks you love on Giving Day, the choices are endless!
Today is Arizona Gives Day! One of the biggest giving days of the entire year for nonprofits across the state. We set a goal of $25,000 to support our programs. Will you help us?
Long-time Local First Legacy Partner, Ideas Collide has generously pledged to match all gifts up to $5,000 to help us reach our goal today!
This is the day Arizonans come together and unite for positive, lasting changes in our communities by supporting the nonprofits that are making a difference in our state every day.
We invite you to step up for our youth and our communities on Arizona Gives Day with a donation to United Way of Northern Arizona.
Together we can advance early childhood development, positive youth development, and safety and security for our neighbors in northern Arizona. You can make your donation HERE.
Your donation will help ensure that we can continue our work to achieve a sustainable, just, and thriving Flagstaff through community education, engagement, and advocacy.
We have lots going on (as usual) on campus these days. For those of you who haven’t been here in a while, we moved our offices from the Art Barn to new digs in the Gallery Building in January.
Our featured artists for March/April are Nancy Foo, Lili Anne Laurin and Amy Light. Come check out their work in our Uptown Gallery Shop!
Also see: Arizona Daily Sun — Gallery: 16th annual Viola Awards
FLAGSTAFF — Ballet Folklórico de Colores won the “Excellence in the Performing Arts Award” at the 2024 Viola Awards held on March 23, 2024 at the Orpheum Theater. The event was presented by by Creative Flagstaff.
More than a 100 guests celebrated the 42 finalists across 10 categories at the event.
Ballet Folklórico de Colores of Flagstaff was recognized for its “Paseo Navideno: A Christmas Journey Through Mexico” performance held at the Orpheum Theater on Dec. 9, 2023.
Spring Break is here!
As Spring Break continues for the next several weeks, we can expect long lines and full parking lots throughout the South Rim. As a result, traffic regularly backs up at all entrance stations, with wait times of up to one to two hours between 10 a.m. and 4 p.m. Parking lots begin reaching capacity by 12 p.m. and shuttle bus wait times will be prolonged.
Thankfully, our fees program is fully staffed and have been working diligently towards expediting wait times by moving traffic into specific lanes. Visitors with pre-paid passes are still encouraged to go to Lane 1 to reduce wait times in line.
Conscious Aging
Monday, April 8, 15, 22, 29
1:30 to 3 p.m.
The class will focus on the philosophy and skills needed to become a wise elder through life review and harvesting, finding meaning and purpose, and leaving a legacy.
Aging – Learn more and register!
For César Chavez Day on March 31, professor Monica Brown shares the impact of the labor leader’s work and his groundbreaking partnership with fellow organizer Dolores Huerta.
Read the blog
Please join CCC&Y for its next Prevention Council Zoom meeting at 10 a.m. Thursday, April 4. Our meetings provide our coalition partners with the opportunity to share the latest news about their projects that support children, youth and their families in Northern Arizona.
The CCC&Y Prevention Council has its roots in our long history of child abuse prevention, our most recent work with substance misuse prevention and our overall commitment to understanding the protective factors, resiliency research and assets our community needs to thrive.
Some examples include:
Planning for previous Child Abuse Prevention Conferences
Engaging in multiple projects with International Child Welfare expert, Kevin Campbell
Developing a library of recorded webinars
Initiating the PAWS community arts and education project
Countries throughout the world have committed to conserving 30% of the Earth’s land and sea by 2030, but questions remain about how such conservation efforts will be implemented and monitored without causing harm to Indigenous peoples and local communities. In a recent publication, researchers at NAU proposed a win-win solution: offer direct payments to those in target areas in the Global South in exchange for their help monitoring and validating conservation data via mobile apps. This mechanism could improve both the quality of the data collected and the economic conditions of local communities.
Introduction to Encaustic Painting
with Helene Farrar
April 4 – 5 : Thursday: 10am – 4pm, Friday: 9am – 4pm
Drip, pour, drag, layer, heat, and incise! Investigate the ancient medium of encaustic painting in this very hands-on workshop using pigmented wax, and a heated palette! Explore a rich variety of marks and surfaces while doing image transfer, etching, and collaging in this seductive medium.
Come celebrate Cesar Chavez Heritage Week by taking advantage of the many activities taking place at NAU and in the Flagstaff area!
The Bright Angel Trail is anticipated to reopen Monday, April 15 following a 4 ½ month closure.
Contract work is currently on schedule and no delays are anticipated at this time. As a reminder, the trail closure remains in effect for the Plateau Point Trail through March 14, 2025.
