Orr_sign_La_Cholla_River.jpg

Ethan Orr’s campaign signs are still up, even though he’s on notice they’re not supposed to be there for at least another week. I took this pic at the corner of La Cholla and River today, along with two others you can see later in the post. It kinda makes you wonder about his ability to focus, his attention to detail.

Republican Rep. Ethan Orr will be facing some stiff opposition in the Legislative District 9 race from two Democrats, Rep. Victoria Steele and Dr. Randy Friese. If Orr makes it on the ballot, that is. A lawsuit claims he’s short a number of qualified signatures on his nominating petitions.

If he weathers the signature challenge, Orr still has to explain his employment situation to voters. He’s no longer executive director of the nonprofit, Linkages. And the explanation he gave to the reporter doesn’t speak well for his time management skills.

Orr said the dual positions — serving full-time as Linkages’ executive director in Tucson and part-time as a state legislator in Phoenix — became too difficult to manage.

After admitting he couldn’t figure out how to juggle the two positions, Orr said he’s planning to launch a new nonprofit. That’s going to be easier than his long-standing position at Linkages, how, exactly? He needs to find funding, hire some competent employees and launch the business. Sounds like he’s making his life more difficult to manage, not less.

Orr_sign_LaCanada_River.jpg

And then there’s those pesky signs. Orr has had plenty of time to take them down, but as I was driving around doing errands this morning, I encountered three: two on River, at La Cholla and La Canada, and one more at Orange Grove and 1st.

Orr_sign_1st_Orange.jpg

Sounds to me like Ethan has a few too many things on his mind to give all of them — or any of them — the attention they deserve.

UPDATE: According to Jim Nintzel, Orr may survive the signature challenge.

[T]he Pima County Recorder’s Office has reviewed the challenged signatures and determined that the freshman Republican lawmaker turned in 393 valid signatures, so Orr may have cleared the hurdle.

Nintzel wrote an excellent piece about Orr and the various challenges he’s facing, going into more detail than other reports I’ve read. That’s why they call Jim a “journalist,” and a damn good one at that.

This article appears in Jun 12-18, 2014.

8 replies on “Orr, Maybe He’s Just Not Ready For Prime Time”

  1. As of yesterday, Adam Kwasman had 5-6 big blue signs on La Canada between Ina and Tangerine and another 4-5 west along Tangerine.

    These signs aren’t supposed to be up until 06/26 and Kwasman knows this. It’s not really a big deal that Kwansman is jumping the gun, but it reveals much about the man. It simply means he’s a low grade cheater…..”Rules? That’s for the other guy.”

  2. Is this a real news item or a bogus pretend journalist posing on the internet as a professional one?

  3. I thought you blogged on education topics? Or are you just another Progressive Liberal blogger?

  7. One of the ugliest things about Tucson is the incredible litter of candidate’s signs…

    It was REALLY horrible a year or two ago(?) when there were 2 overlapping primaries into 2 overlapping general elections…YUCK!!!

    BAN THEM ALL!!!

    And make the public airwaves available for real candidate debates…

  8. Ducey for Governor signs are also up. I notified his campaign yesterday that they are premature and asked whether they signify that the candidate will be a scofflaw governor if elected, as appears likely from his disregard for this law. As to Ethan Orr, I suspect he might say that the law should allow signs 60 days prior to mailing of ballots and he has requested an opinion to this effect from the Attorney General. Of course, until he receives such opinion — unlikely — he’s in violation. And he seemed such a square, straightforward guy.

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