With Tucson council member and incumbent Kevin Dahl leading challenger Sadie Shaw by 19 votes in the Ward 3 primary election, the Tucson City Council voted Tuesday to recommend a recount.
Dahl recused himself from Tuesday’s vote; the rest of the council voted in favor.
The latest count shows 19 votes separate the two candidates according to results from the Tucson City Clerk’s office.
Dahl leads with 3,296 votes. Shaw has 3,277.
Under Arizona state law, a recount is automatically triggered when the vote difference between candidates is less than or equal to one-half of one percent, or 0.5%, of the total votes cast.
That means a margin of 33 votes would trigger a recount.
Following the public meeting about the vote held by mayor and council Aug. 12, the city attorney will file a petition for a local judge to order a recount, who will also confirm the results.
That process can take several days or longer, said public information officer Andrew Squire.
Either way, it makes local history: The last Tucson City Council recount was 1997, said Squire, when Fred Ronstadt was voted onto the council.
“I remain optimistic,” Dahl said Monday afternoon.
In a statement to Arizona Luminaria, Shaw said her team was excited by the result and confident she would continue to close the margin.
“The vote count proves that a significant portion of Ward 3 voters are not happy with their leadership,” Shaw said. “We’re excited by the results thus far and confident that we will continue to close the margin.”
The winner will face Republican Janet Wittenbraker in November.
Among the big issues in the campaign was how to approach homelessness in Ward 3, which includes the Flowing Wells neighborhood to the west, to Swan Road on the east; River Road to the north and the neighborhoods around Drachman to the south — including Sugar Hill and Jefferson Park.
Dahl said there are dozens of solutions to homelessness, and he planned to continue working on all of them. He was proud of Tucson’s purchase of the Wildcat Inn, which the city operates as a shelter, as well as the new emergency shelter in Ward 3’s Amphi neighborhood. He also pointed to the ongoing need for enforcement in some areas.
Shaw said she hears more about homelessness than any other issue from the residents of Ward 3. In her view, the lack of trust between unhoused communities and the city is a roadblock to more cooperation.
About the candidates:
- Dahl offers an environmentally-minded outlook with a focus on enforcing green city ordinances like requiring rain water harvesting plans for local businesses. A longtime nonprofit professional, Dahl previously was the executive director of the Tucson Audubon Society (now the Tucson Bird Alliance) and Native Seeds/SEARCH, a regional group working to preserve the genetic diversity of Southwestern Native American crops.
- A Tucson Unified School District board member, Shaw, grew up in the Sugar Hill neighborhood in Ward 3 and pledges to work more with mutual aid groups on homelessness. If Shaw wins the city council seat, she may have to resign from the school board.
- Wittenbraker previously worked in the city manager’s office and as a contract administrator for Raytheon. She has also run for mayor and Pima County Board of Supervisors previously. She promises an open door and a tougher approach to people selling drugs in public spaces in Tucson.
Arizona Luminaria’s Shannon Conner contributed reporting for this story.
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