Longtime Scottsdale Activist Paula Sturgeon Entering 2022 City Council Race, and We Could Do Much Worse

It is definitely not too early to start looking forward to the 2022 Scottsdale City Council elections to kick the tires a bit on potential candidates. We will have three seats up for election: those seats are currently held by Kathy Littlefield, Linda Milhaven, and Solange Whitehead. As a reminder, we do not currently have a district system, so all seats are at large and any candidates who place in the top 3 after the run-off election (if one is necessary) will become Councilmembers.

Longtime Scottsdale resident Paula Sturgeon filed paperwork last Friday in order to run for City Council. Here at APG, we did a profile/Q&A on her a few years ago which you can read here. She has been tangentially involved in the Scottsdale political scene for a while now, but truly cut her teeth in electoral politics by Co-Chairing the successful bond campaigns back in 2019.

Paula identifies as a Republican minister who is marijuana-positive. If that seems like an unusual but intriguing combo, you’re not alone. She also lists affordable housing as one of the more pressing issues in Scottsdale, and has been holding leaders’ feet to the fire when it comes to spending according to plan, with a more recent example being how bond funds are used for athletic fields.

She had apparently been asked enough about running for City Council in the past that she felt the need to write an op-ed stating why she WASN’T running for one of those seats. According to her, “I’m sitting this one out because there better be some of us left to do heavy lifting that always follows contentious races such as ours…I’m not running now but I will be here when I am needed.” We do wonder what has pushed her over the edge.

It is too early for us to make endorsements in this race. In fact, Ms. Sturgeon doesn’t even seem to have a website up to talk about her priorities. However, our previous conversation with her led us to believe that she is very intelligent with a temperate style, and her more recent follow-up on how bond funds are being used demonstrates that she’s not afraid to get into the weeds. And her desire for affordable housing implies that maybe she will not be part of the NIMBY culture of this City Council. We are encouraged by her run, and will be keeping an eye on her.