The animosity and distrust between the Maricopa Board of Supervisors and the Republican-led Arizona Legislature continues to deepen with a new issue finding a wedge between the two sides.
On Wednesday, Arizona Senator J.D. Mesnard took to the floor of his chamber to address the Maricopa County Supervisors’ ongoing consideration of two legislative vacancies in both the House and the Senate.
"The length of time of these vacancies is the longest, while we've been in session, in a half a century! 56 years!"
One of the vacancies is due to an expulsion of a Republican member of the Arizona House of Representatives. The other for a resignation of a Democrat member of the State Senate.
The Maricopa County Board of Supervisors is statutorily required by law to select the replacement for the vacancy from a pool of three same-party nominees chosen by their party. Republican precinct committeemen transmitted three names for the open House seat (Liz Harris, Julie Willoughby, and Steve Steele) as did the Democrats for the Senate seat (Representatives Cesar Aguilar and Flavio Bravio in addition to Quant’a Crews).
Mesnard’s frustrations boiled over on the Senate floor as he laid out his charge against the Supervisors’ alleged delay in filling the two vacancies for 19 (Senate) and 20 (House) days. He informed his colleagues “the length of these vacancies is the longest, while we’ve been in session, in a half a century – 56 years!” The East Valley lawmaker also said that 8.76 days is the historical average to fill the vacancy.
What seemed to bring Senator Mesnard to this point were some of the rumors he recounted hearing about for the reasons in the delay to fulfill the vacancies. According to the senator, “one of the rumors is there may be a belief that the county can reject all three of the nominees put forward.” The other rumor “is that (the supervisors) just want to sit on this for a while and hold out for some piece of legislation that they want to see passed” – in other words, “leverage” on the Arizona Legislature.
Senator Mesnard spoke on behalf of the 120 Republican precinct committeemen who rearranged their schedule back in April to nominate the three individuals to fill the open House seat. He bemoaned the fact that such a lengthy delay was not previously an issue, and he hinted that maybe his colleagues should take future action to change the statute to force the county board of supervisors to act with more urgency when filling vacancies during a legislative session. He stated that the “Board of Supervisors should have held a special meeting to hasten what should be an important priority for them.”
The members of the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors were definitely paying attention to Senator Mesnard’s words. Supervisor Steve Gallardo quickly responded on Twitter, writing, “Thanks for taking us all the way back to the 70s Senator. We didn’t receive nominees until the 4/18. Some didn’t respond right away to request for background info. Board is performing due diligence. As always, Arizona Senate Republicans are ignoring the facts.”
Thanks for taking us all the way back to the 70s Senator. We didn’t receive nominees until the 4/18. Some didn’t respond right away to request for background info. Board is performing due diligence. As always @AZSenateGOP are ignoring the facts. 🤣 https://t.co/JiRXnWLj0C
— Supervisor Steve Gallardo (@Steve_Gallardo) May 3, 2023
Daniel Stefanski is a reporter for AZ Free News. You can send him news tips using this link.
Downtown Phoenix’s residents experienced a glimmer of hope in the ongoing homeless crisis last month after a court declared the city to blame. If the city doesn’t appeal the court’s order, it may be the end of the massive encampment known as “The Zone.”
The decision flies in the face of the precedent set by other cities: plans and spending that yield no favorable results, ultimately forcing the residents to learn to live with the crime and squalor. Yet, Phoenix may no longer be resigned to the same fate borne by most other major cities. Downtown property and business owners were vindicated in their belief: city officials’ plans, spending, and promises alone don’t qualify as results.
Requiring results of the city could mean The Zone may cease to exist in the near future — restoring a square mile of the current wasteland of city-sanctioned slums into a healthy business district — but only if the city of Phoenix decides to follow through on the court-ordered action to resolve the homeless crisis. Cleaning up The Zone would mean finding shelter and services for around 800 homeless residing in the area, according to a census conducted by the Human Services Campus late last month.
Homeless sit outside a business in The Zone.
The first bout of legal relief came for The Zone’s residents and business owners after the Maricopa County Superior Court ruled last month that the city of Phoenix was at fault for The Zone. The court ordered the city to show that it’s taking “meaningful steps” toward fixing The Zone. They have until July 10 to do so, with a trial date scheduled for June.
The ruling came days after the city of Phoenix promised to finally meet to fix The Zone, a promise prompted by back-to-back murders in the encampment.
