Company will base its operations at the community college’s new Automotive Technology and Innovation Center| Shouldn’t Yavapai invest the $10 million on such a center on a smaller scale on the Verde Campus rather than a brewery? If you missed it, the future is here.

Editor Robert Oliphant

OPINION. Pony.ai announced on Oct. 12, 2022, a partnership with Pima Community College to test drive its autonomous electrical vehicles in Tucson on Oct. 12, 2022. A global autonomous driving technology company, Pony.ai,  will open its first Arizona location in Tucson to test its electric vehicles. The company will base its operations at the Pima Community College’s new Automotive Technology and Innovation Center on its downtown campus.

The company said that it chose Tucson because it already had a strong relationship with the City of Tucson and Pima Community College’s new Automotive and Technology and Innovation Center.

In a press release, Pima County Supervisor Sharon Bronson said that with Pony.ai’s vision, under-resourced populations will have access to more reliable transportation for persons with disabilities. According to a 2017 report published by the Ruderman Family Foundation, self-driving cars offer potential for reducing transportation obstacles for people with disabilities.  The report points to government transportation survey data from 2003 that found six million people with disabilities have difficulties getting the transportation they need.

Wouldn’t it be much wiser for Yavapai Community College to invest the $10 million it’s decided to spend on the Verde Campus in developing an electric automotive and technology center rather that a brewery?  I think so.  After all, in case you missed it, the future is here.

Rep Chevalier outlines concerns with $10 million project charging College failed to conduct appropriate need assessment; prefers College focus on and provide more hi-tech training on east side of County for students

OPINION. By Paul Chevalier. As the Third District representative to the Yavapai Community College District Governing Board, (Sedona, Cottonwood, Clarkdale, Big Park etc.) I see two of my responsibilities as follows: First, providing the residents of Sedona and that portion of the Verde Valley with information about important College developments. Second, protecting your wallet when it comes to wisely spending the millions of taxes residents annually pay toward that institution to support post high school education.  

My concerns relating to those responsibilities arose at the College annual budget meeting, last May, when the Administration asked the Board for approval to spend Ten Million Dollars Plus (since revised to $9,813, 600)to build a 14,000 square foot commercial brewery and distillery somewhere in the Verde Valley for the purpose of teaching students the jobs in beer breweries and distilleries. The Board had never discussed the pros and cons of building a brewery and distillery versus expending funds to expand our fledgling Skilled Center  – funds the college has now removed from our capital budget for at least the next five years in order to build the brewery and distillery. 

Paul Chevalier, Third District Representative to College District Governing Board

The Board was never provided with a need assessment, which is a process that examines what criteria must be met in order to reach a desired outcome. It answers questions such as the following: Where will the students come from? Where will people completing a certificate find a job and what will it pay?  How many faculty will the project require and their needed backgrounds? How will the commercial sale of beer impact the costs associated with the project? What are the anticipated annual maintenance costs? Why wouldn’t it be smarter and cheaper to teach the course with the participation of a local beer brewery? And more.

Despite the absence of information, the Governing Board voted 4-1 to approve the project. I alone dissented and I alone asked questions about the project.  But I received scant information.

Following the meeting, I felt it was my obligation to obtain information that could answer the need issue. I asked the college for its need assessment. However no need assessment was provided. My best option left was to submit a Public Records Document request to the College, something every citizen is allowed to do. If such information addressing the need for, or other reasons for, creating/teaching beer brewery workers existed the law required the College to provide it to me.  I received a document entitled “ Yavapai College Program Demand Gap Analysis”. That document never mentioned beer brewery or distillery workers.  Clearly the College never did a need assessment.

I have a background in business. My formal education included two graduate business degrees from Columbia and Harvard. There I was taught to do a rigorous need assessment before expending significant funds on any new project. I later worked for two Fortune 500 companies for decades. My last 10 years of work were spent in very senior management positions. We did our need assessments.

I decided to try and educate myself about the need for this project on the east side. I note that people who take classes on either side of the mountain live there and rarely travel to the other side for classes because of the time and cost of commuting. Therefore brewery/distillery students will almost all come from the east side.

What about such jobs availability on the east side? My research showed that currently there are less than 40 people employed in a grand total of six micro beer breweries on the east side of the mountain. And six of these people are brew masters with many years of fermenting experience. Our program will offer certificates and not prepare anyone for a brew master position.

Even if turnover in these breweries goes as high as 15% only five jobs a year would be available somewhere on the east side with no guarantee that east side graduates will be offered them or want to commute to them. With regard to hard alcohol distilleries I have found none on the east side of the mountain except one in a several year long startup phase. It has no employees. The owner is doing the startup work. Bottom line: There are no distillery jobs available on the east side.

Moreover the starting wage of Arizona beer brewery and distillery workers does not compare favorably with that of persons who obtain a certificate in some hi-tech training programs taught at Yavapai College in Prescott involving automobiles, automation, or commercial aviation.  The College does not teach those courses on the east side. It could use this money to do that.

Why the College wants to spent nearly $10 million to build a beer brewery and a distillery on the east side has never been explained to the Board and frankly it eludes me.

Is this really a good idea?