Sedona AZ (August 23, 2012) – Well, Ladies and Gentlemen…it’s finally over.
It began with a few citizens standing outside Sedona Fire Station #1 at the end of a particularly disturbing Sedona Fire District Governing Board meeting in June of 2011. After witnessing what they believed to be the final straw, of a Governing Board running roughshod over members of the public and its own professional staff, they asked each other, “What are we going to do?”
What did they do? They organized a cohesive group that became the Committees to Recall Dave Blauert, Charles Christensen and Phyllis Erick. This group of hard-working, knowledgeable and dedicated volunteers had no personal or political agendas, no special interests or axes to grind.
Republicans and Democrats, Independents and Tea Partiers worked tirelessly, side-by-side, in complete cooperation, toward a common goal. They obtained over 2,500 signatures on each of three recall petitions – and later, mobilized the Sedona Fire District electorate for the Special Recall Election, an overwhelmingly successful recall effort.
Diane Schoen, Nazih Hazime and Corrie Cooperman, three Sedona Fire District residents, ran against David Blauert, Charles Christensen and Phyllis Erick and – on May 15, 2012 – the three challengers won the Special Recall Election by a landslide!
Schoen and Cooperman will serve the remaining two years of the recalled Board members terms but the seat held by Nazih Hazime – and one other seat – are open for election in November 2012.
Nazih Hazime and Sedona City Planning and Zoning Commissioner Scott Jablow filed the necessary documents with the Yavapai County Elections Department to launch campaigns for the two open SFD Governing Board seats and, even though soundly defeated in the May recall election, so too did former Board members, Dave Blauert and Phyllis Erick!
However, the August 8, 2012 deadline for submission of documents containing the number of registered voter signatures necessary for Blauert and Erick to appear on the November ballot, came and went. Nazih Hazime and Scott Jablow had obtained and submitted far more than the minimum number of signatures necessary for nomination, but Dave Blauert and Phyllis Erick failed to do so – effectively terminating bids to regain their lost seats on the Sedona Fire District Governing Board.
There was a subsequent two-week window during which a citizen could file with the Yavapai County Elections Department to become an official write-in candidate for the SFD Governing Board election.
No one filed.
As there are two seats open and only two candidates who filed, there is NO NEED for a Sedona Fire District Governing Board election in November of 2012.
Hazime and Jablow will be appointed to the open seats on the SFD Governing Board, duly sworn, and both will begin four year terms in January of 2013, and the Sedona Fire District will put the budgeted allotment for the November election to much better use.
The Sedona Fire District Governing Board recall process is now over. It is expected that SFD taxes will remain dollar neutral, Station #6 appears slated to become a reality, and first response times will become equitable throughout the Sedona Fire District.
And last, but not least, the Sedona Fire District Governing Board will function in the transparent, fiscally responsible, respectful, professional and outstanding manner of which all SFD citizens may be proud.
In June of 2011, if those few citizens standing outside Sedona Fire Station #1 after a particularly disturbing Sedona Fire District Governing Board meeting could have envisioned the perfect ending, THIS would have been it!
A SedonaEye.com guest column, IMOSedona, by Wendy Tanzer, Sedona Arizona. Your comments are welcome. IMOSedona is the property of Sedona Times Publishing and Sedona Eye LLCs. You are welcome to social network the IMOSedona article using the tabs below.
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What a beautiful ending to a great beginning!
Indeed so true!
good wrap up
met a firefighter in sedona yesterday and he was proud to serve
Am frustrated with roads in your city. In the heat of today we sat through TWO lights at the drugstore Walgreens (maybe the intersection before it can’t be quite sure now) when traveling north to city from friends at Red Rock Loop road and for what was the delay?
City planners couldn’t do the work overnight or before 8 AM or after 7 PM? City planners can waste gas and create toxic fume clouds while sitting IDLING in high heat (felt sorrier for the people on the shuttle, one older lady looked like she’d been hosed down) but had plenty of opportunity to notice the lights going up are UGLY. Recognize them as PHOENIX LOW INCOME NEIGHBORHOOD LIGHTS (we own a rental house in a not so good area god help us). My parents area of Mesa and Tempe don’t have so many lights in a few blocks as you do in one!
The sidewalks look so crowded with poles that roaches will be infesting the areas within the lighted areas and don’t kid yourself, it’s true. Ever see the freeways with all its roadkill at night? Lights draw animals and pests. The city planners have stock in APS? Pesticides? You got enough late night crime loiterers to justify wasting such tax dollars?
The road that goes down to VOC is scenic and what the city did there is nice. Am guessing the areas north and west are considered lower incomes but no excuse for low class treatment.
Sounding off about road frustrations. B. Loeb, Scottsdale
What do roads have to do with SFD? Do agree with him what a few folks are mumbling around town in places like New Frontiers and standing in line at Harkins.
But I want to say something here about this article on SFD election/ thanks you’re right on all counts to the writer.
I know one of the recalled folks and the anger at folks around here for the recall clouds this persons judgement. To this person/ remember ‘Time will heal wounds’
Good this over & people can spend time on November issues for President and Congress and Senate (btw Times getting better every week)
read liked thanks