Header image alt text

Joyce Clark Unfiltered

For "the rest of the story"

Disclaimer: The comments in this blog are my personal opinion and may or may not reflect an adopted position of the city of Glendale and its city council.

City Council candidates never seem very interesting to the public as a Mayoral candidate or a Congressional candidate. I don’t know why because your city councilmember is the closest form of leadership to you, the public. These are the people who determine what your water bill is. When you have a problem with the city, these are the people you call. They determine city policies on virtually every aspect of your daily life and represent your city on a myriad of regional, state, and national committees.

Your choice of a city councilmember should be guided by someone who shares your values and who is responsive to your comments, questions, and concerns. If they can’t be bothered doing that as a candidate, I can assure you that they will not be responsive when elected.

Let’s look at the very first Candidate Financial Reports for those running and who is no longer running for council seats in Glendale. In general, none of the candidates have raised a lot of funding yet. Their campaigns start off slow as they hustle for signatures from registered voters for their nominating petitions. Once those petitions are turned in this March, they will be in full candidate mode as they start to raise money in earnest, order their campaign material and go to any groups’ meeting that they are invited to.

Patty Ortega expressed an interest in running for the Yucca Council seat last spring. Since then, she has changed her mind and is no longer interested.

The only uncontested city council race is that of incumbent Councilmember Ray Malnar, representing the Sahuaro District. It’s easy to see why. He’s doing a good job. He is sensitive to and responsive to his district residents. He is also even-handed in his policy discussions and decisions. Here’s what his financial report states. He started with $1,830.37 from his last campaign for Sahuaro district and loaned his committee $250.00. He has received $853.70 in campaign contributions. His expenses to date have been $954.21 leaving him with a balance of $1,729.86. His campaign contributors to date are:

  • Connie Kaiser
  • David Mitchell
  • Marion Malnar
  • Ron Kolb

He has received no Political Action Committee (PAC) contributions.

His major expenses are:

  • GoDaddy, $46.34 for a domain site
  • Wix, $267.87 for a web site

There are no rumors or speculation to report.

Incumbent Councilmember Ian Hugh also has a good record with his constituency. His policy decisions have been good for the city. He is one of the best and most responsive councilmembers. He is caring and will help his constituents out personally whenever possible. Here is his financial report. He starts with $23,753.74 from his last campaign for the Cactus District. He has raised $6,800.00 and has spent $843.14 to date leaving him with a balance of $29,710.60. He has received one maximum contribution of $6,550:

  • Louis Sands, owner of Sands Chevrolet

His other contribution:

  • Ron Kolb, Glendale business owner

He has received no PAC contributions. His expenses to date have been:

  • Costco, $650.57 for election announcement refreshments
  • Staples, $68.97 for petition copies and walking maps
  • Mail and More, $51.60 for petition copies and walking maps

There are no rumors or speculation to date.

A recent contender has surfaced to oppose Councilmember Hugh, Guadalupe “Lupe” Gonzalez, Jr. He pulled a packet and filed a Statement of Organization last week. Consequently, there is no Candidate Financial report available. According to his filing he is the Organizing Manager for a non-profit organization, ONE Campaign, devoted to fighting poverty and disease throughout the world. He is also running for the Alhambra Elementary School Board.

Diana Guzman is a candidate for the Yucca Council seat. She has raised $5,304.84 with $1.602.71 coming from a state legislative senate campaign committee. She has loaned her committee $3,102.13. She spent $1,602.64 leaving her with a balance of $3,702.20.

She has no contributors who have given the maximum amount of $6,550.00. She has received no PAC contributions. Here are her contributors:

  • Ernie Guzman, relative
  • Jane Breakiron, Behavioral Health

Her expenses to date include:

  • Vista Print, $98.27 for business cards
  • Office Max, $64.73 for petition copies
  • Hondo’s Screen Printing, $390.20 for ?
  • Next Day Flyers, $171.11 for pull up sign
  • Phoenix Print Shop, $651.60 for flyers
  • Hondo’s Screen Printing, $168.00 for shirts
  • Plotters Doctors, $52.13 for laminate map

Rumor and/or speculation to date is that I am supporting Diana. This is true. I encouraged her to run and am endorsing her wholeheartedly. She is smart, compassionate and shares our values and goals for the Yucca District and the City of Glendale.

