In Mexico they used to call it the “dedazo.”
It was the moment toward the end of the president’s six-year term in which he pointed his finger (dedo, hence dedazo) at the man whom he chose as the next ruling-party candidate for president. Under that country’s 70-year soft dictatorship, that candidate inevitably became the next president.
In Pima County, we call it an appointment.
One officeholder announces his or her midterm resignation and points a finger at their successor, who carries on the officeholder’s dynasty.
It happened this week, unfortunately for the incoming Pima County sheriff, Chris Nanos. By all accounts (including my own experience), Nanos is apt to be a very good sheriff, the first new one in 35 years with Clarence Dupnik’s July 31 resignation.
For all intents and purposes, Nanos has been the sheriff since Dupnik named him chief deputy in January 2014. What Dupnik himself has been doing since then is unclear.
But the most important thing he did was to give Nanos the dedazo. In a letter to the Board of Supervisors, Dupnik asked them to appoint Nanos, explaining how he arrived at his decision this way:
“The position (chief deputy) had been held vacant for over a decade, as I wanted to ensure that my endorsed successor shared similarities in vision and exhibited characteristics of humility along with intellect.”
Those are admirable characteristics, yes, but note what that sentence implies: That Dupnik had been planning to retire mid-term and appoint a successor for more than a decade. He was just looking for the right guy.
The problem with that is it allows political dynasties to be carried on. Supervisors Richard Elías and Ally Miller, strange bedfellows for sure, both objected Tuesday to appointing Nanos without a more open process.
“The public has a right to know a little bit about these folks,” Elías told me. “I feel good about Chris Nanos. I think he’ll be a good sheriff. But that doesn’t mean he shouldn’t face public scrutiny.”
Elías may seem like a strange messenger for that sort of message. He, after all, was chosen to succeed Raúl Grijalva after Grijalva stepped down from the board to run for Congress in February 2002. But that process at least was an open one, in which 12 people applied for Grijalva’s job before the board (and the board’s clerk) chose Elías, a Grijalva ally.
Current Supervisors Ray Carroll and Ramon Valadez also were appointed after midterm resignations.
So it’s a regular practice, and one that could occur again in coming years. County Attorney Barbara LaWall is 69 and planning to run for re-election to another four-year term next year. It has seemed for years that her chief deputy, Amelia Cramer, would be her successor.
“I’m faced all the time with people saying ‘When are you going to retire?’” LaWall told me Thursday. “I am not ready to retire.”
But if she were to leave office, she said, “I think there a number of people in my office who could easily step into this position.”
When I asked Supervisors Sharon Bronson and Carroll about Nanos’ appointment, both were quick to defend him and the process.
“Any open process would just have been a facade,” Carroll said. “The votes were there.”
Bronson said, “It’s important with law enforcement that you have the continuity of command. It was apparent to me, after talking with a number of the top law-enforcement command, that they supported the appointment of Nanos.”
Still, this is a political appointment as well as a law-enforcement one. Nanos will now have a leg up when his chance at election comes next year. These appointments have served as virtual guarantees of lifetime re-election.
It would be a better political process if either our elected officials would stop resigning midterm, or the board held a more open selection process, not one dominated by the outgoing officeholder.
Only then will it stop reminding me of how close we are, in distance and sometimes in political culture, to Mexico.
New duty for Ciscomani
I told you about Juan Ciscomani and how he has Gov. Doug Ducey’s ear a month ago. Well, Ducey has given Ciscomani, director of the governor’s Southern Arizona office, even greater responsibility.
On Tuesday, Ducey appointed Ciscomani to also oversee the state’s office in Hermosillo, Sonora. Ducey named Juan Francisco Moreno, a Phoenix attorney, as “private initiatives liaison” at the Arizona office in Hermosillo.
I’m not totally comfortable with the idea that the director of the Hermosillo office will be in Tucson. Do they know up in Phoenix that Hermosillo is four hours from here? But as long as Ciscomani’s role is one of oversight, not day-to-day management, it should work.
Our Confederate days
The Confederate-flag controversy is an interesting one for a history major like me. I abhor the idea that, up until today, the flag was flying at the statehouse grounds in South Carolina. To me that’s an endorsement of the Confederacy’s ideology.
But it’s different when the flag is truly part of a historical display. And that’s what it is when it flies in the celebrations of Tucson’s birthday and the rodeo parade. On both occasions, the flags of the four nation-states that have claimed this area, plus the state flag of Arizona, are flown.
Those nations are Spain, Mexico, the USA and the Confederacy. To remove the Confederate flag from the display strikes me as denying those 80 days of 1862 when the Confederacy ruled here.
Besides, the Spanish in their colonial enterprise and their racial attitudes were not exactly innocent. Wouldn’t we have to stop flying their flag, too? Better to stick with history as it happened, for better or worse.
