State may decide today whether to take over Rio Nuevo

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Naomi Pescovitz - View Bio

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The state Legislature may decide today during its special session to pass a proposal which would allow state control of the Rio Nuevo development district board. In doing so, they would likely move forward with the planned hotel project and appoint their personnel to the Rio Nuevo board.

On the eve of a vote that could bring big changes, the current Rio Nuevo board is optimistic.

"I think it's incredibly positive because as the chair said that the scope of the work is beyond the comfortable management of a small board," Rio Nuevo board member Jessie Sanders said.

If the proposal does pass, the board will be expanded, and Phoenix will appoint the new members.

"We're going to ensure that that board is populated with professionals and five of them will be from the city of Tucson and the rest of them will be from surrounding communities in Pima county," Representative Frank Antenori said.

State legislators from Tucson have the opportunity to make recommendations for the new board and some say they know who wont be on the list.

"I'm not going to recommend anybody that's on the current board. I think it's time to start fresh with some new ideas," Antenori said. "If we can't at least get the convention center extension done, you could say goodbye to anywhere between 30 to 100 million dollars in revenue that's produced by the gem show every year. We will lose the gem show."

Tucsonans agree that losing the show, would be a problem.

"It's part of the Tucson history," Tucson resident Melissa Hurst said. "People have known about it for a long time and they come here just for that so it would be a really sad day if it left this town."

"I work hard for the right things, and this is the right thing," Sanders said.