Vice President for Legal Affairs at the Goldwater Institute, Timothy Sandefur, who submitted an amicus brief in the case, told AZ Free News that this ruling was a good first step toward remedying The Zone — but that the city has a ways to go.
“I think this is a first step and a very important one,” said Sandefur.
Sandefur said that the superior court indicated the best next steps for the city would be to build structured campgrounds and establish treatment programs, rather than continue with their current “housing first” approach.
However, notice of a settlement in a separate, federal case issued recently may complicate matters in finally getting the city of Phoenix to fix The Zone.
In the Arizona District Court case, the ACLU and the city held mediation about three weeks ago.
Details of the settlement weren’t made public. The Phoenix City Council plans to convene April 18 in an executive session — a meeting not open to the public — to discuss the terms of the settlement. At some point after, the Phoenix City Council will announce the settlement terms during a public meeting.
Of note, the city attempted to dismiss the superior court case — but not the federal case. The city also spent just shy of $100,000 fighting the superior court case.
Ilan Wurman, another lawyer on the lawsuit against the city, told AZ Free News that the court’s order to fix The Zone was thorough to the point where he imagined it would be difficult for the city to fight it.
“The court’s ruling is such a thorough victory for the business and property owners that it will be very hard for the city to overcome it at a full trial on the merits,” said Wurman. “We hope the city does the right thing and considers a settlement or simply follows through on the court’s instructions — that will save a lot of expense to taxpayers and it will be better for the unsheltered community as well.”
In remarks to the press, the city stresses that it has allocated around $140 million to solve the homeless crisis. However, there’s a difference between commitment and spending. Of the $120 million in COVID-19 relief funds received to address the homeless crisis, the city has only spent about 10 percent.
Of what little the city has spent for the homeless crisis, the Maricopa County Superior Court assessed that none of this spending has actually mitigated the crisis.
Homeless use drugs inside Phoenix’s sprawling encampment known as The Zone.
“With few exceptions, the action items about which city representatives testified centered around the creation of more bureaucracy, additional staff positions, and obtaining additional funding for programs to vaguely address homelessness in general,” stated Judge Scott Blaney. “The Court received very little evidence — if any — that the City intends to take immediate, meaningful action to protect its constituent business owners, their employees, and residents from the lawlessness and chaos in the Zone.”
However, in a recent interview, Mayor Kate Gallego indicated that the city was attempting to follow through on a “housing first” approach, and claimed that the city was “working very hard” to fix the homeless crisis.
As AZ Free News previously reported, “housing first” — also referred to as “permanent supportive” or “affordable” housing — holds the theory that the homeless will choose to seek employment, become financially responsible, and receive mental health care and/or substance abuse treatment if food and housing are provided. The theory also posits that enabling the homeless to choose their housing and support services will make them more likely to remain in that housing and stick with self-improvement initiatives.
Gallego shared that the city was working on launching seven new shelter options in partnership with various organizations, and that the city is hoping to receive additional help from both the state and federal government. She mentioned that she would meet with the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors.
Gallego disclosed that she recently spoke with Gov. Katie Hobbs about the homeless crisis — a conversation that had last occurred during Hobbs’ inauguration week in January. The mayor said that Hobbs was looking for additional resources to provide the city.
“Residents should feel confident that they’re going to see changes,” said Gallego. “The message we want to send to the public is that we recognize it’s a problem and we want to solve it.”
When questioned, Gallego didn’t directly deny that the city wouldn’t appeal the superior court’s decision.
In another interview, Gallego claimed that adequate law enforcement was taking place in The Zone. Gallego’s claim conflicted with the various investigative reports and witness accounts that depicted minimal law enforcement in The Zone.
“We treat every member of our community the same when they commit a crime. We want to be consistent and to enforce breaking the law,” said Gallego. “If you commit a crime, it is the same regardless of your housing status.”
However, the “Gaydos and Chad Show” testified to witnessing a myriad of criminal activity during a recent excursion in The Zone — including drug use, public defecation and urination, and prostitution — but not seeing any police presence. In response, Gallego claimed the city’s police were “too aggressive” when handling the homeless. The mayor cited the Arizona District Court case against the city as justification for her claim. However, that lawsuit concerned whether the city could enforce camping and sleeping bans, as well as whether the city had a right to seize or throw away items from homeless encampments as part of cleanup efforts. The lawsuit does not address police response to criminal activity.