Guadalupe “Lupe” Encinas is also running for the Yucca District Council seat. She has raised $2,618.07and has loaned her committee $1,270.70. She spent $967.69 leaving her with a balance of $1,650.36.

She has no contributors who have given the maximum amount of $6,550.00. She has received no PAC contributions. Here are her contributors:

  • Lauren Tolmachoff, occupation not listed, incumbent Glendale Councilmember, Cholla District
  • Luiz Guzman, occupation not listed
  • Craig Jennings, occupation not listed
  • Grant and Dana Hickman, occupation not listed
  • Glenn and Audry Hickman, occupation not listed
  • Yvonne Knaack, occupation not listed, former Glendale Councilmember
  • Bart Turner, occupation not listed, incumbent Glendale Councilmember, Barrell District
  • Natalie Stahl, occupation not listed, Chair of Encinas Campaign Committee
  • David Serey, occupation not listed, husband of Treasurer of Encinas Campaign Committee

Her expenses to date have been:

  • GoDaddy, $78.49 for email
  • La Art Printing, $889.90 for shirts, flyers and yard signs

Rumor and/or speculation include Councilmember Lauren Tolmachoff encouraged her to run and is or will be, endorsing her. Watch Encinas’ level of missing information in her reports. She fails to enter information that is required. Some of the contributors’ addresses and ALL job titles and employers are missing. These are glaring omissions of fact that are reporting requirements. If she can’t follow the state law for reporting requirements what else will she fail to report?

As you can see, these initial reports don’t contain a great deal of information and the next set of reports due March 2, 2024 won’t have much new information. Once these people have turned in their nominating petitions later in March, more information will be available.

In my next blog I will be discussing the current atmosphere of politics in Glendale. Watch for it. There will be some interesting dynamics to share.

© Joyce Clark, 2023     

FAIR USE NOTICE

This site contains copyrighted material the use of which is in accordance with Title 17 U.S. C., Section 107. The ‘fair use’ of any such copyrighted material as provided for in Section 107 of the US Copyright Law and who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. For more information material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. We are making such material available in our efforts to advance understanding of environmental, political, human rights, economic, democratic, scientific and social justice issues, etc. We believe this constitutes a ‘fair use’ of any such material. For more information go to http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond ‘fair use,’ you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.

Disclaimer: The comments in this blog are my personal opinion and may or may not reflect an adopted position of the city of Glendale and its city council.

Every ten years, Glendale is required to redraw its City Council districts based on data from the U.S. Census. The process is called redistricting and the goal is to make sure each Council district has approximately equal population.

Let’s begin with the Census data for 2020 provided to the city.  On July of 2019 the Census Bureau’s estimated population for Glendale was 252,387. It’s final, official count of Glendale is 248,325.

Everyone in the State believes the Bureau’s count is wrong and the population was undercounted. Experts said they expected to see even higher rates of growth. William Frey, a demographer at the Brookings Institution in Washington, D.C., who specializes in census data and urban populations, said he expected to see a higher growth rate in Arizona. Cities with council districts redraw those boundaries every 10 years after each U.S. census.

Four cities looking to redistrict by the next election in November include: 

  • Mesa
  • Glendale
  • Peoria
  • Buckeye

Other Valley cities, such as Chandler, Scottsdale and Goodyear, don’t use a district system,      instead electing council members on a citywide basis.

Look at this chart for Glendale.

City-data.com got its numbers from the Maricopa County estimates. I have no idea how the County arrived at these figures.

