The Maricopa County Recorder’s race is set and all but one candidate have responded to Independent Newsmedia’s questionnaire regarding their candidacy for the 2024 election.

Maricopa County has one seat for County Recorder whose job is to uphold the integrity of the electoral process and advance transparent elections in Maricopa County.

The County Recorder maintains voter files for more than 2.6 million registered county residents, according to the County Recorder website.

County Recorder Stephen Richer (R) is seeking re-election and facing three contenders: Democratic Candidate Timothy Michael Stringham and Republican candidates Justin Heap and Donald Hiatt.

Heap is the only candidate who did not respond for comment.

Donald Hiatt (R)

As Maricopa County Recorder, how do you plan to make elections more transparent, more secure and more honest?

I plan to use my expert level skills in Business Process Re-engineering to assess the election processes at Maricopa County and propose a more secure and enhanced process. One that adheres to all election laws.

In addition, I would post on the county website information that is available by Public Records Requests. I like the idea of posting images of all ballots and how the races were recorded for each ballot. Making Cast Vote Records available with the ballot images should allow anyone to confirm the accuracy of each and every ballot cast.

How do you expect Arizona’s recent abortion ruling will factor into voter’s prioritization of the issues that drive them to the polls and vote?

I believe Pro-Life issues will draw more voters at this next election, with each voter motivated by their own conscience.

How do you plan to rebuild trust with voters and reduce disinformation?

I plan to:

• Speak Integrity and truth in all I say and do to restore public confidence in the recorder’s office.
• Apply 35 years of IT computer and business management experience to protect the county records and voter data.
• Be dedicated to preventing fraud by assessing and re-engineering current practices to run secure elections.
• Ensure federal and state election laws and requirements are implemented and enforced.
• Implement authentic and complete ballot chain of custody to ensure elections are secure.
• Foster community outreach with public involvement and provide access to election data.

Stephen Richer (R)

As Maricopa County Recorder, how do you plan to make elections more transparent, more secure and more honest?

Regarding transparency: In the past three years, I have: hosted over 100 in-person tours of the election facility, introduced over 20 live public video feeds of the elections facility that can be watched from our website, increased ballot tracking services and allowed for more partisan observation points of the election process.

Regarding security: I have rebuilt the voter registration database and administered the largest ever voter list maintenance effort, implemented signature verification audits, created more ballot chain of custody documentation and greatly enhanced the physical security of the central election facility.

Regarding honesty: I have told the truth about election administration, even when politically inconvenient. I have followed the law at all times, and I have never lost a lawsuit regarding election administration.

How do you expect Arizona’s recent abortion ruling will factor into voter’s prioritization of the issues that drive them to the polls and vote?

I think it will motivate higher participation in the November general election. I suspect we will see over 80% of active registered voters participate in Maricopa County.

How do you plan to rebuild trust with voters and reduce disinformation?

The most important thing leaders can do to improve confidence is tell voters the truth about our elections. I have done that. Even when politically inconvenient.

I have also greatly expanded informational output, which includes the stuff listed above, as well as things like tele-town halls, livestream Q&As, webinars, community outreach, papers, articles, videos, etc.

My office is here to help, here to answer questions. Regardless of whether your confidence in elections is currently a one out of 10 or a nine out of 10, we want to help, we want to answer questions.

Timothy Michael Stringham (D)

As Maricopa County Recorder, how do you plan to make elections more transparent, more secure and more honest?

Voters across the political spectrum are worried about our democracy. Our constitutional rights to vote or to place ballot initiatives or referendums are often frustrated by bureaucratic requirements, our legislative districts are gerrymandered and our elections laws heavily favor the existing two-party system.

All of this is done to the detriment of independents, who now make up the single largest group of voters in Arizona, and all of this is done to protect incumbent politicians.

Local elections officials should be on the side of voters, not political parties and advocate for a level playing field for independents or smaller parties.

Maricopa County has a woefully outdated campaign finance reporting system that requires you to read through PDFs in order to see who is financially supporting a candidate’s campaign. It should be easy to identify which special interests are influencing our elected officials.

It’s also time we considered ranked-choice voting, which would require county elections officials who are up to the task of administering large changes in our elections. Solutions like ranked-choice voting would allow you to cast a vote for whomever you best feel represents your values, not just for the lesser of two evils.

How do you expect Arizona’s recent abortion ruling will factor into voter’s prioritization of the issues that drive them to the polls and vote?

Arizona has always been a place that loves personal freedom and is skeptical of big government solutions. In November, I expect that abortion rights will not only drive Democrats and Independents to the polls, but many Republicans will cross over to vote against a big government takeover of women’s healthcare rights.

However, I don’t think that’s the only issue on the line this November,  and I don’t think voters will be satisfied if politicians don’t do more to address affordable housing, congestion or public education. Our government officials control zoning, manage our infrastructure and our schools and they need to step up and explain to voters what their plan on those other issues is as well.

How do you plan to rebuild trust with voters and reduce disinformation?

Maricopa County is the second largest voting jurisdiction in the entire country. Our elections take thousands of workers, we oversee voting for 2.5 million voters and our elections cost tens of millions of dollars. We should create an independent oversight board that includes experts in finance, computer science and law and true political independents, not just representatives of the two major political parties or former politicians.

Furthermore, that board should be empowered to conduct investigations and release reports so that voters of any political inclination can be confident that our elections processes have true independent oversight, not merely talking points released by politicians or political parties.

We invite our readers to submit their civil comments on this topic. Email AZOpinions@iniusa.org.