Community News

2020: It was a train wreck. Wrangler News looks back on a year in South Tempe and West Chandler that jumped the tracks with a pandemic, social and political unrest ... and an actual train wreck.

Morgan Bell, 9, and her mother, Bridgette, of West Chandler, will have a joyous Christmas. Morgan survived peripheral T-cell lymphoma, a very rare and aggressive type of non Hodgkin lymphoma, a blood cancer. One in a million get it, making known treatments equally rare. Very few patients survive it. 

Even though this year has dimmed many of our Christmas celebrations, the lights along Mill Avenue as well as the beloved display at Pollack Center In Tempe continue to brighten our spirits.

In the seven years since creating Tempe-based Kettle Heroes, a kettle-popcorn business that seeks out everyday heroes to honor, as well as its next-door sister entity, Devoted Guardians, a medical home-care service, the Sinykin brothers have shown that success in business and having a heart as corporate citizens are not mutually exclusive.

What makes the holiday season so special? Family, friends, our places of worship and, of course, those lovingly created treats.

Kyrene del Norte alum and film writer-director Johnny Ysaguirre, delivers an award-winning short film in "Nice Shirt."

Most Chandler and Tempe municipal services will be on holiday schedules the weeks of Dec. 20, in honor of Christmas, and Dec. 27, in honor of New Year’s.

In a difficult year, three burgeoning faith communities in Tempe and West Chandler, have not lost their spirit of giving.