Senator Bob Worsley was a Republican State Senator from Mesa from 2012 until Jan 2019. He and his wife Christi and 6 children (31 grandchildren and 2 great-grandchildren) lived in Arizona for almost 40 years and now spend half of their time in Salt Lake City, Utah where most of the family are now.
He came to the Senate bringing with him an array of entrepreneurial skills having been named 1999 Arizona Entrepreneur of the Year. He began his career as a CPA with Price Waterhouse, went on to found SkyMall in 1989, and sold it to Rupert Murdoch’s corporate empire 13 years later. He then founded NZ Legacy which has been active in real estate, energy, and mineral developments since 2002. He built an $80 Million 27-MW biomass energy plant, fueled by the remains of the Rodeo-Chediski fire which burned over 450,000 acres of Arizona forest land in 2002; Novo Power is currently fueled by 15,000 acres per year of forest-thinning and is staffed with more than 100 employees and contractors. He started getting his feet wet with the future of housing with a wealthy friend in Provo Utah in 2018. Today that interest has blossomed into a new 2 year old start-up called ZenniHome. The startup is building in a factory a state-of-art micro steel volumetric home of the future completely furnished.
While serving in the Arizona Senate, he was involved with energy and technology issues, citizen engagement, data collection, and the required infrastructure for our future autonomous vehicles. Along with Supreme Court Judge Bill Montgomery and other civic leaders, he has actively been seeking a long-term, compassionate solution to immigration challenges in Arizona. He chaired the Transportation and Technology Committee, and served on the Commerce & Public Safety, Finance, and Judiciary committees but announced in June 2018 his retirement from politics “until his party wakes up from its nap.”
Bob has served or serves on Boards of Mesa United Way, Mesa Urban Renewal Lab, United Families, Institute of American Values, Arizona Aerospace Association, Maricopa County Association of Governments Economic Council, American Businesses for Immigration Coalition (ABIC), Scoutmaster for a troop of 36 scouts, LDS Mission to Uruguay and Paraguay, Hispanic congregation leader for almost a decade and numerous other civic, church and philanthropic endeavors.
He is an author of the newly released book “The Horseshoe Virus'' which along with telling his story of being elected to fight for immigrants in Arizona also painstakingly connects some on the far right and far left of working together to kill any comprehensive immigration reform in Washington DC.
