By Jon C. Altmann
Special to American Freedom by Barbara
The Phoenix City
Council met June 14th to vote in the
replacement of Bill Gates, who resigned May 31st, leaving the Council District
3 seat open. Bill Gates, a Republican,
has declared his candidacy for the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors
District 3 seat (not to be confused with the city council district by the same
number) - the county seat is coming open because Supervisor Andy Kunasek is retiring
after serving 19 years.
The Council heard
from nine applicants all about an hour, then took about 25 minutes of public
testimony backing this or that candidate.
Four of the nine wanted to serve as interim only, five wanted to run for
the seat and serve as interim. There is
a sixth candidate running who did not apply for the interim seat.
After 90 minutes
of presentation and public comments made in favor of various candidates, the Council
took less than three minutes to make a motion by Councilwoman Thelda Williams and
then vote 6 to 1 for Debra Stark. If you
blinked, you missed the vote, with only Jim Waring saying "opposed"
to Stark's appointment.
In the November 8th
Presidential election, the District 3 seat will be on the ballot as a
non-partisan office. The field of
candidates is wide. Stark is one of six candidates. The remaining term serves until 2019. In order to win the November election, a
council candidate must achieve 50% plus 1 in the election. If no one reaches that mark, a run-off
election is held within 90 days with only the top two vote getters of the
November election competing.
Stark served
almost three decades as a city employee, retiring as the City's planning and
zoning director, a job that put her in regular contact with major developers,
their lobbyists and other special interests.
Stark is a Democrat. While city
elections are non-partisan, the District 3 seat has been held by Republicans
for decades. Bill Gates was a high
profiled Republican Party member, campaigning for Governor Ducey and active in
the LD28 GOP. The voter registration of
the district has a prominent Republican registration lead and the voter
turn-out over the last seven election cycles reviewed by this writer has been
that Republicans vote more consistently than Democrats by significant
double-digit average of Republicans over Democrats.
Up until a few
months ago, Stark was serving as the county planning director, but resigned
that job to seek the council seat. Stark's
city pension is reportedly, by some city hall insiders, greater than $90,000
annually. The city council position pays
$62,000 annually and is covered under the Arizona elected officials retirement
system. An early backer of Stark is
long-time developer Wayne Howard, as acknowledged on Stark's Facebook page top
photo standing on the mountain-top view porch of Howard's home with Howard's
wife.
Political insiders
have commented that Howard has driven an effort that has already raised about
$100,000 for Stark. Howard has stated
that Stark is a long-time friend. Howard
is well known for his "breakfast club" meetings that bring
development community interests together for political causes.
Phoenix City
Council races have risen in price over the past decade. The original idea behind the district system
was drive down the cost of electing candidates, which was significantly high
because the past method was city wide election of council members. The former
system ended up with most council members coming from central Phoenix
neighborhoods and not representative of the various areas. As a comparison point, a competitive Phoenix
mayor's race clocks in at more than $1 million.
The change over
the past 30 years is that the city's population has grown and there has been no
effort by the council or others to amend the city charter to add
districts. A typical council district
today has somewhere under 200,000 voters with twice that number in total
average district population. Arguably, a
council district today is the population size of a small to medium sized Valley
city.
Other candidates
The field of
candidates and their financial resources is wide. All but one are Democrats, or have been
Democrats turned independents. As of
this writing, there is not a current campaign report available for any
candidate, so any campaign funds discussed in my report are speculative, based
upon conversations with those active in city politics, Facebook or other
internet postings by candidates or their campaigns, or if the candidate has
directly spoken to me.
Ann Wallack is the past Maricopa County Democratic
Party chairwoman. She is best known as
the owner of Runners Den sports shop. To
her credit, Ann has strong skills in organizing grass roots campaigns. My estimate is that she will have no problem
in quickly reaching $50,000 in campaign donations. I would also estimate that there will be team
work between her campaign and that of Eric Meyer, who is seeking the open State
Senate Seat in District 28 (LD28). Meyer
has shown a strong door to door effort in his past four terms as a State
Representative. More than half of LD28
overlaps Council District 3 - providing an opportunity to walk for both Meyer
and Wallack.
Dan Carroll is an independent. He tried to run for city council in his early
20s many years ago when the seat in the north end was open and narrowly lost by
a few hundred votes. Carroll is well
liked around city neighborhood and civic organizations, but his fund raising
ability is not known. Carroll has stated
to me he is prepared to put in more than $100,000 of his own money to compete
for the seat. Carroll recently moved
back into the district, living with his girl friend. Two years ago he had an unsuccessful run in
central Phoenix's District 4 race.
Attorney Chris DeRose is now the lone Republican in the
race. DeRose competed for the
appointment to Council District 6 seat in 2009 when then Councilman Greg
Stanton resigned to join the Arizona Attorney General's office. Sal DiCiccio scored the appointment. DeRose, according to his LinkedIn page, is
currently employed as a senior litigator in the Arizona Attorney General's
office. He is a published author of
books on 19th century American politics.
He assisted Paul Babeu as a paid political consultant in his 2012
Congressional effort. DeRose has Phoenix
council members Sal DiCiccio and Jim Waring along with County Attorney Bill
Montgomery among his endorsers, according to his campaign web site. Arguably, DeRose could put up campaign signs
stating "DeRose - Republican - City Council" and capture a lot of GOP
voter attention - something his opponents can't do. DeRose is rumored to have good support among supporters
of the Governor. DeRose has a
long-standing interest to serve on the city council.
