By Steve Christy
By now, I am sure most of you are aware that my life’s background is one of retail business – not of politics.
I was a first time candidate at 61-years-old. Through numerous decades as a business owner and operator, I have witnessed the negative and deleterious effects that liberal policies have wreaked first hand upon businesses, especially small businesses. That is why I have been and am now – and will always continue to be – a champion and advocate for the business community. Business is what I know best, and what I believe in the most.
Until recently in Pima County, we had never before seen or experienced the full measure of incompetent leftist and “progressive” leadership on full display as we have witnessed by the actions of the ham-fisted and anti-business majority of the Board of Supervisors, led by Supervisors Valadez, Bronson, and Villegas. And, never before has an industry been singled out and treated as maliciously as have been our local restaurants and bars. After weeks of suffering and financial devastation, Governor Ducey finally lifted his restrictions on restaurant operations, particularly dine-in service.
The very first things that hit these tortured businesses directly from the Board of Supervisors majority were a series of burdensome and needless regulations, enforced by the threat of fines if they did not comply.
Does this say that Pima County is open for business?
Realizing that they overreached in their effort to make an end-run around Gov. Ducey, the three majority Board members, after enduring significant backlash, tried to assuage and mitigate their draconian regulations by “amending and removing” several of their 15 regulations by proclamation.
In the middle of Supervisors Valadez, Bronson, and Villegas’ too-little, too-late stumbling, a group of State Legislators requested that the Arizona Attorney General open an investigation and determine if Pima County’s proclamation and regulations were in “conflict” with the state constitution, and were “in addition to” the Governor’s Executive Orders, thus exceeding already existent state guidelines for restaurants to re-open full service.
Now, faced with the very real possibility of being cut off from state shared revenue (such as HURF and vehicle license tax fees), the Board’s majority, through our County Attorney, are now arguing that the regulatory proclamations they have codified are not in “conflict” with or “in addition to” the Governor’s Executive Orders, and that they are in fact consistent and compatible with Arizona statute.
If that’s the case, then why generate any codified Pima County regulations and proclamations at all, and in the first place?
By their recent votes, Supervisors Valadez, Bronson, and Villegas have effectively stated that businesses, particularly restaurants, cannot be trusted to the right thing. They have further created uncertainty for businesses. And another truism that I have learned from my decades in business is that uncertainty in business creates insolvency in business.
As a former business owner, I also know that every responsible and sensitive business owner fully recognizes that their most treasured and important commercial assets are a healthy, professional, and well-trained staff and a healthy, enthusiastic, and loyal customer base. Any committed business owner will do anything and everything to preserve, protect, and defend those two assets.
It is not up to the Board of Supervisors, or any level of government, to make customers “feel safe”. Businesses themselves, along with the marketplace, will do that – as they should.
I will continue to vote and fight against Pima County’s prohibitive and destructive set of regulations codified via proclamation, and I look forward to the Attorney General’s determination.
