The Daily Agenda: Separating from the pack
The Daily Agenda: Separating from the pack
Campaign finance reports are back ... Who's bringing in the big bucks? ... County cleans house.
The fundraising powerhouses are emerging in the races for Pima County offices and local legislative seats.
We now have the first round of campaign finance reports since the official slate of candidates was set earlier this month. So this is our first look into which of the people who will actually be on the ballot are separating from the pack and which ones are falling behind, along with which races are drawing the most money.
At the county, the cash is flowing into the races for county attorney and the supervisor seats in Districts 1 and 3. At the legislative level, no local races come close to the Senate and House races in Legislative District 17.
The fundraising powerhouses so far for county offices are incumbent Supervisor Rex Scott in District 1, incumbent County Attorney Laura Conover and challenger Mike Jette, and political newcomer Jennifer Allen in the race for supervisor in District 3.
Scott has raised $108,000 for his re-election bid, far more than the $1,000 raised by fellow Democrat Jake Martin or Republican Steve Spain’s $8,000.
Both candidates for county attorney are bringing in huge hauls, to the tune of $104,000 so far for Conover and $86,000 for Jette. By our count, that’s more than any other county race.
Allen raised $85,000 for her campaign to take the seat of former Supervisor Sharon Bronson. Allen’s total dwarfs the roughly $5,000 brought in by two other Democrats, Miguel Cuevas and Edgar Soto, or the $9,000 raised by the lone Republican candidate, Janet Wittenbraker. We couldn’t find reports for Democratic candidate April Ignacio.
The races in Legislative District 17 are ones to watch, as we wrote last month. Republicans hold the district’s Senate seat and two House seats, but Democrats think they can flip a seat or two in the district and change the balance of power in the Legislature.
The biggest fundraiser so far in LD17 is Kevin Volk, the lone Democrat running for a House seat.
Volk raised $102,000, nearly double the $53,000 raised by Republican incumbent Rep. Cory McGarr and more than double the $45,000 raised by the other Republican incumbent, Rep. Rachel Jones. Volk did get a helping hand from family members who contributed $29,000 so far. The Republican challenger, Anna Orth, raised $3,500.
Republican Vince Leach is outraising incumbent Sen. Justine Wadsack in the race for the district’s Senate seat, but with a big caveat. Leach brought in $71,000, but that includes $45,000 in loans he made to his campaign. Wadsack raised $54,000 without any loans this election cycle. Both of them are outstripping Democratic challenger John McLean, who joined the race in February. He raised $32,000, including $15,000 he loaned to his campaign.
As for the rest of the local legislative races, most candidates are incumbents who are running unopposed. In the rare races with challengers, none of the challengers raised more than $200.
But there are some tidbits worth noting, such as LD21 Democratic Rep. Consuelo Hernandez filing her campaign finance reports on time again. She raised $62,000 so far, according to the reports she’s filed this election cycle. The state’s campaign finance system says she owes $16,000 in fines for filing reports in 2022 and 2023 months after the deadlines.
Another tidbit worth noting: Incumbent Sheriff Chris Nanos, a Democrat, is having a rough time raising money. He brought in $11,700, and $9,200 of it came from family members. That’s a lot less than one of his challengers, Republican Heather Lappin, who raised $32,000.
This round of reports is the last one we’ll see until mid-July, or about two weeks after early ballots go out for the July 30 primary elections. Today, we just looked at the top-line totals for candidates, but there is a ton more information in the reports that we’ll mine over the next few months as we cover the elections.
If you’re curious and don’t want to wait for reporters to dig it up, you can find the county reports here and the legislative ones here.
This story was supported by the Local News Initiative of Southern Arizona, a fund of the Community Foundation for Southern Arizona.
No vacancy: Pima County Supervisors approved a policy last week that will place deadlines on how long a position can remain vacant before it’s removed from the budget, the Arizona Daily Star’s Charles Borla writes. The policy, which goes into effect at the start of the next fiscal year, could result in the loss of hundreds of jobs and cut nearly $8 million from payrolls. There are 7,400 jobs across all the county’s departments. As of Tuesday, nearly 14% of all positions are unfilled.
In the dark: City officials and the Rio Nuevo board say they haven’t heard anything about a possible plan to relocate the Roadrunners to Tempe, despite Friday's announcement by Coyotes majority owner Alex Meruelo, KOLD’s Sean Mahoney reports. NHL officials announced Thursday the Coyotes would be moving to Utah as a result of the team’s sale to the Jazz. Representatives for the City of Tucson and Rio Nuevo told Mahoney there’s been no communication with Roadrunners ownership or the AHL about a potential move.
“I think a lot of things are happening behind closed doors. We would love to be part of that conversation. We have been in contact with our Tucson Roadrunners leadership here. Haven’t heard a lot from the Coyotes yet,” said Rio Nuevo Vice Chairman Edmund Marquez.
Digging deeper: The Tucson Sentinel’s Blake Morlock said the Arizona Board of Regents need to demonstrate some oversight and publicly ask more questions about the University of Arizona’s finances, like requesting specifics about how the financial crisis happened in the first place. Morlock suggests a list of questions about budget cuts, the strategy behind them, consequences and fulfillment of the UA’s mission.
Standing together: The Tucson Tenants Union joined the Malibu Apartments Tenants Union in a rally Saturday to protest what they claim is retaliation by management in response to their attempt to organize, KGUN’s Alex Dowd reports. Missy Arroyo, who started the Malibu Apartments union last month, says that after their second meeting, she and several members were given eviction or written notices asking them to vacate within 10 days. The groups staged a protest Saturday.
Education inequity: Arizona’s decades-old English-only school segregation policies combined with systemic racism and xenophobic laws have created extensive mental health barriers for Latino students, who are at greater risk for mental health disparities, the Arizona Luminaria’s Beatriz Limón writes. Arizona ranks last in the nation and is three times below national standards for ensuring there are enough counselors to serve students. Experts are calling on state leaders to act quickly before more Latino students fall through the cracks.
Leading the charge: Tucson has become a model for climate action among cities in the Southwest, Mayor Regina Romero writes in a guest piece for the Star. Romero said her vision is to bring in every federal dollar possible to invest in clean energy, protect residents from the impacts of extreme heat and climate change and create long-term green jobs.
4-10: The degrees above the normal high temperature in Tucson yesterday.
I would like to urge readers to click on the English only article. All the cruelty, all the suffering; totally unnecessary. We must get back to respecting students and meeting them where they are and for who they are, and then helping them to get the education that they are looking for.
The financial reports are fascinating reading. The utterly useless Sally Ann Gonzales raise zero money but is sitting on a pile of cash. And in the reports there are soooooo many lobbyists.