Supervisor Reyes targeted in latest recall effort by San Luis resident
SAN LUIS, Ariz. – A San Luis resident who already has launched efforts to recall four elected officials in the city now has his sights set on a fifth, Yuma County Supervisors Chairman Tony Reyes.
In his application for recall petitions, Gary Snyder claims Reyes has used his other position as head of the Comite de Bienestar, a nonprofit San Luis housing development organization, to exert undue influence on voters in the city and on the San Luis City Council and the governing board of the Gadsden Elementary School District.
Reyes said Snyder is abusing the state law that provides for recalls of elected officials.
“I’m not going to enter into a discussion against those allegations,” Reyes said. “Any person has the right to use the established systems, but no citizen has the right to abuse them.”
Snyder already has been circulating recall petitions to recall Guillermina Fuentes, Gloria Torres and Rosa Varela from the board of the Gadsden district, which serves San Luis and Gadsden. He is also trying to recall Torres from the seat she simultaneously holds on the San Luis City Council, as well as Councilman Jose Ponce.
Snyder previously ran unsuccessfully for seats on the both the council and the school board in 2020, and some of the incumbents have said he is trying to accomplish with a recall what he couldn’t in the elections.
Snyder has a deadline of Aug. 18 to collect at least 2,378 petition signatures from registered voters in supervisorial District 4, which comprises San Luis, Gadsden and part of Somerton,
to force Reyes to defend his seat in a recall election.
He must collect 1,237 petitions signatures in the Gadsden district by July to recall the three school board members, and he also has a July deadline to collect 447 votes in the city for each of the two San Luis council members.
“I’m not alone in this,” Snyder said. “I have a team that is helping me and I’m sure we can do it. The people agree with me and are signing the petitions.”
Snyder said it’s his right to launch recalls, and that he will do so as often as necessary to remove elected officials he believes look out for their own interests above all others.
Reyes said Snyder is doing the work of a limited number of people in the city and the district who don’t like the way regular elections have turned out.
“This is part of his agenda and that of those behind him. It’s an abuse. There is nothing irregular that I have done. Besides, this is what elections are for. They had their opportunity to compete against me and no one did it.”
Reyes was elected to the board of supervisors for the first time in 1998 and has been re-elected in successive election. In 2020, he had no opponent.