The current era began in the rubble of the crash and became Scottsdale’s most self-aware chapter. The economy rebuilt broader than before — tech, finance, and healthcare beside the resorts — while the culture cashed in its long game with the Museum of the West (2015) and the canal’s transformation into an arts stage.
The politics turned on limits. Prop 420 (2018) locked the Preserve behind a permanent public vote; the pandemic (2020) stress-tested the visitor economy in both directions; the Rio Verde Foothills cutoff (2023) made Scottsdale the global face of Colorado River reckoning; and the Axon referendum war (2024–25) dragged the growth argument all the way to the state legislature — while voters changed mayors over it twice. The era is still being written; so is this page’s decade-by-decade detail.
The decades of this era
- The 2010s — Recovery & the New West: the rebound, the museum, OdySea, and Prop 420.
- The 2020s — Growth on Trial: COVID, Rio Verde, Axon, and a changing city hall.