Please note, according to Census data, that every council district but the Yucca district added from 2,000+ in population to 6,000+ in population. Yet the Yucca district supposedly lost 315. Can anyone in their right mind believe this? The Yucca district has exploded over the last 10 years with new residential subdivisions (Copper Cove, Bethany Ranch and Positano to name just a few) as well as new apartment complexes. Yet, in the past ten years the Yucca district lost 315 people? Ridiculous. It’s nuts. The data makes no sense. The city should be requesting a recount of the Yucca district data. Someone, somewhere screwed up. If you put garbage in, garbage comes out. I suspect that the Yucca district, in fact, gained about 10,000 in population over the last decade.

Not only that, but the Census Bureau has also been late in releasing census block data (will do so this month, September) on population counts, the very data needed to redraw districts.  As a result, Glendale has until December 15, 2021, about 3 months, to submit their new council districts to the State.

Here are the guidelines, city council adopted, that shall be used to redraw the districts:

  • Each district shall respect communities of interest as much as possible;
  • District borders shall follow visible natural and man-made geographical and topographical features as much as possible;
  • District borders shall be drawn to avoid locating more than one current Councilmember in any one district as much as possible;
  • Each new district shall preserve the corresponding existing district’s population and territory as much as possible;
  • Districts known to be areas of higher-than-average population growth in the two to five years following redistricting, based on development projects that have received final plat approval from the City, may be under populated within the population deviation amounts allowed by law;
  • To the extent possible, consistent with constitutional law and the requirements of federal and state statutes, each district shall contain a substantially equal number of electors.

 

 

 

The city has created a dedicated web site allowing all Glendale residents not only information about the redistricting process but on or about September 16th the public can see the population data by census block and draw their own redistricting maps. Here is the link to the web site:

https://glendaleaz.com/your_government/connect/departments/city_clerk/redistricting/current_district_map

You can learn more and get involved by attending one of three public Glendale workshops. By the time of these city hosted workshops occur the appropriate data should be available on the city website to any citizen who wants it. Here are the workshop dates:

 Monday, September 20  2:00 p.m. Glendale City Council Chambers
5850 W. Glendale Avenue
 Wednesday, September 22  10:00 a.m. Glendale Main Library Auditorium
5959 W. Brown Street
 Monday, September 27  6:30 p.m. Foothills Recreation & Aquatics Center
Coyote Room
5600 W. Union Hills Drive

Why should we focus on redistricting whether it be on a local, state or national level? We all vote for those representatives that most closely align with our values and goals. With redrawn districts you may find that now you are in a district that has a representative with whose values and goals with which you disagree. By involving yourselves in the redistricting process your input will contribute toward making sure that your representative actually represents you.

© Joyce Clark, 2021       

FAIR USE NOTICE

This site contains copyrighted material the use of which is in accordance with Title 17 U.S. C., Section 107. The ‘fair use’ of any such copyrighted material as provided for in Section 107 of the US Copyright Law and who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. For more information material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. We are making such material available in our efforts to advance understanding of environmental, political, human rights, economic, democratic, scientific and social justice issues, etc. We believe this constitutes a ‘fair use’ of any such material. For more information go to http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond ‘fair use,’ you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.

Disclaimer: The comments in this blog are my personal opinion and may or may not reflect an adopted position of the city of Glendale and its city council.

This is a special blog for a very special person and my small way of expressing my thanks for a thankless job well done. As Glendale’s Vice Mayor (this year) I often do not spend much time in my office unless I am meeting someone there. Just by way of example, this morning I attended a ribbon cutting for Credit Union West’s new corporate headquarters in my district. The rest of the day I will be spent doing my homework in preparation for council’s upcoming Tuesday’s workshop on departmental budgets. It’s a 400 or 500 page book and I expect it will take several days to go through it.

While I am doing these kinds of things someone has to be holding down the fort. That person is Shelli Henson, not just my Council Assistant but assistant to Councilmember Ray Malnar as well. In essence, Shelli has two bosses with often competing needs and use of her time. Today marks her Second Anniversary as our Council Assistant.