More information on the Transcanyon Waterline project can be found on the park website here.
A variety of virtual health and welfare resource networking meetings are held each month in Coconino County. The meetings offer health professionals and representatives from a variety of governmental and non-profit organizations the opportunity to share information on upcoming programs and events that benefit the educational, health and welfare needs of children, youth and families throughout the region.
The following is a listing of some of those meetings.
Thank you to everyone who attended this year’s STEMMY Awards Ceremony. The evening was full of celebration, innovation, and dedication to advancing STEM education and awareness within our beloved community. A special thanks to our esteemed keynote speaker, Dr. David Engelthaler for joining us.
Highlighting excellence across various sectors, the STEMMY Awards showcased individuals and organizations who have demonstrated outstanding commitment to STEM education and awareness.
Watercolor and Ink for the Traveler
with Casey Cheuvront
March 27 : 11am – 4pm
Watercolor is a popular, flexible medium, and suitable for anyone that travels and would like to capture the beauty of their surroundings. In this workshop we will explore watercolor basics, using a journaling/sketchbook approach. We’ll cover the basics of composition, value, brushwork and color relationships, experiment with color mixing and ink drawing, and finish by working with the living landscape to create sketchbook paintings that can stand on their own or serve as inspirational notes for later studio works. At the end of the workshop, you should have begun a sketchbook of your own that you can carry virtually anywhere, which will allow you to record your travels, and your progress in this medium. Suitable for beginners a
State leaders recently called upon health sciences researcher Dierdra Bycura to analyze firefighter recruitment and retention across Arizona. Working with experts from the Franke College of Business, Bycura published a report showing that most firefighters in the state are satisfied with the profession, but some say they struggle with mental health and large call volumes. The report’s findings could influence future state policies.
It is hard to overstate the importance of apprenticeship programs in today’s economy, where numerous industries have identified a persistent “skills gap” in the workforce.
The State of Arizona’s Office of Economic Opportunity recently announced it is working to expand registered construction and trade apprenticeship programs with grants from its BuildItAZ initiative, but time is running out to apply for these funds.
IN THIS ISSUE
• HELLO FROM SUPERVISOR HORSTMAN
• WILDFIRE CRISIS REPORT: PRIORITIZING THE
UPPER RIO
• BOARD OF SUPERVISORS RESOLUTION
REAFFIRMS OPPOSITION TO URANIUM MINING
NEAR THE GRAND CANYON
• PARKWAY SEDIMENT BASIN/MUSEUM FIRE
• FLOOD MITIGATION COMPLETED!
• PRIMARY DATE MOVES TO JULY 30th
• ELECTIONS WAREHOUSE RIBBON-CUTTING
• URGING VOTER APPROVAL OF THE
EXPENDITURE LIMIT INCREASE FOR
COCONINO COUNTY
• SUPERVISORS ATTEND NACo LEGISLATIVE
CONFERENCE IN D.C. AND ADVOCATE FOR
COCONINO COUNTY FEDERAL PRIORITIES
• SUPERVISOR HORSTMAN ATTENDS FIRST
MEETING OF 2024 BLM/RAC
• GRAND CANYON FOOD PANTRY: HELPING
COMMUNITY, WITH ONE BAG OF GROCERIES
AT A TIME
• COCONINO COUNTY BEGINS CONSTRUCTION
ON YOUTH BEHAVIORAL RESOURCE CENTER
• PUBLIC MEMORIALS IN COUNTY PARKS
• TUSAYAN AWARDED SMART GRANT FROM
ARIZONA DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION
FLAGSTAFF — NAU Dept. of Comparative Cultural Studies will present “Disrupting mining in Honduras: Hegemony, territorial struggles, and contradictions of the neoliberal mafia-state” with Nate Edenhofe at 6 p.m. Thursday, March 21 at Liberal Arts 136.
Anti-mining movements have put extractivism on the defensive in Honduras.
Why did mining production fail to expand in Honduras despite some of—if not the— most aggressive pro-extractive reforms on the continent?
Both existing theories of extractivism and social movements have difficulty explaining this outcome.
Latest ‘Behind the Scenery’ Podcast available
On Sunday, the latest episode of the Behind the Scenery podcast aired on Apple podcasts and the park’s website.
In this episode, Canyon Interpretation staff interview Gerald Lomaventema, an award-winning silversmith, a mentor to young Hopi artists, and a runner. He’s also the great grandson of Olympic medalist Louis Tewanima. Louis won silver in the 10,000 meters in the 1912 Olympics and set an American record that stood for decades. He was also a spiritual leader in his community.
