Sharon Bronson's replacement process set after board squabble

A selection process to replace Sharon Bronson’s District 3 seat on the Pima County Board of Supervisors has been decided on, despite some heated discussion about potential interview questions.

Bronson, who’s been on the board for nearly three decades, announced last week that she will be stepping down from her position after suffering broken ribs in a fall at her home.

The selection process is set to begin Wednesday, Nov. 22, at 9 a.m. and will last until Dec. 1, 5 p.m., the board said Tuesday in a news release. Whoever is appointed to fill Bronson’s chair will hold the seat until November 2024, in which all five district seats are up for election.

Applicants must be at least 18 years old and live in District 3. They must be a registered Democratic voter (as is Bronson) and provide the following: a résumé, a completed financial disclosure statement and a conflict of interest affidavit.

The county will also conduct background checks on all applicants.

The board agreed Tuesday to review all applications by the Dec. 5 meeting. The League of Women Voters of Greater Tucson is set to hold a public forum during that meeting for all candidates.

The board intends to vote on Bronson’s replacement during its Dec. 19 meeting. The appointed person would complete the reminder of Bronson’s term, through December 2024.

During Tuesday’s meeting, a heated exchange over a potential questionnaire began.

Originally, a questionnaire was to be included in the required materials for applicants. Questions such as “What’s the biggest challenge facing Pima County right now?” and “What sets you apart from the other candidates?” were originally posed, among 13 others.

Its original purpose, according to District 5 Supervisor Adelita Grijalva, was to help the board narrow down the applicant pool in the event a large number of applications is received.

District 1 Supervisor Rex Scott first added to the discussion that some of the questions, such as “If you were handed $1 million and told you could spend it on anything in the County, what would you spend it on?” and others regarding specific policies shouldn’t be included.

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District 4 Supervisor Steve Christy objected to the questionnaire altogether.

“There’s one question missing, and that’s ‘if you were a tree what kind of tree would be?’” he said.

“This is something that’s never been done before and we do not need a questionnaire … all else is fine but we do not need a questionnaire,” Christy said. “It looks like an agenda here for a candidate in order to fill some sort of litmus test that meets certain requirements that are attractive to certain supervisors.”

Bronson, in her last of 630 Board of Supervisors meetings she’s attended, likened the questionnaire to “Nazi Germany” several times.

“This sounds like Nazi Germany … I mean who do you want to elect, Adelita?” Bronson said to the board chair. “I’m just so disappointed … it is not a tool it is YOUR tool.”

Bronson did not explain her Nazi Germany reference, nor why she thinks this questionnaire was tailored for whom Grijalva wants in the position.

In response, Grijalva and the supervisors removed the questionnaire from the required materials.

“I think that there clearly doesn’t seem to be consensus on the questionnaire, I don’t want to be accused of trying to manipulate this process in any way,” Grijalva said. “I don’t want that to be something that’s maligning this process or have Supervisor Bronson feeling that I’m, in any way, trying to manipulate or rig whatever this process is. I don’t appreciate that at all, and that’s absolutely not the case.”

Bronson, who was first elected to the board in 1996, won re-election six times and served as the first woman appointed as chair of the board.