Turns out the entire thing is a fluffy piece about how great Mesa, Arizona is (complete with a reference to how it's "larger" than cities like Minneapolis) and "a new kind of urbanism." How a city with about the same population as Minneapolis but twice as sprawling counts as anything urban is beyond me, but the article likes to grasp at straws.
One particularly great (appalling?) part was a drooling reference to Colorado Spring's "fee-for-government" structure set up during the recession that the author seemed completely unfazed by:
Anyway, if you need a laugh or to shake your head in sadness, you can read it here.In late 2009 and early 2010, as the recession hammered the sales tax receipts that were used to fund most government operations (the city’s property taxes are some of the lowest in the nation), Colorado Springs was forced to drastically cut its operations. Pools were closed. Trashcans were removed from parks. Bus service was gutted. A third of the city’s streetlights were turned off. When the city’s voters rejected an initiative in 2010 that would have hiked taxes to restore many services, Colorado Springs embarked on a remarkable experiment in fee-for-service government. Instead, of paying taxes, residents could elect to have their streetlights turned back on—if they were willing to pay $100. This model didn’t stop at streetlights: One group of neighbors pooled $2,500 to “adopt” their local park. Once the city received the cash, the trashcans and sprinklers were returned. Colorado Springs remains very libertarian—bus service, for example, has never really recovered. The lights are back on, however, a seeming admission from city government that the initial cuts might have gone too far.
