Wes Gullett, a Phoenix mayoral candidate, doesn't mince words when it comes to his opposition to the most recent water rate increase in Phoenix.
"I opposed it," he said during the first mayoral debate in the runoff election between him and his opponent, Greg Stanton. "We didn't need it ... It was not necessary this year, and it not necessary next year."
Camp Stanton points out that in 2005, Gullett, a lobbyist with FirstStrategic Communication and Public Affairs, was perfectly willing to work for the Chaparral City Water Company as it sought a nearly 29 percent increase in water rates. The Arizona Corporation Commission authorized a 17.86 percent revenue increase, according to its 2005 decision.
"Mr. Gullett's hypocrisy is astonishing. He rails against water rate
increases unless his client is paying him to shill for them," says
Stanton campaign manager Ruben Alonzo.
Daniel Scarpinato, a spokesman for Gullett's campaign, said the point is moot because Gullett
wasn't lobbying the Arizona Corporation Commission on behalf of his client, only working to raise public
awareness about the pending water rate increase.
Gullett, at the
same time, takes a shot at Stanton for pledging that, as mayor, he will
steer clear of appointing lobbyists to boards and commissions when he
voted in favor of appointing 12 lobbyists to those exact boards and
commissions in 2008.
Gullett has resisted being labeled as a
lobbyist since he
first began his campaign. Ironically, though, as Gullett highlights
that Stanton voted in favor of placing 12 lobbyists on board and
commissions in 2008, Gullett has no choice but to include himself -- a
lobbyist -- on the list.
Gullett also started calling his
opponent a "taxpayer-funded lobbyist" because he registered as a
lobbyist while he served as the Deputy Attorney General.
Stanton
says there is a vast difference between the type of lobbying he did on
behalf of the people of Arizona, including protecting Luke Air Force
Base and improving border security along the U.S-Mexico border.
"Only Wes
Gullett would confuse law enforcement work with the special interest
lobbying he's done his whole life," Stanton tells New Times. "I'm proud to be the only candidate in this race willing to take city hall out of the hands of lobbyists."
He
says that since more than 90 percent of board and commission
recommendations come from the mayor, he will be able to easily change
the tone of government moving forward by prohibiting lobbyist from
serving on city boards and commissions.
"We must end the lobbyist stranglehold on our city government," Stanton says.
Gullett spokesman Scarpinato says that Stantons' "faux outrage on
this issue is just the latest example of Greg Stanton's record not
matching his rhetoric."
Gullett,
too, has come under fire for various positions he has taken on the
campaign trail -- vowing to immediately repeal the food tax while
telling voters about the need to support a proposal to increase taxes to
support a more robust art program; for talking about his work for First
Things First, a fund of money used for early childhood development
programs, but then recommending that money should be loaned, or given,
to the state to balance its financial troubles.
