PHOENIX – Funds for the future Hilton Family Holocaust Education Center in Phoenix are now up to $38 million, providing more resources ahead of the expected opening in April 2027.
The Maricopa County Board of Supervisors allocated $2 million to the project in October 2024. Phoenix has given $2 million, and the state also authorized a $7 million appropriation in the fall.
“This collaboration with the Arizona Jewish Historical Society will help preserve and embrace the rich heritage of our local Jewish communities, educate the public on the historical significance of the Holocaust, and teach students to take responsibility for building a better and more just world,” said Board of Supervisors Chairman Thomas Galvin in an October news release. The $2 million from Maricopa County came from Galvin’s portion of the county’s Community Solutions Funding. Continue reading “Phoenix Holocaust center raises $38 million, expected to open in 2027 to foster education”
PHOENIX – The sun rises on a new era in Phoenix for the Mercury.
Tuesday’s excitement of the Mercury’s blockbuster trade to acquire five-time All-Star Alyssa Thomas from the Connecticut Sun was soured with the gut punch of a free agency decision from Brittney Griner.
Griner, a 10-time All-Star and a face of the Mercury franchise for the last decade, plans to sign with the Atlanta Dream, she announced in an Instagram post on Tuesday night and her agency, Wasserman Group, confirmed Wednesday with Cronkite News.
“I need to introduce my new teammates because I will be joining the Atlanta Dream,” Griner said in a video with Dream players Allisha Gray, Rhyne Howard, and Jordin Canada. “I’m thrilled for this chapter.”
WNBA free agents can not officially sign contracts until Feb. 1.
“For now, the video BG (Brittney Griner) posted will serve for comments on this, but her time in Phoenix and with the Mercury organization will be addressed when she is formally introduced, if not before,” Calder Hynes of Wasserman Group told Cronkite News.
The Griner move is just one of the monumental offseason changes looming over the franchise. While the acquisition of Thomas and Griner’s decision sent shockwaves through the basketball community Tuesday, the world is still waiting on a potential retirement decision from Mercury legend Diana Taurasi.
Griner has spent her entire WNBA career with the Mercury since being selected with the No. 1 overall pick in 2013. She burst onto the scene as a rookie, averaging 12.6 points per game and earning All-Rookie honors and her first All-Star appearance. Her career continued to flourish in the Valley, leading the WNBA in scoring twice and propelling the Mercury to a WNBA championship in 2014.
While Griner is a high-level scorer, her defensive ability stands out the most. She’s a two-time WNBA Defensive Player of the Year, seven-time All-Defensive honoree and ranks third all-time in career blocks.
Before joining the WNBA, Griner dominated at Baylor University. She averaged 22.2 points, 8.8 rebounds and 5.1 blocks in 148 games. She became a four-time AP All-American, two-time AP Player of the Year, and an NCAA champion in 2012.
Last season, Phoenix finished the regular season 19-21 before losing in the first round of the WNBA playoffs to the Minnesota Lynx.
“Happy for you,” former teammate Natasha Cloud commented on Griner’s announcement post.
Community Impact
A game-changer for the Mercury on the court, Griner also impacted Phoenix locally. She was awarded a WNBA Cares Community Assist Award three times, including twice in 2023.
She earned the WNBA Cares Community Assist Award for June 2023 due to her work and contributions in supporting the safe return of wrongful detainees overseas and her efforts to help marginalized Phoenix communities.
In February 2022, Griner was arrested and detained at a Moscow airport on drug-related charges. Russian officials claimed vape cartridges with illegal cannabis oil were found in her luggage. The arrest came a week before Russia’s invasion launched against Ukraine.
In a July 2022 trial, Griner pled guilty while claiming the cannabis oil was packed accidentally. Her lawyers also stated she had a medical prescription for the drug. In August 2022, she was found guilty of smuggling drugs with criminal intent and sentenced to nine years in a penal colony.
Griner was detained in Russia until Dec. 8, 2022, when she was released in a prisoner exchange with the United States in exchange for Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout, who had been serving a 25-year sentence in federal prison. In 2024, Griner released her book, co-authored with Michelle Buford, titled Coming Home that details her incarceration in Russia.
After rejoining the Mercury in February 2023, Griner partnered with Bring Our Families Home, an organization that works with families of Americans who are wrongfully detained or held hostage in another country to spread awareness about their cases.
Griner also teamed up with Phoenix Rescue Mission, a nonprofit whose mission statement is to “provide Christ-centered, life-transforming solutions to people facing hunger, homelessness, addiction, and trauma.”
“My commitment will continue to be helping those who are struggling and shining a light on wrongfully detained Americans who should be home with their families,” Griner said about the honor.
