In Conversation with LD 9 AZ State House Candidate Nancy Gutierrez

I’m quite dissatisfied with the current state of political discourse in the United States. Too many sound-bites; too little real conversation. Too much empty rhetoric and culture-war nonsense; too little reflection on the real issues and challenges we face as a self-governing society. I think these are pretty common sentiments these days.

Luckily, I’m in a position to do my own little part to remedy the situation. I believe – and hope – that maybe there is an audience for real conversations about the public interest and public policy that can inform and deepen the public discourse and really get to know those who want to represent us. To that end, I have begun a project that I hope will invite a demand among those who wish to play a role in our politics to discuss public matters at greater length and in greater detail than they are usually able through traditional media.

I am fortunate to have the luxury of a channel of public communication limited only by the time and attention of my audience. So, I decided to push the envelope of what’s possible and normative in local politics by making at least some local political candidates accessible and knowable in a way that is uncommon, if not unprecedented – outside seeking them out and arranging to have an extended conversation with them yourself.

I decided that I would start by recording and sharing real, unscripted, in-depth discussions with some of the folks who have decided they would like to represent me, and my immediate community, in our state government. I hope that the result will be as stimulating and informative for an audience as it has been for me, personally.

If the response is positive and the participants find it to be of benefit, then I hope this little seed might grow.

Right now, I am reaching out to those who have stepped forward to be nominated to replace one of my state House representatives, Randy Friese, who has submitted his resignation effective November 15th. Right now, I am open to participation in this experiment by anyone who has filed to run in the ’22 primary to be elected to a seat in the newly-drawn district in which I live. I reiterate my invitation to all those fine folks to contact me (MBryanATgmailDOTcom) and participate in this conversation. To any others outside LD 9 interested in having such a conversation, I extend an invitation to arrange to participate in the coming months.

As of writing this post, three candidates who have put themselves forward for either the appointment to Dr. Fiese’s seat and/or the primary in ’22 (in which both state House seats will be open, as Pam Powers-Hanely will not be seeking re-election) – Chris Mathis, Nathan Davis, and Nancy Gutierrez – have taken me up on my invitation and sat down for an open conversation about their opinions and commitments foundational to what they want to accomplish by running for public office. My aim is to listen more than I talk and to penetrate to the bedrock of their character and concerns that led them to seek public office. I don’t seek to summarize their campaign platforms; I seek an understanding of their views, why they seek the job, and what their concerns for our country and state might be.

This post features my discussion with Nancy Gutierrez, who will be running for the nomination in the August ’22 primary, but not for the appointment for the ’22 session due to personal and professional commitments, as she outlines in our interview.

I sat down with Nancy for our conversation here in Tucson at The Ren Coffeehouse (a local business that I highly recommend). The result was far from perfect technically (we only realized that there was a market going on that day once we had arrived, so there is considerable background noise I did my best to suppress in post-production), but Nancy soldiered on and think the result is still very good.

I’m not going to try to summarize our conversation for you, dear readers. I think to do so rather misses the point of this experiment.

The audio of this interview is also available as a podcast.

BlogForArizona’s Podcast page.

You can also search for us (‘BlogForArizona’ – all one word) on Audible, Spotify, Apple podcasts, and in your favorite podcasting app. We are just getting set up, but we’re improving our production values as we go.