News Nuggets: Investigations, recounts, contracts, and more

What to do about the ballot propositions … Lesher’s contract on the table …. Sad farewell to local candidate.

It’s investigation season at the Pima County Board of Supervisors.

At tomorrow’s meeting, Supervisor Steve Christy wants to get his colleagues on board with asking the Arizona Attorney General’s Office to investigate Recorder Gabriella Cázares-Kelly’s decision to stop accepting online requests for early ballots in mid-October.

The Recorder’s Office said they were having trouble handling the high volume of online requests for early ballots, so they closed the online portal and referred voters to a telephone number. Several thousand voters were affected.

Christy called for the supervisors to ask the AG’s Office, or a “non-conflicted County Attorney” to look into Cázares-Kelly’s actions “with respect to Early Voting in the 2024 General Election, including but not limited to, the circumstances that led to the cancelation of voters’ accepted online Ballot by Mail requests.”

His request for an outside investigation comes a week after the supervisors voted unanimously to ask the AG’s Office and the U.S. Attorney’s Office to investigate Sheriff Chris Nanos’ decision to suspend his political opponent in the final days of the campaign.

The vote margin in the sheriff’s race is so narrow that county election officials say they want to do a recount. The supervisors will hold a special meeting on Thursday to decide whether to go ahead with it. Even though Republican challenger Heather Lappin already conceded the race to Nanos, the margin is within the range that state law says requires a recount. The estimated cost of the recount is about $32,000.

The vote tally as of Monday morning.

Now that Arizona voters gave the green light to ballot propositions that change how local governments conduct their business, county officials have to figure out how to handle those new requirements.

Supervisor Adelita Grijalva wants to know the “fiscal and operational impacts” of several propositions in particular:

• Prop 311: Everyone convicted of a crime must pay a $20 fee, which goes toward paying $250,000 to the spouses or children of first responders who are killed in the line of duty. It also raises punishments for aggravated assault against police officers and other first responders.

• Prop 312: Property owners can get refunds on their taxes if the local government doesn’t enforce public nuisance laws like loitering, panhandling and illegal camping. This one could up the pressure on county officials to deal with homelessness. It’s unclear how much it would cost or the size of the refunds that individual property owners could request.

• Prop 313: Anyone convicted of sex trafficking a minor would get a life sentence in prison. Supporters of the measure wanted to send a message to predators. Opponents worried victims of sex trafficking who get coerced by their abusers could end up in prison. Experts say the main cost will come from longer prison sentences.

• Prop 314: Local police can now enforce immigration laws, such as crossing the border illegally, which was highly unpopular in Pima County during the SB1070 era. The proposition doesn’t provide funding and statewide cost estimates go as high as $325 million annually for enforcement and incarceration. It won’t go into effect until the U.S. Supreme Court rules on a similar law in Texas.

The supervisors are going to discuss County Administrator Jan Lesher’s contract, which runs through January 7. The discussion will be held behind closed doors in executive session. If they want to take any legal action, they have to do it in public.

Lesher took over for longtime County Administrator Chuck Huckelberry in late 2021 after he was injured in a bicycle accident. She officially became county administrator in April 2022, when the supervisors by a 3-2 vote approved a contract with a $260,000 salary, which was $32,000 less than Huckelberry’s salary. At the time, Christy wanted a more extensive search for Huckelberry’s replacement, while Supervisor Matt Heinz objected to Lesher getting paid less than Huckelberry.

You can watch the supervisors’ meeting on the county’s YouTube channel. The meeting starts at 9:00 a.m. tomorrow morning.

No biggie?: Climate change didn’t play a big role in this year’s elections, even as Arizona went through record-setting heat. Just 16% of voters said climate change was one of their top issues. The Arizona Daily Star’s Tony Davis spoke with experts and candidates who pointed to political factors, like successful GOP outreach, as well as the difficulty of convincing voters that climate change is important and a general lack of knowledge about what the state’s utility regulator, the Arizona Corporation Commission, actually does.

Rest in peace: The Democratic candidate for state Senate in Legislative District 17, John McLean, died in a car wreck on Friday, the Star’s Charles Borla reported. Police say an impaired driver ran a stop sign and crashed into McLean’s car on Broadway near Houghton Road around 6 a.m.

Auditor taking heat: Santa Cruz County officials sued the Arizona Auditor General, saying the auditor general’s negligence allowed an alleged $38 million embezzlement scheme to go undetected for years, the Nogales International reports. County officials say the auditor general’s standards declined and they failed to confirm much of the information former Treasurer Liz Gutfahr included in her reports, while she allegedly embezzled the money.

Teflon Tom: Most Cochise County voters aren’t holding Supervisor Tom Crosby’s indictment for election interference against him. He was leading in his race for re-election on Friday, along with fellow Republican candidates for county supervisor seats Kathleen Gomez and former state Sen. Frank Antenori, Arizona Public Media’s Paola Rodriguez reports.

Taking another crack at it: Former Tucson City Councilman Rodney Glassman says he is running against Attorney General Kris Mayes in 2026, Capitol Media Services’ Howard Fischer reports. Glassman is running as a Republican. He has run as both a Democrat and Republican for U.S. Senator, Arizona Corporation Commission, attorney general, and Maricopa County assessor.

Library plans: County officials are working on ways to recruit more people to work at local libraries, a key reason officials proposed closing several library branches in August, the Tucson Sentinel’s Natalie Robbins reports. For now, county officials say they are keeping the status quo and not closing any branches.

“Nothing is changing at this point in time. There are a lot of options on the table. I don't know what they're all going to look like, at the end, but nothing is changing right now,” Lesher said.

0: Ballots left to be counted in Pima County as of Sunday. By the end, elections officials had counted more than 518,000 ballots.