

With the addition of a new prospective candidate for a four-year term on the Prescott City Council, the field of possible candidates has now grown to seven.

In Prescott Unified School District, the Governing Board is offered a chance to get a peek at the projected 2023-24 school budget far in advance of when final documents are due come late June.

Work has already begun in the Congress area on Yavapai County’s multimillion-dollar initiative to improve high-speed internet in rural areas, and a groundbreaking is expected to take place in the next two to three months in the Black Canyon City area as well.

A project intended to improve transparency and efficiency in the Yavapai County Recorder and Elections departments will move onto the next step, with a design contract expected to go to the Board of Supervisors in March.

Now several months into a $3 million improvement project along the Granite Creek Corridor in downtown Prescott, the creek water is rushing within a more defined channel, and rock weirs are helping to direct the flow.

With more and more voters becoming interested in the election process, the Yavapai County Recorder and Elections departments are looking to redesign their offices to help with transparency, as well as work flow.

Heavy precipitation so far this winter has served to fill or nearly fill all of the City of Prescott’s lakes, and that, in turn, has led to an earlier-than-normal start of recharge of the aquifer with water from Watson Lake.

Yavapai County’s new Justice Center and Jail in Prescott is expected to be substantially complete within about three months, and county officials say the total construction cost has now gone up by about $1.7 million.

As the annual National Day of Remembrance for American Downwinders approached on Jan. 27, local Downwinder advocate Sherrie Hanna appeared before the Prescott City Council and the Yavapai County Board of Supervisors.

To help handle traffic at an intersection that is expected to get busier soon with added development, city officials say a traffic signal will be required at the corner of Prescott Lakes Parkway and Smoke Tree Lane.