In this episode of the Behind the Scenery podcast, Gerald talks about his art, his cultural connections to Grand Canyon, and running and Louis’s legacy in the Hopi community. This episode is available on Apple podcasts and the park website.
This year Women’s History Month has particular resonance for United Way of Northern Arizona both because of the makeup of our small and mighty staff and because of this year’s theme: Women Who Advocate for Equity, Diversity and Inclusion.
Worldwide, three out of four United Ways are led by women, but UWNA’s staff is entirely female.
I am honored to lead a team that includes Christine Pierce, our Campaign and Operations Manager; Elaine Hebestreit, our Administrative Assistant; and Tempy Wessel, who recently joined us as our Northeast Representative.
Additionally Carol Dykes and Sybil Smith continue to assist us with community engagement, managing volunteer efforts and crisis response.
Shamrock Shuffle, Downtown Flagstaff, Saturday, March 16
Get ready to Shake your Shamrock in Downtown Flagstaff! We are celebrating St. Paddy’s Day at some of our favorite bars and restaurants with this St. Patrick’s Day themed bar crawl! 2 p.m.
Learn More
Thank you to everyone who attended this year’s STEMMY Awards Ceremony. The evening was full of celebration, innovation, and dedication to advancing STEM education and awareness within our beloved community. A special thanks to our esteemed keynote speaker, Dr. David Engelthaler for joining us.
Highlighting excellence across various sectors, the STEMMY Awards showcased individuals and organizations who have demonstrated outstanding commitment to STEM education and awareness.
Editor’s note: Part of a continuing series of profiles of board members and staff of the Coconino Coalition for Children & Youth.
By the Coconino Coalition for Children & Youth
COCONINO COUNTY — As per Coconino Coalition for Children & Youth’s Mission statement, “We ignite collective action that creates better lives for children and families.”
For CCC&Y, it takes a variety of individuals to build that inclusive movement of people dedicated to transforming and healing our communities — volunteer board members, organizational and individual members, supporters and partners, and staff members.
To promote the work of CCC&Y, the Coalition has been assisted for nearly a decade by Outreach Coordinator Frank X. Moraga. Frank has worked at the Coalition since December 2014, staffing a variety of outreach events and community resource meetings from Flagstaff to Leupp, Williams, Tusayan, the Grand Canyon, Tuba City, Page and Fredonia. He currently facilitates the monthly Tuba City Community Resource meeting. He also produces the Coalition’s weekly e-newsletter.
Distilling the Landscape in Sedona
with Ben Hamburger
March 16 : Saturday, 9am – 3pm
Simplifying what you see is a necessary component of observational painting. But it can also be used as a liberating constraint to explore design, composition, and color. During this class, you will focus on distilling your surroundings into compositions that convey both the essence of the landscape around us and our individual artistic voices. We will begin by focusing on selection and composition exercises before moving on to full color paintings. Discussions on theory and demonstrations will be followed by painting time with guidance by the instructor and group critique. Beginner and experienced plein air painters are welcome, however, this class is a class for people with some substantial painting experience. While demos will be provided in oil paint, both oils and acrylic painters are welcome.
The strength of any nonprofit organization largely depends on the people who are willing to give their time and talent to ensure its success. United Way of Northern Arizona has always been fortunate in having leaders who embraced our goals of stepping up for our youth and our community.
At the Annual Campaign and Community Impact Celebration on March 27 (register here), we will install four new members to the UWNA Board of Directors. These remarkable people bring a wealth of experience and diverse perspectives that will augment an already exceptional board.
A Holocaust survivor whose story continues to inspire. A seamstress who made state history. A librarian (Delia Ceballos Muñoz) who shed light on Flagstaff’s long-overlooked early Hispanic and Latine settlers. To celebrate Women’s History Month, we’re sharing a few stories about Lumberjack teachers, leaders and alumnae who made history by breaking glass ceilings, advocating for their communities and accomplishing remarkable things.
On Friday, March 1, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) issued new guidelines for respiratory illness, to include Covid-19. The CDC is updating its recommendations for Covid-19 to bring them in line with its advice for other kinds of respiratory infections, including influenza and RSV.
People who test positive for Covid-19 no longer need to routinely stay away from others for at least five days. The CDC now says people who have Covid-19 should stay home until they’ve been fever-free without medication for at least 24 hours and their symptoms have been improving for 24 hours.