Additionally, Griner supported the Valley’s homeless community through BG’s Heart and Sole Shoe Drive, founded in 2016. The drive provides unhoused individuals in need with pairs of shoes.
Griner also won the award in 2017. She donated the $5,000 in award money to the local LGBT Youth Center one.n.ten., which was rebuilding at the time following an arson attack.
“I can’t believe someone would take away a safe space for kids by doing something so violent, but I hope this donation helps a little in their recovery,” Griner said.
Looking ahead
Griner joins a Dream team that went 15-25 last season and lost in the first round of the WNBA playoffs to the eventual champions, the New York Liberty. Atlanta was led by Howard’s 17.3 points per game and Gray’s 15.6 points per game.
The Dream also brought in new coach Karl Smesko, who spent the last 23 seasons as the Florida Gulf Coast coach. He leaves the college hoops scene holding the third-highest winning percentage by any active head coach in NCAA Division I women’s basketball, with a record of 611-110.
For the Mercury, Thomas immediately launches into being a key part of the team. She has finished top five in MVP voting in the last three seasons and is a six-time All-Defensive Team honoree and three-time All-WNBA.
The duo of Thomas and Kahleah Copper (21.1 points per game) is a talented one, but if Taurasi decides to retire the Mercury will return only one of their top four scorers from last season.
Griner’s intentions to sign with the Dream marks the end of an accomplished career in Phoenix, both on the court and in the community, while signaling a new era for the Mercury.
“It’s my first time going into free agency. … It was a hard decision because you’re leaving what you know, what I’ve known my whole career,” Griner said. “But also there’s an exciting factor of OK, this is like a rebrand now. I get to show them something different.”
Brittney Griner, a 10-time All-Star and WNBA champion, leaves behind a lasting legacy with the Phoenix Mercury as she prepares to join the Atlanta Dream. (Photo by Spencer Barnes/Cronkite News)After 11 seasons with the Mercury, Brittney Griner is set to sign with the Dream in a major shift for Phoenix basketball. (Photo by Spencer Barnes/Cronkite News)
PHOENIX – Madeline Sulka is relentless in her pursuit to become the NBA’s first female head coach — a goal she first expressed in her Concordia University Irvine basketball bio as a player in 2017.
“All basketball players can relate that you don’t always know exactly what’s next when you are done playing,” Sulka said. “You love the game for so long, and it’s all you know. (Basketball) is engraved into who you are as a person.
CHANDLER – Surrounded by those who had been part of her journey, from players she once coached to colleagues who had watched her rise through the ranks, Karen Self could feel the weight of the achievement settle in. She had become the winningest coach in Arizona girls basketball history on Jan. 17 against Globe, a milestone that was not just hers alone, but one that belonged to an entire community.
Her legacy, built on 833 wins (and counting) and 12 state championships, was now woven into the fabric of Seton Catholic and the Arizona basketball scene.
WASHINGTON – Kindergartners are less likely to get vaccinations in Arizona than in almost any other state. And fewer than three in five state residents have access to fluoridated water – also well below the national average.
These metrics leave public health experts in Arizona especially concerned about Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who was grilled by senators Wednesday during the first day of his confirmation hearings for secretary of Health and Human Services.
For years, RFK Jr. has questioned the safety and effectiveness of childhood immunizations against measles, polio and other scourges that have mostly disappeared in the United States. And he wants to eliminate fluoridation of public water supplies, which dental experts believe would cause an epidemic of unnecessary cavities.
“It would be catastrophic if he gets in this job,” said Will Humble, executive director of the Arizona Public Health Association, whose members include nurses, researchers and other health care professionals.
PHOENIX – A landmark legal battle by a 19-year-old Canadian defenseman has forever changed the face of college hockey in the United States.
The swift action began last August with a lawsuit that challenged the NCAA’s long-standing rule prohibiting Canadian Hockey League players from competing for Division I schools. Rumors swirled almost immediately that the NCAA would buckle and change its eligibility rule, which has barred generations of CHL players from competing in U.S. collegiate athletics.
On Nov. 7, the NCAA Division I committee voted to drop the ban. The new rule will take effect on Aug. 1 – and the landscape for college hockey in the U.S. will change drastically.
PHOENIX – Nearly three years ago, Phoenix Mercury center Brittney Griner was detained at Sheremetyevo Airport while traveling to Russia to play overseas during the WNBA offseason. She was held for nearly 10 months after being charged and sentenced for possessing vape cartridges containing oil derived from cannabis.
Her harrowing experience highlighted the risks and uncertainties athletes face when seeking offseason opportunities abroad, underscoring the need for a safer, domestic alternative — a gap the Unrivaled Basketball League aims to fill for WNBA players.
