Pima County supervisors appoint new constable to fill vacant position

Pima County supervisors appointed Deborah Martinez to take over as constable for Justice Precinct 8 in a 4-0 vote Tuesday.

Supervisor Steve Christy abstained in the board vote.

Martinez was selected by the supervisors out of four candidates vying to replace former Constable Kristen Randall, whose resignation took effect on Feb. 13. Martinez will take over the job of serving legal summons such as eviction notices and protection orders from the justice courts to residents in midtown Tucson until the position goes up for election in 2024.

Martinez served 16 years in the Army, works with homeless veterans and runs an adaptive golf program for veterans called PGA HOPE. She’ll start the job with a $66,999 annual salary.

The new constable said she was motivated to seek the position for reasons similar to why she was drawn to join the Army.

“I joined (the Army) after Sept. 11, and I just felt that it was wrong for me to sit at home when I knew that I could contribute,” Martinez said. “It’s the same thing with serving my community, I can see a need.”

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Randall announced her resignation Jan. 31, citing a lack of consistency in how each of the county’s 10 constables approaches their jobs.

The county’s constables have faced recent scrutiny with county administration suggesting the elected officials take a pay cut or be replaced with county employees. A report from Assistant County Administrator Mark Napier found uneven workloads among the constables and that “citizens being evicted from their homes are treated differently based on where they reside within boundaries on a map.”

Martinez said she hopes to “get on the same page” with her colleagues and supports consolidating the workload among them.

“There’s a negative perception of the constables’ office. I can’t force anyone else in that office to do anything. But I think if I operate at a high level of standard, then maybe it’ll motivate some of the other constables to operate at the same level,” she said. “It’s not OK for one person to be serving 100 papers a month and one person to be serving seven.”

In her resignation letter, Randall expressed frustration with a lack of ability to keep people in their homes in a job that requires her to evict them. Martinez said she plans to approach evictions with “empathy and humanity.”

“When I deal with the people that I have to evict, I understand that’s my responsibility, but they’re still people,” Martinez said. “Just giving some basic dignity and respect can go so far in helping these people rebuild their lives.”