However, the CDC still does recommend that people take additional precautions for an additional five days to lower the risk of spreading the virus. These precautions include improving ventilation indoors, masking, and limiting close contact with others.
Don’t miss the chance to celebrate the vibrant creativity of our community’s young artists. 11 a.m.
Learn More
COCONINO COUNTY — Coconino County Superintendent of Schools, Cheryl Mango-Paget, extends her heartfelt congratulations to the outstanding educators selected as finalists for the prestigious Teacher of the Year and Rookie Teacher of the Year awards.
The winner in each category will be revealed at the 11th annual Coconino County Teacher of the Year Awards event on Thursday, April 25, 2024, commencing at 5 p.m. at the High Country Conference Center.
COCONINO COUNTY — CCC&Y member partners have an opportunity to make a difference in the lives of individuals and programs throughout Northern Arizona by taking part in the annual Arizona Gives Day on April 2, 2024.
Arizona Gives Day is an annual giving movement uniting nonprofits, big and small, new and established, with all missions and backgrounds, to celebrate and increase philanthropy in Arizona through online giving, said AZ Impact for Good, which runs the program. The event helps raise awareness about the critical role Arizona nonprofits play in our community and inspires people to give generously, creating a thriving and stronger Arizona for all.
So if you have registered by the Arizona Gives Day deadline of Feb. 28, 2024, be sure to contact the Coconino Coalition for Children & Youth so we can support your effort by providing links to your organization and donation pages in our upcoming weekly e-newsletters.
COCONINO COUNTY — Coconino County Health and Human Services (CCHHS) published the 2024 Coconino County Community Health Needs Assessment (CHNA) on March 5, 2024.
The chna is a comprehensive evaluation, conducted every three years, to gain a deep understanding of the health status, risk factors, causes and concerns of poverty in our communities and available resources within Coconino County. The main goals of this assessment are to understand community health; identify health disparities; create a path for improvement; and reduce barriers.
In this edition…
• Supervisors Oppose the Pinon Plain Uranium Mine
• County Awarded $7.7 million NRCS Grant to Protect Residents from Flood Damage
• Supervisor Vasquez Testifies on Transportation at Arizona Capitol Board Members Travel to Washington, DC to Advocate for Coconino County
• District 2 Events and Activities
Upcoming Events And More!
Learn about the contributions women have made to the world at campus events throughout the month of March. In partnership with other campus organizations, the Commission on the Status of Women has invited a diverse set of speakers to talk about the stories and accomplishments of women from both the past and the modern day.
Distilling the Landscape in Sedona
with Ben Hamburger
March 16 : Saturday, 9am – 3pm
Simplifying what you see is a necessary component of observational painting. But it can also be used as a liberating constraint to explore design, composition, and color. During this class, you will focus on distilling your surroundings into compositions that convey both the essence of the landscape around us and our individual artistic voices. We will begin by focusing on selection and composition exercises before moving on to full color paintings. Discussions on theory and demonstrations will be followed by painting time with guidance by the instructor and group critique. Beginner and experienced plein air painters are welcome, however, this class is a class for people with some substantial painting experience. While demos will be provided in oil paint, both oils and acrylic painters are welcome.
2023 Park Profile and statistics now available
Last week the NPS released its 2023 visitation statistics. Service-wide, the NPS welcomed 325.5 million visitors in 2023, an increase of 13 million or 4% over 2022.
Grand Canyon National Park experienced its eighth busiest year ever in 2023 with 4,733,705 visits. Last year’s visitation was only 1,600 more than the previous year with a less than 1% increase from 2022. Grand Canyon once again ranked as the second most visited National Park in the National Park Service system behind Great Smoky Mountains National Park. Visitation to Grand Canyon reached its highest level in 2018 with approximately 6.4 million visitors.
Plan on joining us as we celebrate our collective community impact and share some exciting news that will further our efforts to step up for our youth in Coconino, Navajo, and Apache counties.
Our Annual Campaign & Community Impact Luncheon will start at 11:30 am on Wednesday, March 27 at Little America Hotel.
Tickets are $50 / $375 for a table of 8.
New Student Orientation is now Lumberjack Welcome—an immersive experience that takes place the week before school starts and connects new students with resources and support that will help them in the first few weeks of school and for the entirety of their Lumberjack career. It’s an important piece of NAU’s commitment to helping 100,000 people earn high-value NAU credentials by 2035, preparing them to succeed in the always-changing Arizona workforce.
