After the primary election polls closed yesterday, SFR visited a few candidates' post-election parties. Below are our interviews with some of the winners: State House Speaker
Ben Luján, Sr.
, former PRC staffer (and new Santa Fe County Commissioner)
Danny Mayfield
and 2nd-term County Assessor
Domingo Martínez
. (Cross-posted at sfreporter.com.)
Ben Luján, Sr.
State Representative, Dist. 46
Luján: 50.87% (2,115 votes)*
Carl Trujillo: 49.13% (2,043 votes)
It's not surprising that the venerable speaker held onto his seat; he's done it for more than 30 years. What's shocking about this election is that he squeezed by his opponent, the young and comparatively inexperienced Carl Trujillo,
with only 72 votes.
SFR caught up with Luján after the election was over.
"It was a very low voter turnout," he told SFR over the phone last night.
"A lot of my people thought, 'Oh, you don't have anything to worry about,' and didn't vote
—but enough of them did [vote], and we're very grateful for that."
Luján also cited Trujillo's "negative attacks" and recent news linking him to a Nambé
as factors in the race.
"Part of it was the unfortunate, negative stuff that came out on the parking lot, which I had absolutely nothing to do [with],"
Luján told SFR. If anything, though, the race's closeness is an indication that not everyone's content with the Speaker, and Luján admits there's work to be done.
"A lot of people I visited [during the campaign] were very concerned about the economy," Luján says. "That's one thing we need to work better at. We need to do economic development, get our gross receipts [tax revenue] up and try to provide as many jobs as possible."
Daniel "Danny" Mayfield
Santa Fe County Commissioner, District 1
Mayfield: 31.94% (1,279 votes)
Jon Paul Romero: 29.59% (1,185 votes)
Paul White: 20.45% (819 votes)
Leonard Roybal: 18.03% (722 votes)
The Mayfield contingent was small but festive, clustering around the TV at the San Francisco Street Bar & Grill. But while White and Romero traded places for second, Mayfield held a modest lead all night. SFR caught up with him shortly after he arrived, when the party was already in full swing.
"I knew this would be a very close race," Mayfield said. He said he'd spent the day visiting polling places, trying to garner last-minute support and showing people what he'll be like as a county commissioner: "I will be out there, going to communities, hearing their concerns," he says. Mayfield also promises to uphold his campaign pledge to put the county's contracts online.
"I'm going to commit that we will have our contracts publicly out there"
—online, he later specified—
"and we will have our POs, our purchasing orders, attached to them,"
Mayfield told SFR. "What I'd like to do is get our contracts pdf'ed immediately, posted on a database, and [then] tie in all purchase orders and documents." One more initiative, in addition to the obligatory talk about belt-tightening: "We need to go out to
competitive bid processing."
"I'm going to live up to my promises," Mayfield concluded. "I mean that."
Domingo Martínez
Santa Fe County Assessor
Domingo Martínez: 42.65% (6,578 votes)
Benito Martínez Jr: 38.46% (5,933 votes)
Paul Duran: 18.89% (2,914 votes)
Incumbent County Assessor Domingo Martínez had a spirited challenge from Benito Martínez, Jr., who held the office before him, but like Mayfield, Domingo held a steady, modest lead throughout the night. SFR reached him via phone after most results had come in. Judging from the background noise, Domingo seemed to be enjoying a lively throng of supporters somewhere on the south side.
"It looks good!" the usually reserved Martínez said with enthusiasm. Almost immediately, he launched into campaign-speak.
"We're going to continue the good work we've done so far," he promised. Though Martínez was the incumbent in this race, he still apparently sees himself as the change candidate; he often returns to his refrain about inheriting a "backlogged" office from Benito Martínez Jr. "A lot of people are tired of the old way of doing things, and we brought in a new method," Martínez said, referring to the assessor's new(ish) computer system.
"The change is coming!"
Martínez concluded.
"It started three and a half years ago."
*All election figures are UNOFFICIAL RESULTS from Santa Fe County Clerk Valerie Espinoza.