Her duties and responsibilities are many and varied. All are done with compassion and caring and a sense of political diplomacy while being detail oriented with timely completion. Not an easy job. On any given day she will be taking constituent calls, staffing one of our one-on-one meetings with the public or staff, taking minutes for later transcription, doing research, delivering something we need from the office, checking our current council budget status, setting up a district meeting or preparing not just our weekly E-newsletters but writing for my twice yearly Yucca district newsletter. That’s in addition to the daily events that suddenly appear. I’ve probably only listed a small fraction of her responsibilities but I think you get the idea. This is a job that requires good communication and writing skills, diplomacy, orientation to detail when required, the ability to multitask and to deliver a work product on time.

Shelli has all of these requirements nailed. She’s even mastered unlocking my car when I leave the keys in it!! Not a small feat. So, on her second work anniversary I just wanted to publicly thank her for all that she does not just for me but for Councilmember Malnar as well. I know that he shares my thoughts and thanks. It is for the most part, as I stated above, a thankless job and often the work product is taken for granted.

So, thank you Shelli. You have become our “alter ego.” You publicly represent our offices very well. Thank you for your assistance. We couldn’t do it without you and we often don’t take the time to recognize it.

© Joyce Clark, 2019         

FAIR USE NOTICE

This site contains copyrighted material the use of which is in accordance with Title 17 U.S. C., Section 107. The ‘fair use’ of any such copyrighted material as provided for in Section 107 of the US Copyright Law and who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. For more information material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. We are making such material available in our efforts to advance understanding of environmental, political, human rights, economic, democratic, scientific and social justice issues, etc. We believe this constitutes a ‘fair use’ of any such material. For more information go to http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond ‘fair use,’ you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.

 

Please note: Tom McCarthy very recently passed away. Tom had been a voice in Glendale for many years and was well known in our community. He was a first rate attorney and long-time advocate for downtown Glendale. He was a gentleman and most certainly, a scholar. He will be missed. My condolences to his wife, Diane McCarthy. Your family and Tom will be in my prayers as well as those of many Glendale residents. I am so sorry for your loss, Diane.

It has been 17 years and 317 days since the city’s pledge to build the West Branch Library.

I had planned to post this blog yesterday afternoon but then Paris. It just didn’t seem appropriate. Many people share their speculations with me. Lately, rumors and speculation abound about  Councilmembers Chavira and Aldama and yes, sadly…disgraced former Councilmember Sherwood.

There are no hard facts in this blog but rather a compilation of rumors and speculation melded together from a variety of sources. Let’s begin with the Sahuaro district. At this moment things have quieted down but don’t expect it to last for very long. Sherwood claims he will run for his Sahuaro seat again. That may be problematical for him. He has lost a great deal of support and previous donors to his campaign coffers are fading into the political mist. The fire union is frantically looking for someone to run against newly elected Sahuaro district Councilmember Ray Malnar. Don’t be surprised if a Phoenix Deputy Fire Chief, Larry Contreras, whose move into the Sahuaro district was publicly announced by Chavira, becomes their candidate of choice.

In the Yucca district voters will choose a councilmember on November 8, 2016. Expect events to heat up there as well. Rumors have it that current Councilmember Chavira will not run for reelection. Instead, there is speculation that the Tohono O’odham will hire him for a position perhaps as Marketing & Communications Director or Public Safety Director (he seems qualified for neither). It appears that Sammy’s support of the casino may have paid off for him big time. A competing camp believes that under the mentorship of Ruben Gallego, newly elected U.S. Congressman representing Arizona’s 7th District , Chavira may run for the State Legislature providing the fire union some representation in that body.