Watch: The Zone – Homelessness and Crime Rampant in Phoenix
Corinne Murdock is a reporter for AZ Free News. Follow her latest on Twitter, or email tips to corinne@azfreenews.com.
Last month, the City of Chandler unanimously passed Resolution 5656 to reject the proposed ‘Landings on Ocotillo’ high-density housing project. From the start, the developer has been smearing our neighbors for no other reason than we support the plans that have been voted on and approved for our community.
Along with the city, we support additional affordable housing for the community. But the fact is, this isn’t about affordable housing. If it were, then the developer—and their high-paid zoning lawyers, PR firms, and nonprofits—would have found a way to make the project work at one (or more) of the 14 other sites that fit within existing planning.
This is about profit. And to make matter worse, in just 15 years, this housing can (and probably will) convert to regular market rate housing. This means that the subsidies will go away, and the tenants who need the subsidies will get kicked out.
The reality is that the City of Chandler has already approved multiple affordable housing projects in line with the voter-approved City Master Plan. In October, the City of Chandler approved a large public housing development for seniors. In November, the City approved hundreds of affordable housing units in its Downtown District. Resident and neighborhood opposition groups have been unanimous in their support for affordable housing, which can be further evidenced by their 85% affirmative vote on the Chandler General Plan.
The problem is that the high-density housing project (Landings) proposed by the Developer (Dominium) is on an unsuitable county island site. Development as a multifamily living site is incompatible with the voter-approved General Plan, the Chandler Water Master Plan, and the Chandler Airpark Area Plan, as noted by the City Council in Resolution 5656.
Given that Arizona is a desert, the largest issue is the incompatibility with the Chandler Water Master Plan—the site in question does not have the water capacity to support any form of housing. The City allocates water in accordance with the Chandler Water plan depending on intended use and zoning. The site in question is currently zoned for farming with the plan to rezone it to light industry or employment under the Chandler General Plan and Chandler Airpark Plan. Light industrial/employment is allocated 121 gpd per 1,000 ft, whereas the proposed multifamily housing requires over twice that amount at 253 gpd per 1,000 ft. If this project were approved, the site would have grossly insufficient water. Neither Dominium nor its representatives have addressed in the media or to government officials how they will supply the 102 gpd shortfall. With existing drought conditions, Chandler is currently under Tier 2 water shortage restrictions. There is simply not enough water to support this proposed development at this location.
The assumption that this land would be used for light industrial uses has been the basis for other plans like traffic planning. Using this land for housing instead of light industrial would increase the number of cars on the road in an area that already has the highest traffic incidents with a record injury rate when compared to the rest of southern Chandler. The full impact on traffic from current construction projects is yet to be felt in this already congested area, and this unplanned project would only make it worse.
The City of Chandler offered Dominium fourteen other locations for consideration that are in line with existing plans. Dominium refused to consider these other locations. Instead, it is focused on this specific parcel of land. The alternate locations are smaller, but they have the requisite water allocation and would fit within the parameters of the voter-approved Chandler Master Plan.
The everyday residents who live and work in this neighborhood were all universally opposed to the project at the City Council meeting. Those who spoke in favor were from other cities and organizations. Should special interest groups and outside actors determine what is best for a city? Is the voice and concern of the neighbors and residents inferior to that of a deep-pocketed developer with the right political connections?
Enough is enough. Where a voter-approved plan exists, we the people should always have final say—not some multi-million-dollar corporation. And when this case is brought before the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors this year, they must affirm this important principle.
The Voice of Chandler is a group of concerned Chandler residents fighting for the rights of We The People. You can find out more about their work here.
During the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors meeting on Monday, several poll workers testified that election machines at their locations had issues prior to Election Day.
During its canvass of the election results, the county reported that stress testing prior to Election Day didn’t reveal tabulator or printer issues. The board ultimately voted to certify the election results.
Tom Vanek, who reported being a registration clerk at Dysart Community Center, said that his location experienced issues with the printers on the day before Election Day. He reported that those issues were resolved by the day’s end. However, Vanek said that none of the sitebooks were connected to the server on Election Day. That meant that none of their workers could clock in.
