Unsure who to vote for in the Pinal County recorder's race? Hear from the candidates

The upcoming state primary will likely determine the Pinal County recorder's race.

The seat holds immense power over election operations. In Pinal County, the county recorder oversees both the Recorder's Office and the Elections Department. That means they are responsible for maintaining voter registration records, administering all voting and overseeing tabulation and other post-election processes.

The county recorder also manages public records, including property documents and governmental information.

Just one person is running for the job: Republican Dana Lewis, who was appointed as recorder by the Pinal County Board of Supervisors in 2022. She is currently working to regain voter trust and turn a new page following a rough midterms election cycle, and is likely to keep her post while running unopposed.

Arizona election: Read our full coverage of county races.

The Arizona Republic asked Lewis questions about her bid for office and how she would handle key issues if elected. Here's what she had to say. Answers may have been slightly edited for clarity and brevity.

Moving forward: How do you avoid the mistakes of the past?

Pinal County saw a rough election cycle in 2022. How will you work to establish policies and procedures that ensure such issues do not arise in the future?

Dana Lewis: Yes, I agree — in 2022, Pinal County saw elections that were less than perfect. Over the last 18 months, we have worked diligently to establish policies, protocols and security procedures that ensure what happened in the programming of the elections and security protocols will not happen in the future. We've brought in vendors to come in and train our staff, we have onboarded GPS locks and staff are now trained with several elections underneath them. They are certified election officials for the state of Arizona and have the passion to do this job. I am proud to lead the team we have.

Growth: How will you ensure election and recording processes can withstand population increases?

The county is rapidly growing. How will you position the Recorder’s Office to accommodate more voters and more recorded documents as the influx of new residents continues?

Lewis: Pinal County is in the top 10 fastest-growing counties in the United States. We understood this when we decided to build the Pinal VOTES building, and we ensured that the square footage could accommodate the growth over the next 15 to 20 years. Luckily, the county planned for even past that, ensuring to acquire the land around the space.

Top-tier staff have worked beside me to identify and establish not only a great organizational restructure, but also a succession plan. We also are ensuring that staff are cross-trained to be able to grow. Another thing that we pride ourselves on is in-person early voting and all early voting tasks, from ballot transfer to chain of custody and GPS tracking to reconciliation and audit trails. We believe we have an amazing process in our VOTES building, and some of our satellite offices. Recorder's Office staff in Building E of the government complex in Florence take on the brunt of recording physical documents for Pinal County. We've been proactive with training and ensuring that we have the ability to grow our staff at a pace that makes sense with the growth of the county.

Threats: How will you protect your workers from harassment?

County election officials have seen threats and harassment in recent years. What steps would you take to protect your staff, ensure your office can retain employees and ensure you can attract new workers when needed?

Lewis: Pinal County started seeing threats and harassing calls to staff coming into the election cycle. We identified the problem and we reached out to county management to ensure that we could record phone calls for training and safety purposes. Now, voters who call get that warning. Additionally, any time that we receive unlikable mail from voters or concerned citizens, we always elevate that to the Sheriff's Office or the Pinal County Attorney's Office. Additionally, we ensure that staff get trained in de-escalation procedures and built a building with security and safety in mind. If the staff doesn't feel appreciated, secure and safe in their work environment, you can't retain them, so we made sure that was not going to be a problem going forward.

Electoral trust: How confident are you in election results?

How confident are you in the certified results of the 2020 and 2022 elections?

Lewis: I did not administer the elections in 2020 and 2022. I can tell you that I am confident in the results of elections from 2023 — our jurisdictional — and the 2024 presidential preference election. Of course, all of these processes have human involvement and humans make mistakes. But we will continue to identify those problems and ensure that people have resources and support. They need to be successful and make sure that we can go forward together as a team, executing fair, free, legal and accurate elections.

On a personal note: Who do you admire?

What person in public life, past or present, do you most admire, and why?

Lewis: I admire everyone involved in this process, whether it be a voter; or somebody who comes to this country to become a naturalized citizen so they can vote; or the poll worker who wakes up at 5 a.m. to work a 16-hour shift; or the election specialist who gives and gives and gives to learn the process and always make it better and follow the law; or the deputy recording clerk who records, documents and houses in-person early voting; or the registrar staff who work diligently to clean up our rolls. This is our public. These are people and all of them in some way, shape or form protect our constitutional republic. That's what I admire.

This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Pinal County recorder candidates answer questions on key issues