Here's what happened at the TUSD board meeting Tuesday. Mark Stegeman was voted board president. Here's how the vote went: Leila Counts voted yes along with Stegeman and Rachel Sedgwick. Kristel Foster and Adelita Grijalva voted no.

It was a complex discussion coupled with a series of complicated votes, but never mind. When the smoke and dust cleared, Stegeman was board president, and Counts' vote was an essential part of that decision.

Do I think Stegeman should be board president? Was Counts wrong to vote for him? I'm going to table that discussion until the end of the post. That's not why I'm writing this.

I'm writing this because some people went nuts over Counts' vote. Nuts. "Counts is a traitor!" "Counts is the new Michael Hicks!" "Counts is a Stegeman stooge!"

Those people drive me nuts. Not because they disagree with Counts' vote. That's fine. They drive me nuts because, for them, Counts failed the "One strike and you're out" purity test, and that's the end of that. "You voted for Stegeman? You voted with Stegeman? You're dead to me."

I'm about to go off on a rant about political purity tests and demonization here, so if you're only interested in my opinion on the board vote, skip down to the heading "TUSD Board Vote." This is going to take a while.

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Former state lawmaker Steve Farley, fresh from last year's unsuccessful gubernatorial run, tells The Range he'll formally announce his entry into Tucson's mayoral race tonight.

"I want to serve the city I love," Farley said.

Farley will make his opening argument tonight at the Democratic Party's Nucleus Club, which meets at 5:30 at Viscount Suites, 4855 E. Broadway.

Farley will be live-streaming his speech on his Facebook page if you can't make it to the meeting.

It's been a busy week for potential candidates who want to replace Tucson Mayor Jonathan Rothschild, who is stepping down after two terms. Yesterday, Ward 1 Councilmember Regina Romero announced she was jumping into the race.

A graphic designer whose photographic tiles grace the walls of the Broadway underpass at the eastern entrance of downtown, Farley made his first political run in 2005, when he lost a Democratic primary for the Ward 6 Tucson City Council race to former TV newscaster Nina Trasoff.

The following year, he won election to the Arizona House of Representatives. In 2012, he won a seat in the Arizona Senate, where over three terms, he rose to Senate assistant minority leader.

He also played a key role in bringing the modern streetcar to downtown Tucson through his work in developing the Regional Transportation Authority's transportation plan.

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Tucson City Councilmember Regina Romero is announcing this afternoon that she is running for mayor of Tucson.

Jonathan Rothschild, who has served two terms atop City Hall, announced that he would not seek reelection last month.

Romero has represented Westside Ward 1 since winning election in 2007.

The other big-name Democrat talking about a campaign is former state lawmaker Steve Farley, but others may well join the crowd in the coming months.

Here's the press release from Romero:

Regina Romero is a Southern Arizona native and a University of Arizona graduate with a post graduate certificate from Harvard Kennedy School of Government. She has served on the Tucson City Council representing Ward 1 for eleven years.

“I am running for Mayor of Tucson because I am prepared to fight for what is right for working families, provide a safe, clean and environmentally sustainable city with access to economic opportunity for everyone.”

As Mayor of Tucson, Romero will focus on developing an economic incentive program that will help small businesses thrive in the City, work with experts to craft a citywide climate resiliency plan and push for higher wages to improve the quality of life for city workers and those that contract with the city.

“I was first elected to the Tucson City Council just as the Great Recession was beginning to affect our city. Since then, we have seen unprecedented economic growth because of the many incentives and continued work that I and my colleagues on the Mayor and Council have done. I look forward to Tucson’s continued economic growth and will work in partnership with the business community, nonprofits, neighborhoods and other jurisdictions to make sure we honor Tucson’s rich history and retain our unique character while continuing our path towards prosperity.”

Key accomplishments for Romero on the Tucson Council include drafting the City’s Primary Jobs Incentive Program that has created hundreds of high wage, long term jobs and pushing for the creation of an Economic Initiatives office. As a mother who understands the needs of working families, she fiercely protected the City’s KIDCO program from being eliminated during the recession. Pushing forward sustainable practices, she helped develop Tucson’s Water Service Area policy that safeguards Tucson’s future water supply while protecting hundreds of acres of pristine desert in our region..

Understanding that protected open space is critical for the health of our community, Regina was instrumental in protecting Painted Hills and Tumamoc Hill as permanent open space. She also led the Tucson effort against Arizona’s racist SB1070 law and pushed for the creation of a paid Cesar E. Chavez holiday for the city.

Knowing how critical infrastructure investments are for the City, Romero supported and advocated to pass initiatives that have invested millions of dollars on our roads, public safety and our parks. She has been a force for downtown redevelopment with her advocacy for federal funding for the modern streetcar and for the development of the Westside. She has pushed for millions of dollars in public and private investment including the Cushing Street bridge, Mercado San Agustin, West End Station, Monier Apartments and facilitating the relocation of Caterpillar in partnership with the Rio Nuevo Board and the State of Arizona. She also fought to bring the streetcar to the Westside and helped protect the Tucson Origins Heritage Park, the birthplace of Tucson. As Mayor, Romero will bring her vision and ability to get things done to the whole city.

Romero feels strongly that dark money should be kept out of politics and will be participating in the City’s Clean Elections program. Her campaign will be co-chaired by businessman Cody Ritchie and environmentalist Carolyn Campbell. To learn more about Council Member Romero’s campaign, visit her website at http://www.votereginaromero.org

Representative Pamela Powers Hannley (D, LD-9) was named "The Most Valuable State Legislator" on The Nation's 2018 Progressive Honor Roll. She's not one of the most valuable. She's the only state legislator on the 2018 list.

[Full disclosure: I've known Pam for years. We both wrote on Blog for Arizona until I moved to The Range. She's also one of my state representatives.]

About a dozen people were selected for this year's honor roll, including Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Rashida Tlaib, Bernie Sanders and Amy Klobuchar. It's quite an honor for Powers Hannley to be in the company of such a high profile collection ranging from newcomers to old timers. It's also an indication that Arizona is on the radar as a state with a significant number of progressive office holders.

According to the blurb on the Honor Roll, Powers Hannley has spent "years as a blogger and activist." She ran for office because "she wanted to help fight for women’s rights, criminal-justice reform, strong unions, public banking, and her vision for democratic renewal."

The Nation is a highly respected weekly progressive magazine. It was founded in 1865, making it the oldest continuously running weekly in the country.

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Judging from the complaints I heard during the election season, sending people unsolicited text messages about political campaigns isn't the best way to persuade voters to support you.

Nonetheless, the National Republican Congressional Committee made a point of spending money to text an unknown number of constituents in Arizona's Congressional District 2 to let them know that newly elected Congresswoman Ann Kirkpatrick voted for Nancy Pelosi for Speaker of the House. The NRCC press release:

Today, as House Democrats went back on their promises to constituents and elected Nancy Pelosi as Speaker of the House, the NRCC launched its first paid campaign ads of the cycle.

Immediately after the Speaker vote, voters in districts across the country received text messages, paid for by the NRCC, informing them that with their first vote as a member of Congress, their Democrat Representative has already sold them out to the radical left and voted to hand the Speaker’s gavel to Nancy Pelosi. Today’s vote sets the tone for what voters can expect from congressional Democrats as the party continues to follow their radical base and march to the left on everything from immigration to taxes to national security.

We don't know why the NRCC would boast about this effort, but if what we can expect from the NRCC is spam text messages, we suspect the GOP's reputation in Southern Arizona is going to continue to decline.