Got a late notice to attend a candidate community forum sponsored by the NAACP – Tucson chapter, Tucson Urban League, and the Tucson-Southern Arizona Black Chamber of Commerce, held tonight at the Dunbar School Auditorium, 325 W. 2nd Street (at Main Ave.) As I walked in Jonathan Peck, President of the Tucson Urban League was announcing that all Republican, Democratic and 3rd party candidates (statewide) and for Southern Arizona had been invited to attend & participate. About 100 people, mostly African Americans, were in the audience.

These were the state legislators that participated tonight (1st panel):
LD 25 House Rep. Pat Fleming (D)
LD 27 House candidates Sally Ann Gonzales and Dr. Macario Saldate (Ds)
LD 28 Senator Paula Aboud (D)
LD 28 Senate candidate Dave Ewoldt (I)
LD 28 House Rep. Steve Farley (D)
LD 28 House candidate Bruce Wheeler (D)
LD 30 House candidate Andrea Dalessandro (D)
LD 30 Senate candidate Dr. Todd Camenish (D), came in late

Also attending to participate in the 2nd panel were U.S. Senate candidate Rodney Glassman,
Attorney General Terry Goddard running for Governor, Sec. of State candidate Chris Deschene, and State Mine Inspector candidate Manuel Cruz, all Democrats.

Questions asked of the panelists were basically about steps they would take to improve education, to bring economic opportunity to minority populations, to strengthen public health for communities of color, to provide quality health care, and to insure equal treatment in the criminal justice system for minority populations. Being as these were all Democrats (and one Independent, formerly a Green Party activist) their answers were quite uniform in advocating and trying to restore funding to all these areas.

Of note: Sally Ann Gonzales mentioned that she is of Yaqui heritage, Chris Deschene is a member of the Navajo Nation, and Manuel Cruz and Dr. Macario Saldate are Hispanic, and provided their ethnic backgrounds and expertise to their responses.

The last question was about what steps could be taken to insure a fair and just dialogue re: immigration reform, and both Rodney Glassman and Terry Goddard said that could be done by “retiring John McCain.” Chris Deschene repeatedly asked the audience to elect Democrats to the state legislature, where he currently serves as House Rep. in LD 2.

Also in attendance tonight were former Pima County Democratic Party Chair Paul Eckerstrom for Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, and former Democratic Pima County Supervisor Dan Eckstrom. Fellow blogger “3 Sonorans” (David Morales) was there as well, and will be posting a video capturing the panelists’ answers to some of these questions. I’ll link to his blog once he posts it. UPDATE: Unfortunately neither David nor I got a lot of advance notice of this forum, so his cell phone video did not tape well (see his comment below).

The final provisional ballots cast on Tuesday August 24 for the Arizona primary have been counted, and the Secretary of State website has posted the final unofficial results (click here). Tom Horne prevailed by 899 votes over Andrew Thomas for the Republican nomination for Attorney General (out of a total of 555,699 votes cast in that race). State law (ARS 16-1661) would mandate an automatic recount should the vote total be less than 200 votes between these 2 contenders.

Horne declared victory yesterday August 30 on various news media, and Thomas finally conceded this morning August 31. Horne is the current Arizona Superintendent of Public Instruction and Thomas is the former Maricopa County Attorney, and was the 2002 Republican nominee for this AG position (losing to Terry Goddard). Horne’s website: www.electtomhorne.com.

During the primary campaign, Horne accused Thomas of using his Maricopa County Attorney’s office to launch politically motivated prosecutions against his alleged enemies, even Superior Court Judges who ruled against him. Thomas, in turn, accused Horne of supporting amnesty for illegal border crossers, and criticized him for a lifetime trading ban imposed in the 1970s by the Securities and Exchange Commission, while in law school.

Horne now faces Democratic nominee Felecia Rotellini, a former Assistant Attorney General and former Superintendent of the State Banking Department, now the Department of Financial Institutions (DFI). Rotellini is in private practice and her website is: www.feleciaforarizona.com.

Rotellini faced off in a tough primary with State House Minority Leader David Lujan and former Assistant Attorney General Vince Rabago (former Chair of the Pima County Democratic Party). Rep. Lujan was in a close race with Rotellini on election night and was only losing by 350 votes, but the gap widened by August 26 to 3203 votes, when Lujan conceded. The final unofficial tally showed Rotellini received 2427 votes more than Lujan.