Vanek relayed that no troubleshooter was on site, and that the county hotline couldn’t resolve the issue. He reported that the first rounds of voters that showed up to vote left the site without voting. The troubleshooter couldn’t resolve the problem and sent for another technician: the t-tech . There was still a communication issue with the printers. The first voter was able to check in at 7 am, over an hour later, but the printer failed to print her ballot.
Poll Worker explains how his ENTIRE polling location was inoperable when they opened on Election Day.
This is getting very, very bad for Maricopa County. Very bad. Like, unbelievably bad. pic.twitter.com/Fsh83t6b26
Michelle Altherr, who reported working at the Estrella Foothills High School vote center, claimed that the tabulators were malfunctioning during training. Come Election Day, Altherr reported that her location’s scanners were down for two hours.
Several other workers who testified also questioned why the screening processes failed to capture the election machine issues prior to Election Day. They challenged the county’s assertion that the Election Day troubles didn’t qualify as disenfranchisement.
One such worker, Martha Kochi, reported that the machines at her location didn’t offer any explanation for many of the rejected votes like they normally could. Kochi added that there were three ballot-on-demand printers not functioning at her location, one of which stopped working for several hours.
Mary Ziola, a worker at Happy Trails Resort wearing a #AZREVOTE shirt, said the Door 3-only option for those affected by malfunctioning tabulators caused mass concern and anger with voters. Ziola said she witnessed voters who left without voting because of the wait times or concerns with provisional ballots. One purported voter was a policeman that had to leave on an emergency call; another, a nurse that had to leave to return to work.
Several others in addition to Ziola wore “#AZREVOTE” shirts: a growing movement of activists demanding a redo of the 2022 general election. The county reported over 16,700 ballots cast in Door 3 boxes.
Another worker, Mike Peterson from the Paradise Valley Community College location, said that forcing voters to cast a provisional ballot was disenfranchisement. He alleged that only 150 of 675 voters cast a vote at one point. Peterson contended that the county didn’t train poll workers on check-out procedure.
“We, as poll workers, were not taught how to check out voters at our poll centers,” said Peterson.
Maricopa Poll Worker CONFIRMS: Poll Workers WERE NOT trained properly, voters were 100% disenfranchised.
Peterson’s testimony conflicts with the county’s response to the attorney general about this issue. The county stated that it trained workers on check-out procedure, included relevant materials in inspectors’ training materials, and trained inspectors on check-out procedure in weekly workshops.
According to the county, 206 voters checked in at one location and voted at another. Of those voters, 84 successfully checked out and cast a regular vote. The other 122 cast provisional ballots.
Raquel Cantacessi, an observer at one of the Lutheran churches, expressed concern with the mixing of tabulated and untabulated ballots in Door 3. She claimed those were lost votes.
In their report, the county explained that two vote centers ran into that Door 3 ballot mixing issue: Church of Jesus Christ of LDS Gilbert and Desert Hills Community Church. The county stated that it backed out results reported on Election Night and retabulated those ballots.
Following public comment, the county issued over two hours of an in-depth dissection of election data. Explanations of this data and Election Day issues were also made available in a report issued on Sunday by the county’s newly-launched election disinformation center.
Elections day and emergency voting director Scott Jarrett disclosed that the county is conducting a root cause analysis to determine why the tabulators malfunctioned on Election Day.
Jarrett reported that, so far, they discovered one of the issues behind the widespread tabulator failures: one of the two types of ballot-on-demand (BOD) printers used by the county had a printer setting incompatibility with the ballot paper sizing. The county increased the ballot size from 19 to 20 inches to accommodate for several candidates and propositions that weren’t finalized until late August.
The county uses two different BOD printers. One of the printer types, the “Oki” model, had a heat setting that printed the ballot markings either too lightly or in a speckled manner. The Oki model was retrofitted in 2020 to be a BOD printer for this election.
“It was very perplexing to us why this was an issue because we stress-tested our ballot on demand printers; we did it right before as we were coming up to the election,” stated Jarrett.
. @MaricopaVote : the faulty printer setting causing widespread tabulator issues occurred in one of two types of printers: the one retrofitted to be a ballot-on-demand printer, "Oki." County expressed confusion with its failure since stress testing went well. 71 sites impacted. pic.twitter.com/jZEmQiZXQn
Contrary to circulated claims of hours-long wait times at most vote centers, the county declared that the average wait time on Election Day was three to six minutes and the longest wait times for 189 of the 223 vote centers was between one and 45 minutes.
