Pima County voters decide RTA Next

Pima County voters were having their say on the RTA Next transportation plan on Tuesday. Ballot drop-off sites closed at 7 p.m., with the initial results expected just after 8 p.m.

Voters were being asked to approve Prop. 418, which is the new $2.67 billion transportation plan, and Prop. 419, which would extend the existing half-cent-per-dollar sales tax that would fund the plan.

The Pima County Elections Department planned to release results shortly after 8 p.m. That release will include whatever ballots election workers had been able to process by 7 p.m. on Tuesday, according to Pima County Elections Director Constance Hargrove.

Hargrove said that tally would be the only one made public Tuesday evening, with any remaining ballots verified and added to the count in the next few days.

As of Tuesday afternoon, county officials had verified and counted 194,277 of the more than 656,000 ballots mailed out.

The RTA Next plan includes
$1.58 billion for major road expansion, $177 million for pavement
rehabilitation and $726 million for transit.

Proponents of the RTA
Next plan say it would continue to improve regional
infrastructure, maintain and expand transit services and create jobs
while keeping the sales tax at the current level. A failure to pass it,
they warn, would result in a cut of at least $30 million in annual
dedicated funding for transit and delay road work in a region
that’s already struggling to keep up with traffic needs.

Opponents’
arguments include complaints that there’s not enough funding for
transit, that the proposal will widen roads, particularly in suburban
communities, and that the RTA can’t be trusted because transportation
officials over-promised and
under-delivered over the last two decades.

As of Monday, March 9, the Recorder’s Office had processed 190,384 ballots that had been returned by voters. 

The Recorder’s Office had mailed 656,455 ballots to voters, including 5,085 replacement ballots, according to election officials. A total of 32,600 had been returned because the ballot was undeliverable or the voter was deceased.

Based on those numbers, voter turnout was hitting roughly 31 percent as of Monday.

Voters had until 7 p.m. Tuesday to return their ballots, although traditional polling places were not open.

Ballot
replacement centers and drop-off locations included the Pima County
Recorder Gabriella Cázares-Kelly’s Downtown office at 240 N. Stone
Ave. and her South Side offices at 6550 S. Country Club Rd., as well as a
third location at the City of Tucson Ward 2 office, 7820 E. Broadway. 

Voters could also drop off ballots at any time at one of the Recorder’s Office’s
three ballot drop boxes. Two of them, including a drive-thru option, were located at the Downtown
branch and another is located at the East Side office, 6920 E. Broadway. 

Find more basics about the RTA Next package here and Tucson Sentinel’s coverage of the proposal here.

More details on ballot replacement centers/drop-off locations here.