Richard Elías, a Democrat, has represented
District Five on the Pima County Board of Supervisors since February
2002. He works for and is a vocal advocate for the Sonoran Desert,
for affordable housing, for eliminating health-care disparities,
for nurturing the development of our youth, for quality education.
Richard
works to protect our precious water supplies and the shrinking
wildlife habitat of our desert region; he works to diversify and
improve our housing stock while repairing and reinvesting in our
aging urban infrastructure; he works to make Pima County more hospitable
and prosperous, a better place for people to work and play; he
seeks to bring everyone together in a spirit of community cooperation
to enhance our quality of life.
Among numerous honors Richard has
earned in recent years are: Public Service Award of the University
of Arizona Alumni Association; Arizona Minority Bar Association
Community Service Award; Job Path’s Jim Haag Award for Vision,
Initiative and Perseverance; Sky Island Alliance Public Service
Award; National Latino AIDS Awareness Day Special Recognition Award;
Salpointe Catholic High School Distinguished Alumni Hall of Fame
Award.
Other boards Richard serves on include the Pima County Board of
Health, the Little Chapel of All Nations Board of Directors, the
Salpointe Catholic High School Board of Directors, the Diabetes
Association Board of Directors, Tucson Unified School District
Mexican-American Studies Advisory Board, the Juvenile Justice Executive Board and the UA Healthcare Hospital at Kino Advisory
Board.
Richard entered public office after a lengthy career in the government
and non-profit development of affordable housing. He earned a degree
in History, with a minor in Mexican-American Studies, from the
University of Arizona.
A fifth-generation Tucsonan, Richard is the son of a longtime
local union printer, and was a union shop steward with Retail Clerk’s
Union Local 727 (now United Food and Commercial Workers Local 99)
when he worked in the grocery industry before completing college.
Richard is married to Emily Velde Elías and they have a daughter,
Luz.
Supervisor
Richard Elías