Jim Mapstead recently announced he switched from
long-standing Democrat voter registration to independent. He is a small business owner in Sunnyslope
and competed in the 2007 Council District 3 race, but did not make the run-off. He has reportedly retained Javelina
Consulting, which is tied closely to other Democrat efforts, plus long-time
Democrat Rick DeGraw has been out pounding city hall doors and other
connections for Jim. Rick and Jim are long-time friends. Mapstead has a long history with the Phoenix
Chamber of Commerce and has gained some business and labor support, according
to his Facebook page. Mapstead reported
on Facebook he has booked $100,000 in contributions. Mapstead is a past city Planning & Zoning
Commissioner and past service on the Paradise Valley Village Planning
Committee, however, at least part of the developer community, evidenced by
Wayne Howard's support of Stark, is missing from Mapstead's campaign
supporters. Mapstead is a serious
candidate with a long standing dedication that he wants the job. He is expected to be a highly competitive
candidate.
Charles Hargrave, as reported by The Arizona Republic, is a
sales agent for a call-center company and was a past unsuccessful California Congressional
candidate.
The Contest Ahead
The field of
contenders is large and most will be adequately to well-funded. The price tag for this contest will go
up. Three of the contenders I know well
or have spent some time in discussions - Mapstead, Carroll and DeRose. These three have a deep interest in gaining
the seat and I expect them to run hard.
Into the mix is there are two women candidates, so the woman's vote
divides. Ann Wallack will have a strong ground effort. Stark has no previous campaign experience. One office holder who has worked around Stark
has said she is personable, but she is a really a liberal Democrat, especially
on social issues.
As for the
election itself, this will be a well-financed battle and most likely there will
not be a clear 50% plus 1 winner, so a run-off of the top two in March is very
likely. Stark now has the
"incumbent" role, but holding on may be a lot harder. Gates is a hard act to follow and it is
highly unlikely his supporters will aid any of the Democrats or independents.
Republicans may
very well focus on the city's budget and the standard suggestion by others to
increase the property tax for homes and businesses. The city has not increased property taxes in
three decades. Dead on arrival are bringing
back the food sales tax and strapping an extra charge on the water bills.
Stark's quote in
The Arizona Republic on the tax issue is she "needs to discuss the issue
further." Keep in mind that Stark
retired as a top city official and until recently was Maricopa County's
planning director. Knowledge about the
city budget and its revenue needs should be something a city hall insider and
veteran like Stark should be able to quickly grasp. What the voters will know before November is
if she will vote for the new tax because the city must adopt the budget and
revenue plan prior to July 1st by state law.
City issues are
not as simple as the Legislature. Cities
must provide a range of daily services and respond to demands from their
citizens for a variety of services not provided by the state. Since the Great Recession, hours for
libraries, resources for senior centers and senior services have been cut,
along with hundreds of police officers.
About half of the fire trucks in Phoenix are nearing the end of their
service life and it is not clear there was a long range plan to deal with that
- keep in mind fire trucks cost about $1 million each. Add to it, the city does its own ambulance
billing and collection and is the only major U.S. city without an electronic
patient reporting system - something that is mainstay in both public and
private ambulance services for expeditious recovery of ambulance bills. Most other major cities outsource the billing
and collection.
Another point is
that Council Districts 1, 2, 3, in the north part of the city, and Council
District 6 in the Ahwatukee and Arcadia areas, have Republican voting
majorities. The costly light rail system
essentially provides no service to those districts and is another fiscal
sticking point. City street maintenance
demands were a priority for Councilman Gates, preferring a greater emphasis on
upkeep of existing infrastructure, not building more light rail.
The starting pay
for Phoenix police officers is no longer competitive with other Valley cities,
ranking roughly 10th behind other cities.
The question posed by Councilman
Nowakowski has been do we need more body cameras or simply use finite dollars
to hire more police officers? Police
response times have been greatly impacted by a shrinking police force who is
seeing more of their officers retire each month without enough replacements in
the pipeline.
Property tax increase,
no long range plan to reduce or retire city's debt, and the need for more
police officers are some of the issues. District
3 no longer has any large track of land for shopping malls or major business
build out. All politics are local. Stark's remarks in front of the council
mentioned more "in-fill" building on small lots and trying to do
something with vacant strip mall shops.
District 3 is home
to a lot of working middle income families who are highly focused on a still
recovering economy and the last thing they may want to hear is their city
government wants more money, while lacking a plan for the long term debt that
keeps mounting. The five ton elephant in
the room (no GOP pun intended) is how are we as a city making an updated strategic look ahead to cover infrastructure, paying attention
to services that make the city attractive to people and business who may wish
to move to Phoenix?
More to come, it's
early in the campaign.
Author
disclosure: Jon Altmann was an applicant
for the interim only seat for Council District 3, pledging not to run, only to
serve and assist until District 3 voters elected the replacement. Altmann was a 2007 candidate for District 3
and received 44% of the vote in the run-off election. Altmann was a professional journalist with
the former Phoenix Gazette newspaper in 1973, later joining the circulation
department. He has been a published
author in criminal justice, public safety, emergency medical services and the
fire service. He is a past contributor
to American Freedom. He has previously served
as a GOP Precinct and State Committeeman in Arizona. He is an established
public safety consultant and past ambulance industry senior manager and
executive with 22 years service in the
Navy.
