The Daily Agenda: For Rosenthal, it’s all about recruiting and relationships

Sandy Rosenthal says the fish’s head is rotting at the sheriff’s department … He wants more training academies, officers in schools ... Big money coming for Tucson housing.

If you lived in Tucson 13 years ago, you probably still remember where you were when the news broke on that Saturday morning in January that U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords and 18 others were shot in a Safeway parking lot.

Giffords’ survival from a point-blank gunshot wound to the head is often credited to her then-intern, Daniel Hernandez Jr., who assisted at the scene while waiting for medical help.

But a second, often overlooked person is also credited with saving her life: Local paramedic Aaron Rogers.

Rogers was part of a program that provided special training to paramedics so they could enter a potentially dangerous environment and get to work before police had the situation under control. And since paramedics aren’t allowed to enter an unsecured scene, it’s unclear if Giffords would have survived if that program didn’t exist.

The Regional Paramedic Team was developed and implemented by Sandy Rosenthal, one of four candidates challenging Chris Nanos to become the next Pima County Sheriff. Rosenthal also created the Regional SWAT Team and is responsible for emergency vehicle preemption in the county, which allows first responders to change traffic signals to expedite their travel.

Rosenthal, who spent 36 years working for PCSD, says that innovations like these and that his “vast amounts of experience” are reasons that he’s the best man for the job. He’s got a little over a month to prove it, before he faces off against Nanos in the July 30 Democratic primary.

On Monday, Rosenthal will join Nanos and Republican challengers Heather Lappin, Bill Phillips and Terry Frederick in a candidate forum hosted by the NAACP and the League of Women Voters of Greater Tucson (and we’ll be there to cover it.)

Rosenthal already squared off against Nanos in a debate last week, but before that, he spent time talking with the Tucson Agenda about his choice to run and his priorities should he win. He said that addressing deaths in the jail is at the very top of the list.

“The jail has food, it has safety and security, it has a place to put your head down and rest and it has medical (facilities.) That should be the safest place in all of Pima County,” Rosenthal said. “The jail is part of the population of our community, we can’t have people dying in there. And we’re required as operators of the jail under the 8^th and 14^th amendments to take care of the people in there, so we need to solve it.”

He pointed towards Maricopa County, which he said has paid out about $275 million over the past eight years for lawsuits involving former Sheriff Joe Arpaio and his policies and decisions while in office.

“If you think about the situation with the jail, that’s where we’re headed,” Rosenthal said. “The federal government can sue us at any point, and what’s our defense? We’re working on it? Well, we’re not even working on it.”

While Nanos is fixated on building a new jail, despite Pima County Administrator Jan Lesher saying that isn't an option, Rosenthal said the focus should be on saving lives, which he believes can be accomplished by better addressing the substance use and mental health issues of the people in the jail.

Rosenthal said instead of continuing to contract with a company based in Alabama to handle medical care in the jail, he would approach El Rio Health Center and Banner Health to see about having a local operator take over, saying “we can do so much better here in our community.”

Providing support to people after they’re released from jail can also go a long way to helping them stay out, he said, adding that he hopes to add more wraparound services for mental health, substance use, housing and job assistance into the mix.

“When you walk out of jail, you can’t go back to the same life you had. If you’re a drug addict, we need to provide you services when you need them. If you have mental health issues, we need to help you continue to get the support you need,” he said.

Staffing in the department has also long been an issue, with many deputies spending time working in the jail to help account for the shortage of corrections officers. While Rosenthal acknowledged that recruiting is a challenge, he said the bigger issue is that PCSD is only running a deputy academy every eight months, which can’t keep up with the average loss of 1.5 deputies every two weeks.

If elected, Rosenthal said he wants to run an academy every 90 days. He acknowledges that this will be a big lift for staff but says the benefit to the deputies and community outweighs the extra work.

And when it comes to those recruiting challenges, he also has ideas about how to turn things around. Rosenthal said he’ll work with high schools, community colleges and universities in the state to get the word out about opportunities for employment at PCSD.

Another way to address recruiting challenges, according to Rosenthal, is to truly integrate School Resource Officers into the community of the school at which they work and allow them to form relationships with students, teachers, parents and administrators.

While Nanos’ campaign website says that he expanded the SRO program to the point that there’s an officer in every school, Rosenthal said that’s not entirely accurate. He said there are actually only 20 school resource officers and they’re each assigned to three schools, which doesn’t allow them to develop relationships with anyone and doesn’t provide the same level of safety as a dedicated SRO in each school.

Relationships, or a lack thereof, seem to be a common theme when it comes to the department’s troubles. Rosenthal said PCSD is left out of conversations about the border and other statewide issues because of Nanos’ unwillingness to work with other Arizona sheriffs.

He also pointed towards what he called Nanos’ problematic relationships with subordinates, which has led to a drop in department morale.

“The fish dies from the head down,” he said. “That’s the worry here.”

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This story was supported by the Local News Initiative of Southern Arizona, a fund of the Community Foundation for Southern Arizona.

On the debate stage: Policing border communities and deaths at the Pima County jail were points of contention during a debate last weekend between the two Democratic candidates for Pima County sheriff, the Tucson Sentinel’s Cris Seda Chabrier reports. Sheriff Chris Nanos is fending off a challenge from a former lieutenant in the department, Sandy Rosenthal (who we wrote about today).

Big money for bonds: Sahuarita voters are going to vote on a $66 million bond this November, the Green Valley News’ Jorge Encinas reports. The town council unanimously approved putting the bond on the ballot as they eye population growth, which they expect to lead to a greater need for services and infrastructure, such as road repair and wastewater treatment. 

Our friend and former Arizona Daily Star colleague Justin Spears is hosting a golf tournament next month, benefitting TMC for Children.

Big money for housing: As part of a statewide effort to fix the affordable housing crisis, Gov. Katie Hobbs was in Tucson this week to mark the infusion of $66 million for a low-cost housing project for seniors, the Arizona Daily Star’s Analeise Mayor reports. The money came from CVS Health and will boost the West Point II Apartments near East Broadway and South Stone Avenue. 

Taking pride: Nogales artists and residents kicked off LGBTQ Pride month with murals and conversations about acceptance in the city, the Nogales International’s Daisy Zavala Magaña reports. Some participants pointed to having to hide their affection for their wife in public, while others pointed to a lack of health resources for the LGBTQ community. 

“I think events like this create a path to actually being inclusive in a city that likes to say it is, but really isn’t,” said local musician Valentino Valencia, who is transgender.

New faces at court: Pima County Superior Court has five new judicial officers, KVOA’s Zachary Jackson reports. The court has a new Judge Pro Tempore, Tracy Miller and Commissioners Sandra Bensley, Daniel R. Huff, Derek Koltunovich, and Dawn Walton. You can read more about them here. 

Uptown branding: The Foothills Mall is getting rebranded as “Uptown” and a new hotel is coming in, KGUN’s Reyna Preciado reports.The Tempo by Hilton hotel is the latest edition to a project by Bourn Companies that will extend into the next decade.

$16,007.82: The total amount of contributions made to Pima County Sheriff candidate Sandy Rosenthal’s campaign as of March 31, according to campaign finance reports.