All of these rumors led me to do some speculating of my own. Now, imagine this scenario, Chavira and Aldama are very close…buddies. We know that Aldama wants to run for mayor so badly it hurts. Everything he does as a councilmember seems to be specifically designed for that goal. Right now Aldama is on a different election cycle. If he were to run for mayor he would have to resign from his council seat and he would no longer enjoy the power of incumbency to assist him. But what if he could stand for reelection in the same cycle as the mayor? With a little shuffling it could happen. Imagine his buddy, Chavira, giving Aldama a heads up that he is not running again way before he announces that publicly. Aldama, as Ocotillo district Councilmember, claims his residency in the Ocotillo district as required by law. But he has a perfectly good home in the Yucca district (where everyone believes he lives) and he could pull a nominating packet to run for the Yucca district council seat right now. If he were to win the seat it would put him up for reelection in 2020, the very same time the next race for Glendale’s mayor would take place.

If you live in the Yucca district and have always harbored the desire to run for city council, get ready. Without Chavria running, the seat will be wide open (even if Aldama decides to run for this seat). The next election is exactly a year from now. Call the Glendale city clerk and ask when nominating packets can be pulled.

They say that truth is stranger than fiction. If even a smidgeon becomes reality it will be a strange Glendale indeed. For political junkies it makes for interesting conversation.

Lastly, food for thought: People tend to gravitate to and associate with like-minded people. Over the coming months take note of just where Mark Burdick in his run for mayor is getting his support…Frisoni, Aldama, Chavira…hmmm…

© Joyce Clark, 2015

FAIR USE NOTICE

This site contains copyrighted material the use of which is in accordance with Title 17 U.S. C., Section 107. The ‘fair use’ of any such copyrighted material as provided for in Section 107 of the US Copyright Law and who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. For more information material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. We are making such material available in our efforts to advance understanding of environmental, political, human rights, economic, democratic, scientific and social justice issues, etc. We believe this constitutes a go to http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond ‘fair use,’ you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.

It has been 17 years and 314 days since the city’s pledge to build the West Branch Library.

Tonight, November 10, 2015 Ray Malnar was sworn in as Glendale’s newest councilmember representing the Sahuaro district. Gary Sherwood is definitely gone and to be forgotten. Councilmember Malnar, in his acceptance speech, set just the right tone. It was positive and hopeful as he suggested that Glendale can have better days ahead.

Many people have said that there are apparently two more sleazebag councilmembers that need to hit the brick road…Councilmembers Chavira and Aldama. Councilmember Chavira is up for reelection in 2016 and Councilmember Aldama faces reelection in 2018. We’ll see what the future holds for both.

I wanted to share an Arizona Republic news story by Chris Coppola. In it Coppola reports that Chandler is starting its search over again for a new city manager. Here is the link:

http://www.azcentral.com/story/news/local/chandler/2015/11/06/chandler-city-manager-search-starts-over/75235616/ .

Kevin Phelps, under consideration as one of two finalists for Glendale’s position of city manager, was one of the five finalists for city manager in Chandler ultimately rejected by their city council.

Let’s hope Glendale has the strength of fortitude exhibited by its sister city, Chandler, and rejects its two finalists and starts over. Glendale’s consultant, Slavin, did a poor job of securing candidates for the city. If Chandler can start over, so can Glendale. Glendale deserves better.

For the better part of an hour Glendale’s city council rubber stamped every agenda item. Not one agenda item was pulled for further questioning. Yet we know that while some of the items may have been “of a routine nature or discussed in workshop,” that was not the case with every agenda item. They appeared to show very little interest in the items they approved and on several occasions Mayor Weiers seemed to practically plead for some council input on anything. It was disappointing and literally painful to watch. Has this council slipped back into the modus operandi of previous councils?

© Joyce Clark, 2015

FAIR USE NOTICE

This site contains copyrighted material the use of which is in accordance with Title 17 U.S. C., Section 107. The ‘fair use’ of any such copyrighted material as provided for in Section 107 of the US Copyright Law and who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. For more information material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. We are making such material available in our efforts to advance understanding of environmental, political, human rights, economic, democratic, scientific and social justice issues, etc. We believe this constitutes a go to http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond ‘fair use,’ you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.

WordPress › Error

There has been a critical error on this website.

Learn more about troubleshooting WordPress.