Long v. Napolitano

In Long v. Napolitano, 203 Ariz. 247, 254,16, 53 P.3d 172, 179 (App. 2002), a taxpayer challenged legislation creating and implementing the Tourism and Sports Authority ("TSA"), contending, among other things, that the legislation was an unconstitutional special law. 203 Ariz. at 251,1, 53 P.3d at 176. The TSA legislation at issue applied to "any county that has a population of more than two million persons." Id. at 252,6, 53 P.3d at 177. The taxpayer argued that the TSA legislation was inelastic because no county other than Maricopa County could attain the classification criteria. Id. at 258,37, 53 P.3d at 183. Specifically, the taxpayer argued that "even if other counties achieve the population threshold, they can never enter the TSA classification because they could not call the required election by August 1, 2000." Id. The Court disagreed, explaining that the population threshold was not tied to a specific date or census and "the 2000 county election" served "as a triggering device for the TSA legislation rather than as a criterion for class participation." Id. at 258-59,38, 41, 53 P.3d at 183-84. Thus, although we concluded that the population classification used in the TSA legislation was sufficiently elastic, we did not address the actual or reasonable probability that another entity would enter the class. Id. at 260,45, 53 P.3d at 185.