The Holbrook City Council certified the results of the July 21 primary election last week, confirming three new four-year council members and one two-year member while declaring that all four proposed charter amendments failed at the ballot box.
According to the official canvass, that was adopted unanimously, the city’s 2,462 registered voters cast ballots. Adrian Tubbs led the four-year council seat race with 362 votes, followed by Karina Pack with 341 and Arcenia Pacheco with 310, all three winning seats. Alexandria Carroll won the two-year seat with 347 votes. The winners will be sworn in Nov. 18 following the Nov. 3 general election.
Voters rejected every charter question put before them. Proposition 451, repealing the charter section on the city treasurer’s position and duties, failed 221 to 273. Proposition 452, on voter approval of certain public expenditures, failed 199 to 298, and Proposition 453, on the timing of election canvasses, failed 229 to 265. Proposition 454, addressing the use of gender pronouns throughout the charter, saw the widest defeat at 178 to 317.
The council had already conducted an unofficial canvass at a July 28 special meeting to satisfy the charter’s requirement that results be canvassed within seven days, but official results from the Navajo County Elections Department arrived too late that week to adopt by resolution. Mayor Kathleen Smith noted Tuesday that the numbers had not changed from those announced at the special meeting.
In the night’s most debated item, the council pulled back a proposed zoning change that would have opened the city’s C2 general commercial district, including much of the historic Route 66 corridor, to apartment conversions, sending Ordinance 26-06 back to the Planning and Zoning Commission after its first reading rather than advancing it to a scheduled second reading on Sept. 9.
The amendment would have allowed multifamily housing as a conditional use throughout the district and created a legal pathway for motels to convert to apartments, something city staff say has already happened illegally at several properties operating with substandard conditions. “We just don’t have the legal framework to actually work with it,” Kevin Auster, the City Planner and Community Development staff member, told council.
Smith, citing a citizen email forwarded to the full council, said her chief worry was the downtown core along Hopi Drive, where inexpensive commercial buildings could be bought up by investors for duplexes and triplexes just as the city hopes for retail growth. “We desperately need to look at our zoning issues,” she said. “We need opportunities for multifamily housing, but we do want to protect our commercial streets.”
Other members pointed to burned out motels still standing, lost lodger’s tax revenue and the city’s enforcement record. “We get all these codes and we want all these ordinances and we want to do all these things, but then we don’t enforce any of them,” Councilmember Teri Tafoya said. “So my problem is if we’re not going to enforce what we approve, then there’s no point in approving it.”
Auster acknowledged enforcement has historically lagged and said a citywide enforcement policy is under review with the city’s attorneys. He floated a compromise keeping parcels that front Hopi Drive and Navajo Blvd. purely commercial while allowing conditional multifamily use on land behind the main streets. The council directed staff to restart the process at Planning and Zoning and plans a work session, likely in September, that will include public comment.
The council also advanced two grant funded projects. On a 5-1 the council adopted a resolution authorizing City Manager Randy Sullivan to apply for a Land and Water Conservation Fund grant for a new community park anchored by the city’s first fishing pond, a project estimated at $2.7 million with the city responsible for roughly half in matching funds that can include in-kind staff time. The pond would sit on the flood-prone ground near the BNSF property and is pitched as part of the answer to the area’s standing water and mosquito problems. Councilwoman Pacheco cast the lone no vote, questioning the roughly $1.3 million match and the cost of maintaining a seventh park. Smith stressed the vote committed the city only to applying, saying, “This isn’t the end all be all decision tonight,” and that acceptance would return to the council if the grant is awarded, which is expected to be known around January.
The council separately approved $294,293.60 in new playground equipment for Hunt Park from vendor WillyGoat, funded by a $129,500 Arizona Public Service grant and by federal ARPA money set aside for recreation during the pandemic. Members struck a heavy-duty seesaw from the order over safety concerns and asked the city’s risk pool to review the equipment, which will replace the park’s central climbing structure and buried tires with a new structure. APS wants the project done by year’s end, with installation expected two to three months after approval.
Two construction bids were awarded without dissent. Teal Enterprises won a $67,450 contract to build roughly 1,000 linear feet of six-foot block wall around the cemetery’s new section behind the American Legion, beating a $93,750 competing bid, with Sullivan telling the council the existing cemetery has about two years’ worth of plots remaining. Mr. Tanner Construction of Chandler, the sole bidder, won a contract of about $71,760 to apply a penetrating fog seal to Golf Course Road and the road to the firehouse; work expected this summer that may briefly close the golf course.
In a late addition that prompted the amended agenda, the council approved a special event liquor license application for the Holbrook Chamber of Commerce for Wild West Days, set from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. on Saturday, Aug. 22, at the historic courthouse, where the chamber will partner with Empty Pockets on a beer garden.
The council also settled its calendar through December. November will have a single meeting on Nov. 18 because Nov. 11 is Veterans Day and Nov. 25 falls the night before Thanksgiving, while regular meetings remain Sept. 9, Oct. 14 and Dec. 9, with Dec. 23 cancelled and Sept. 23 likely reserved for the zoning work session.
Smith proclaimed Sunday, Sept. 6, as Rat Rod Day, when up to 125 custom rat rods on the Rat Rod Magazine Route 66 Invasion Tour are expected to arrive around 1 p.m. for photographs at the city’s new Route 66 sign on Hopi Drive and a luncheon hosted by Custom Stitch. In closing remarks, she thanked residents and city crews still working through cleanup from the flooding several weeks ago and Sullivan reported that Hill Road remains closed to protect an exposed water line, with reconstruction of the crossing set to begin in about two weeks.
All council members attended except Councilmember Roxanne Pergeson, who was excused. The meeting adjourned at 7:19 p.m.
