Maricopa City Hall
Maricopa City Hall. [Bob McGovern photo]

The field of primary election candidates for Maricopa City Council is set.

Four candidates – three incumbents and one challenger – filed paperwork and submitted signatures before Monday’s 5 p.m. deadline.

Three seats are open on the board this time around.

Maricopa Realtor Adam Leach will challenge incumbents Vice Mayor Vincent Manfredi and Councilmembers Rich Vitiello and Henry Wade in the Aug. 2 primary election.

Manfredi, co-owner and advertising director for InMaricopa, and Wade, director of housing counseling services for Chicanos Por La Causa, are seeking their third terms on council. Vitiello, office manager of Kooline Plumbing, is running for a second term.

City council elections are non-partisan, so candidates do not represent a political party on the ballot. Candidates were required to turn in a minimum of 378 signatures to qualify for the ballot but could not submit more than 755.

According to City Clerk Vanessa Bueras, nine candidates filed Statements of Interest to obtain nomination packets allowing them to petition for signatures to appear on the ballot. Five of them – John Callaway, Julia Gusse, James Hughes, Richard Quinn and Henry Staggs – did not submit signatures by the deadline.

Gusse, who served terms on city council from 2011-15 and 2017-21, filed a Statement of Interest but subsequently relocated to Washington, D.C. She lost a six-way race for three council seats in 2020, finishing fourth behind current Councilmembers Amber Liermann, Bob Marsh and Nancy Smith.

Staggs is the owner of Preferred Roof Consultants of Arizona. Callaway owns the Arizona Law Dawgs gun shop in town. Quinn is a former member of the Homestead North Homeowners’ Association board of directors. Hughes, no relation to Maricopa’s police chief, is a recent transplant to the city.

In the primary, voters cast ballots for up to the number of seats available, so the August ballot will allow voters to select up to three candidates. With four candidates on the ballot, the total number of votes cast will be divided by the number of candidates – four – then that number will be cut in half and one vote added to get to a 50 percent plus one vote total. Any candidate reaching that threshold in the primary wins election and does not participate in the general election.

Should a general election be required, twice as many candidates will advance as there are seats on the ballot. So, if one seat is available, the two highest vote-getters not already elected from the primary would face off in the general, with the candidate achieving a simple majority winning the seat. If only one candidate wins election through the primary, four candidates would advance to the general for the two remaining seats.