Council Candidates are collecting signatures to get on the ballot
2024 Oro Valley Town Council election is underway. There are three council seats for election. These seats are held by current council members Bohen, Greene,and Solomon. Greene and Bohen have announced for reelections. There is a third candidate, Mary Murphy, a former member of the town's Board of Adjustment.
468 Signatures required to get on the ballot
Candidates must submit at least 468 valid elector signatures in order to be on the ballot. The signatures ("nomination papers") must be submitted by April 8. Unlike previous elections, we expect that all candidates will use online as well as in-person signature gathering.
You can sign an online petition for a candidate, starting the process here. Online requires a valid drivers license or your entering in personal data. Once you have done this, you will be presented with a list of all candidates in the state who are seeking to get on the ballot for other elections. Scroll until you find the Oro Valley election. You are allowed to sign the petition of up to three Oro Valley candidates. And we encourage you to do so.
Positive campaigns by all candidates...
The 2020 election for these council seats was marred by dirty tricks. The tricksters were current council members Solomon and Greene. They hired a political consulting firm. They mailed glossy "hit pieces" on candidate Bill Garner. Greene solicited the help of former police chief and former mayor candidate Danny Sharp. Sharp in a glossy mailer was in police uniform when he asserted that Garner was anti-cop. The town issued a letter to Greene to remove that picture. (link to 7-14-20),
Wait. There's more. Solomon also went so far as to slap stickers on his campaign sign, saying that he was going to "Preserve Vistoso". This implied that that Solomon was endorsed by the group, "Preserve Vistoso". He was not. In fact, Solomon was anything but supportive. He was one of the people who wanted to parse the entire golf course for development.
Would be "a breath of fresh air"
New candidate Mary Murphy has pledged that she is going to run a positive campaign: "I look forward to running a very positive campaign focused on ways in which I can best serve our wonderful Oro Valley community!" We know that candidate Tim Bohen will do the same. We don't have any confidence that Greene will do the same, the third announced candidate. We suspect that he will focus his election efforts on going after Bohen, if Solomon is also on the ballot with him. We hope that that will be a failed strategy because we don't think people should be elected because they've slammed the other candidate.
Campaign Financing: "You are judged by the company you keep"
Special interest contributions have dominated campaign funding of pro-growth candidates since 2010. In 2020 we wrote Big money buys access, referring to the substantial special interest funding of the last Solomon and Greene campaign. Since then, both have voted in favor of every proposed rezoning, most of which have been rejected by the council majority. This, as opposed to Tim Bohen's 2020 campaign which was much more modest in funding and all contributions came from residents. Will the same happen in 2024? In Bohen's case, we know it will. We suspect Solomon,, if he runs, and Greene will do as they did then. We have no idea of Mary Murphy's campaign financing plan. In any event, we will be watching when the first meaningful campaign finance reports come out in June.
More to follow as we learn more
Our plan is to keep you informed of any developments as they happen during this 2024 council election season. So stay tuned for more.
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