View this email in your browser Art Workshops and Classes in March 2024! CERAMICS CLASSES: Ceramics: Pottery Wheel for Beginners with Neil Kennedy March 2 – April 6 Saturdays, 9am to 12pm CERAMICS – POTTERY WHEEL FOR BEGINNERS : SIGN…
By the Coconino Coalition for Children & Youth
COCONINO COUNTY —
Please join CCC&Y for its next Prevention Council Zoom meeting at 10 a.m. Thursday, March 7. Our meetings provide our coalition partners with the opportunity to share the latest news about their projects that support children, youth and their families in Northern Arizona.
The CCC&Y Prevention Council has its roots in our long history of child abuse prevention, our most recent work with substance misuse prevention and our overall commitment to understanding the protective factors, resiliency research and assets our community needs to thrive.
Some examples include:
Planning for previous Child Abuse Prevention Conferences
Engaging in multiple projects with International Child Welfare expert, Kevin Campbell
Developing a library of recorded webinars
Initiating the PAWS community arts and education project
We asked faculty and staff: Which Black musicians inspire you? What prominent Black figure, living or dead, would you want to have dinner with? What’s your advice for future generations? Read and watch their thoughtful answers to these and more questions in this multimedia story, part of a university-wide celebration of Black History Month.
The Board of ECoNA had a robust, wide-ranging conversation with Senator Mark Kelly recently that covered infrastructure improvements in northern Arizona, possible strategies for addressing our chronic housing shortage here, and the senator’s profound disappointment that the border security bill that was negotiated in Congress did not garner enough support to pass.
Earlier in the day, Senator Kelly had presided over a field hearing of the Senate Transportation and Infrastructure Subcommittee at City Hall, which focused on a progress report from local officials and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers on the Rio de Flag Flood Control project.
As an All of Us scholar, NAU junior Cecilia Perez pursued a research project on the understudied topic of endometriosis in women of color. The disease that causes severe pelvic pain and menstrual bleeding is widely believed to affect mostly white women—but Perez’s research shows it touches the lives of racial and ethnic minorities at similar rates.
Read the story
FLAGSTAFF — Two Coconino Community College students, Grace McCullough and Carly Miller, have been nominated for the All-Arizona Academic Team as part of the All-USA Scholarship competition sponsored by Phi Theta Kappa.
Each year, the Arizona Board of Regents provides tuition scholarships to exceptional Arizona resident community college transfer students, based on outstanding academic performance and community service.
Students are nominated by their community college and submit their applications directly to the Phi Theta Kappa International Honorary organization. Scholarships cover resident tuition at any Arizona state university.
The Train Depot Bridge project is nearing completion and will officially reopen to the public on Friday, February 23. This project was a collaborative effort between the Grand Canyon National Park Special Projects Crew and the Trail Crew. Both crews worked together as a team, successfully rehabilitating this old bridge in the historic district of the South Rim Village. This bridge will serve visitors in accessing greenways, bus stops, and the train depot for many years to come.
Celebrate craft beer at any of Flagstaff’s 8 breweries, with discounts, events, and more! Various times.
When school started last year, the EdWeek Research Center (part of the publication Education Week) conducted a survey, asking high school students the following question: In the past year, what, if anything, has had a negative impact on your mental health?
Here was the statistic that pulled me up short: only 16% of the respondents said “Nothing.”
That means 84% had experienced enough stress and anxiety – about everything from school to the future of our planet – that it had a detrimental effect on their mental health.
COCONINO COUNTY — The 2023 Controller of the Year Awards recently recognized Coconino County Treasurer Sarah Benatar as the winner of Controller of the Year for the Government Category.
Benatar has served as Treasurer of Coconino County since being appointed in 2014, winning reelection in 2016 and 2020, and was the youngest County Treasurer in Arizona. She serves the County as an officer of the Arizona County Treasurer’s Association and as past President of the Arizona Association of Counties (AACo). She is a voice for rural communities, advocating for her constituents by serving on the board and as Treasurer of the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials (NALEO), and as president of the National Association of Hispanic County Elected Officials (NAHCO).
COCONINO COUNTY — Whether it’s connecting families with local representatives from the Coconino County Health & Human Services’ Women’s, Infants and Children (WIC) program, to helping foster care families learn about potential scholarship programs for their youth, resource guides provide a valuable assistance to residents throughout Coconino County and Northern Arizona.
To spread the word about these valuable information options, CCC&Y has compiled a listing and link to a variety of resource guides throughout the region including CCC&Y’s created Page/Fredonia and Tuba City resource guides and the recently updated Williams Area Community Resource Guide.