The upcoming Arizona Citizens Clean Elections Commission debate between Horne and Rotellini is scheduled for

September 08, 2010 (UPDATE:Debate canceled on 9/3/10 as neither candidate is participating in “clean” elections, further UPDATE 9/8/10 debate may be back on as “non clean elections.”)
Candidate Debate
7:00:00 PM – 7:30 PM
Televised on KAET Horizon Channel 8 (Phoenix)

Tom Horne

Felecia Rotellini

Arizona Citizens Clean Elections Commission schedule for upcoming General Election debates:

Statewide races, all telecast on KAET Horizon Channel 8 in Phoenix, to be posted online at their website within 72 hours after the debates. D indicates Democrat, G indicates Green Party, I indicates Independent, L indicates Libertarian, R indicates Republican. Most of these candidates will be invited, but not all attend the debates, as it’s only mandatory for those participating in “clean” elections. To find out who’s a participating candidate, click here.

Governor
September 1, 7 to 8 p.m.
(Governor Jan Brewer – R, Larry Gist- G, Attorney General Terry Goddard- D, Barry Hess- L)

Attorney General (9/3/10 UPDATE: DEBATE CANCELED DUE TO NEITHER BEING A “CLEAN” ELECTIONS CANDIDATE).
September 8, 7 to 7:30 p.m.
(Tom Horne- R, Felecia Rotellini – D)

Superintendent of Public Instruction
September 15, 7 to 7:30 p.m.
(John Huppenthal -R, Penny Kotterman- D)

Secretary of State
September 22, 7 to 7:30 p.m.
(Sec. of State Ken Bennett – R, Chris Deschene – D)

Treasurer (9/3/10 UPDATE: DEBATE CANCELED DUE TO NEITHER BEING “CLEAN” ELECTIONS CANDIDATE).
September 29, 7 to 7:30 p.m.
(Doug Ducey – R, Andrei Cherny – D)

Corporation Commission (2 seats)
October 4, 7 to 7:30 p.m.
(Commissioner Gary Pierce – R, David Bradley – D, Brenda Burns – R, Jorge Luis Garcia – D)

State Mine Inspector
October 06, 2010, 7 PM – 7:30 PM
(Inspector Joe Hart – R, Miguel Cruz – D)

Legislative Districts (Southern Arizona), all “Clean” candidates in House & Senate are required to participate, and others running traditionally may do as well. One seat is open in the State Senate, two seats in the State House in each legislative district.

District 26 (9/3/10 UPDATE:DEBATE CANCELED AS ALL CANDIDATES NOT PARTICIPATING IN CLEAN ELECTIONS, RUNNING TRADITIONALLY)
September 16, 6 p.m.
PCC Northwest Campus, 7600 N. Shannon Rd.
(State Senate: Cheryl Cage – D, Senator Al Melvin – R;
State House: Terri Proud – R, Rep. Vic Williams- R, Rep. Nancy Young Wright – D)

District 27
September 9, 6 p.m.
PCC West Campus, 2202 W. Anklam Rd.
(State Senate: Olivia Cajero Bedford- D, Duke Schechter- R is a write-in candidate,as is Jaime Vasquez – R; State House: Gene Chewning – I, Robert Compton – R, Sally Ann Gonzales – D, Dr. Macario Saldate – D, Kent Solberg – G)

District 28
September 14, 6 p.m.
PCC Community Room, 4905 E. Broadway
(State Senate: Senator Paula Aboud – D, Ted Downing – I, Dave Ewoldt – I, Greg Krino – R;
State House: Rep. Steve Farley – D, Ken Smalley- R, Bruce Wheeler- D)

District 29
September 28, 6 p.m.
PCC Community Room, 4905 E. Broadway
(State Senate: Senator Linda Lopez – D, unopposed;
(State House: Rep. Matt Heinz – D, Pat Kilburn – R, Rep. Daniel Patterson – D)

District 30
September 30, 6 p.m.
PCC East Campus, 8181 E. Irvington
(State Senate: Senator Frank Antenori – R, Dr. Todd Camenisch – D;
State House: Andrea Dalessandro – D, Rep. David Gowan – R, and Rep. Ted Vogt -R)

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