The county said that none of their vote centers put a time limit on voters casting their vote. The county said that the Door 3 option for casting a ballot has been in place since 1996.
At one point, about 80,000 people were watching the meeting’s live stream. Much to the audience’s chagrin, public comments remained at the two minute time limit.
Arizona: It's been a long day at The Maricopa County Board – was up to 80,000 live viewers – now a reduced audience is waiting for them to certify their latest election debacle.
Some commenters criticized Maricopa County Board of Supervisors Chairman Bill Gates’ and Recorder Stephen Richer’s involvement with the Republican Accountability Project (RAP): a Democratic dark money group. RAP’s Republican Accountability PAC spent over $4.5 million to ensure GOP gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake’s defeat according to trigger reports on the secretary of state’s campaign finance portal.
Gates disputed allegations that the county speeded up their certification process. He reminded the audience that it was taking place 20 days after Election Day.
“To challenge unofficial results would be like to challenge a TV network’s prognostications after the polls close,” stated Gates. “The canvass is what makes the results official.”
Nothing like a golden hour to commemorate the delivery of our 2022 General Election Canvass to the State Capitol. ☀️ You can find out more about the canvass here: https://t.co/PwpG4yOb2Dpic.twitter.com/tUj9NGi0XV
— Maricopa County Elections Department (@MaricopaVote) November 29, 2022
Corinne Murdock is a reporter for AZ Free News. Follow her latest on Twitter, or email tips to corinne@azfreenews.com.
Maricopa County ended the public comment portion of its Monday meeting certifying the election results with compliments from a Democratic activist.
The final speaker after an hour and a half of public comments was Blake Lister: a 2020 Arizona State University (ASU) Barrett Honors College political science graduate who worked recently with the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) to lobby for the Equality Act. That legislation would protect sexual orientation and gender identity under the Civil Rights Act.
Lister said he is a supporter of the Constitution as instituted by the Founders. Lister thanked the county for upholding election integrity. His remarks prompted angry outbursts from the audience.
“As an American citizen, I am a supporter of our Constitution and the process for our republic our founders set out for us over 200 years ago: that we are a republic chosen for us by We the People through our Democratic process,” stated Lister. “While being faced with threats, including threats on your life Mr. Gates, this board, the recorder, and county employees, many of them temporary, worked tirelessly long, 16-plus hour days to count every vote in a manner as timely as possible.”
Prior to HRC, Lister worked as a Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) field manager and a campaign assistant for failed Democratic congressional candidate Hiral Tipirneni. Lister also worked as an Arizona Democratic Party field organizer; an intern with the Arizona Advocacy Network (AAN), a political action committee that shuffles leftist dark money; and an intern for Senator Kyrsten Sinema (D-AZ).
Lister is also a graduate of several activist training groups: the Maricopa County Democratic Party’s Activist Academy, the Arena Academy, and Leading for Change programs.
This morning, I spoke at the @maricopacounty BOS meeting to uphold our democratic process and to thank our hardworking election workers.
Leading For Change (LFC) was founded by Beth Meyer: a former executive for the Center for Progressive Leadership and Planned Parenthood of Central and Northern Arizona. Meyer also founded and serves on the board of AAN.
Meyer formerly served on the boards of Defenders of Children, NARAL Arizona, Arizona American Jewish Committee, Arizona ACLU, and the Arizona Family Health Partnership Board of Directors.
Among LFC’s board of directors is House minority leader Reginald Bolding (D-Laveen). Also on the board is: Nate Rhoton, the executive director of One-N-Ten: an LGBTQ+ youth advocacy organization and longtimecollaborator with the Phoenix Children’s Hospital (PCH) transgenderism unit; Michelle Steinberg, public policy director and lobbyist for Planned Parenthood Arizona; Julie Rivera Horwin, former Arizona Education Association president and presently an National Education Association board member; and Roy Herrera, founding partner of a law firm that teamed up recently with Russiagate lawyer Marc Elias’ firm to prevent the cleaning of Arizona’s voter rolls.
Their board of directors previously included governor-elect Katie Hobbs when she was the Senate minority leader.
Corinne Murdock is a reporter for AZ Free News. Follow her latest on Twitter, or email tips to corinne@azfreenews.com.
