PHOENIX — This Sunday, people across the country will spring forward and set their clocks one hour ahead—unless you live here in Arizona.
Our time stays the same year-round.
Since 1967, Arizona has chosen not to join practically the whole country and fall back and spring forward with daylight saving time.
"Arizona is fiercely independent, or we like to think we are,” said Arizona State University professor of history Calvin Schermerhorn.
So in the light of that, we hit the streets to find out what you think of daylight saving time while giving you a little history of why we don’t change our clocks.
“I like the fact that we’re not on it, don’t ever have to change.”
“It’s there, I don't think we need it in Arizona, but we don't have it, and I'm fine with that.”
“We've never had it. There's no need for it anymore.”
But Arizona did try out daylight saving time several times back in the day.
The most recent, according to Schermerhorn, was when the state complied for a year with the federal Uniform Time Act of 1966.
“There was a huge public outcry about it. Why the pushback? If you lengthen the school day, if you lengthen the business day, you have to air-condition most buildings more, right? Because most of the population lives in the Sonoran Desert,” he said.
So there you have it. Arizona doesn’t do daylight saving time to save energy, and it doesn't hurt to have a little less sun in the evening in that triple-digit heat.
The only area in Arizona that does observe daylight saving time is the Navajo Nation, which includes towns like Tuba City, Chinle and Window Rock in the northeastern part of our state.
Meanwhile, the Hopi Nation, fully surrounded by the Navajo reservation, does not observe daylight saving time.