TEMPE – Behind every athlete’s highlight-reel performance lies an unseen effort, where nutrition plays a starring role.
From carefully crafted meals to personalized fueling strategies, the journey to peak athletic performance starts long before game day – and it’s happening behind the scenes at Arizona State University.
WASHINGTON – At the behest of Arizona and three other states, a federal judge in Seattle on Thursday temporarily blocked President Donald Trump’s attempt to end birthright citizenship for anyone born on U.S. soil without at least one parent who’s an American citizen or green card holder.
Senior U.S. District Court Judge John Coughenour was the first judge to hear and decide on Trump’s controversial executive order reinterpreting the 14th Amendment, which grants citizenship to anyone born in the U.S. Nearly half the states have challenged the order that Trump signed on his first day back in office.
WASHINGTON – The “QAnon Shaman” called President Donald Trump’s pardons for him and other Jan. 6 rioters “a brilliant political move.” Another Arizona man in the mob called his pardon a relief but criticized Trump for wiping away convictions for others who attacked police.
“It’s a really nice weight off my shoulders,” said Cory Konold, a Tucson man who was near the front of the crowd that day with his sister. But, he added, “I don’t think truly violent offenders should be fully pardoned.”
PHOENIX – While some view coaching football as a chore, others see it as an opportunity to teach a younger generation. With college football undergoing constant changes on and off the field, some have argued that the art of coaching a football team has evolved.
Coaches come from all walks of life. Whether they are in their first season as the head of a program, or wrapping up decades of dominance at one school, everyone has a different philosophy of how they go about their business.
Monday’s College Football Playoff showcased those differences in coaching styles and experience, with Ohio State coach Ryan Day and Notre Dame Marcus Freeman – named the 2024 Paul “Bear” Bryant Coach of the Year – emphasizing their unique approaches, while Arizona State coach Kenny Dillingham & Co. nearly took down Steve Sarkisian’s Texas Longhorns in the CFP quarterfinals.
“I think (coaching philosophy) comes from obviously your experiences and where you come from,” former ASU football coach Todd Graham said. “Different people believe in different things.”
WASHINGTON – Arizona and 21 other states went to court Tuesday hoping to block President Donald Trump’s efforts to end birthright citizenship for children born to non-Americans.
Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes called Trump’s order “blatantly unconstitutional.” Gov. Katie Hobbs, a fellow Democrat, blasted it as both “unconstitutional and un-American.”
By Mackenzie Miller, Matthew Bird and Justin Patton Cronkite News and the Howard Center for Investigative Journalism at ASU
PHOENIX – The mood at the Arizona State Museum at the University of Arizona in Tucson on Wednesday was shock.
The museum’s staff, who facilitate the repatriation of Native American human remains and artifacts to Indigenous tribes, learned that Gov. Katie Hobbs was seeking $7 million to aid their efforts.
WASHINGTON – After a scripted half-hour inaugural address, President Donald Trump went off on a lengthy, unscripted riff to an overflow crowd at the Capitol – venting about a “rigged” 2020 election and blasting former President Joe Biden for 11th-hour pardons of lawmakers who investigated the Jan. 6 attack.
WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump returned to office with an ambitious agenda intended to reassert American leadership and undo four years of Democrat Joe Biden’s policies.
By Madeline Bates, Matthew DeWees, Emma Paterson and Samuel Travis Cronkite News
WASHINGTON – Donald Trump offered a vision of American renewal as he returns to the White House, along with swift and sweeping changes on immigration, “woke” ideology and the economy.
WASHINGTON – Newly elected Rep. Yassamin Ansari prefers to be in Phoenix as President-elect Donald Trump is sworn in. But freshman Sen. Ruben Gallego and veteran Rep. Greg Stanton will be among the Democrats on hand to witness his return to power.
The second inauguration of the divisive former president is putting civility to the test. Former first lady Michelle Obama is skipping it. So is former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
PHOENIX – For 54 seasons of Major League Baseball, Milwaukee Brewers fans experienced one constant: Bob Uecker.
Moments after a heartbreaking loss in the National League Wild Card series to the New York Mets in 2024 fans of the Brewers likely didn’t know it would be the last time they would hear ‘Mr Baseball’ on the call for their team. Uecker, the Hall of Fame broadcaster known for his wit and his iconic voice, died Thursday after facing “a private battle with small cell lung cancer” since early 2023, according to his family.
PHOENIX – The Arizona Diamondbacks didn’t offer Corbin Burnes the most money in free agency, but his new deal includes a perk no other team could match: a chance to stay local and prioritize his family.
Burnes moved to Arizona in 2018 with his wife, Brooke, who gave birth to twin girls last summer.
