Achievements
- Richard fought successfully to keep open and rejuvenate
Kino Community Hospital, a County-owned facility that is the only hospital
in the Tucson metropolitan area south of Broadway Blvd.
- Richard sponsored a resolution that the Pima County
Board of Supervisors ultimately approved which required Kinder Morgan
Energy Co. to relocate its troublesome petroleum pipeline to a more
sparsely populated area when the current license expires.
- Reinforcing his commitment to affordable-housing needs,
Richard won Board of Supervisors approval of $30 million in bonds to
pay for construction of affordable housing and neighborhood reinvestment
projects in established urban areas.
- Richard was a chief architect of the Board of Supervisors'
November 2004 creation of an Affordable Housing Trust Fund and a new
Housing Commission. Some of the May 2004 bond money will get this fund
started and graduated fees to be levied on new housing that sells for
$135,000 or more will keep it going. Money in the fund will be used
to build new housing for families whose income is less than 80 percent
of the median household income, to provide down-payment assistance
to families at or below the 80 percent of median household income level,
and to provide funds for the same target group to rehabilitate their
existing homes. The Board will appoint 10 members to a commission that
governs the new trust fund and the County Administrator will appoint
one member to this commission.
- When the City of Tucson proposed to turn Columbus Park
into a major regional facility with numerous brightly lit ball fields
without neighbors' consent, Richard stepped in and helped neighbors
hammer out a compromise that was satisfactory to all. The agreement
will confine lighted fields to a parcel north of El Camino del Cerro.
- Richard worked diligently to ensure that Pima County's
May 2004 bond package included more than $174 million for the purchase
and preservation of open spaces in critical county areas.
- Richard was a key player in bringing the AFL-CIO's
coast-to-coast Immigrant Worker Freedom Ride through Tucson in late
2003. This event highlighted the tremendous contributions immigrant
workers make to this country in terms of workforce production, tax
revenues, and cultural enrichment.
Biography
Positions
