Nogales mayor Barraza dies at 38

NOGALES — Mayor Ignacio J. Barraza died shortly before 8:40 a.m. Wednesday at University Medical Center in Tucson. He was 38.

Barraza, who underwent a heart transplant 19 years ago, was admitted to UMC on Monday, Nov. 19, after he began feeling ill.

He is survived by his mother, Jaimina Barraza of Nogales; and a brother, Marco Mada of Florida.

Juan Pablo Guzman, the city’s public information specialist, said in a telephone interview shortly after the mayor’s death, “I sadly announce the loss of a dynamic visionary. He was a leader to the very end who loved Nogales and the border community. His loss will be felt by all.”

While Barraza had shied away from naming a vice mayor since taking office in January, Guzman said, “all city business operations continue under the direction of the acting city manager (Jan Smith Flores) and deputy city manager (John Kissinger).” Legal staff is researching the options available to the city council to name the next mayor.

In 2003, after former Mayor Marco Antonio Lopez resigned to take a position with the governor’s office, the council named one of their own, Albert Kramer. They then appointed Barraza to fill Kramer’s council position.

In his 10.5 months in office, Barraza’s administration has been credited for forging a relationship with the University of Arizona to establish post-secondary education in Nogales and Santa Cruz County.

Last week, Barraza appeared before the Arizona-Mexico Commission in Ciudad Obregon, Sonora and successfully lobbied to get a “Binational Mitigation Flood Control Project” on the AMC’s Emergency Management Committee’s action plan.

Earlier this month, the mayor authored an order that was approved unanimously by the council authorizing city staff to begin forming a public-private partnership with Carondelet Health Network in an effort to build a modern, regional medical facility.

The city pledged to help finance up to $7 million for a new hospital.

Barraza also was a key member of a team comprising officials of Santa Cruz County, the Greater Nogales Santa Cruz County Port Authority, and local business interests that have been lobbying to secure more than $175 million from the federal government for the expansion of the Mariposa Port of Entry.

In addition to local strategy sessions, the team has traveled twice to Washington, D.C., for meetings with the congressional delegation and other government officials to keep the funding and the project on tract.

Barraza focused on forging regional relationships with other governmental agencies. Arguably the Ambos Nogales governmental relationship has never been stronger; and he met with several border region mayors, beginning with an unprecedented one-on-one meeting with Mayor Gary Gay of Patagonia.

Barraza hoped to form a “general council” of Southern Arizona mayors. “There are many issues of common interests, from immigration to cross-border crime, funding ... and I believe if we become united in our message on those key common issues we will become a force to be reckoned with,” he said in an interview following his first 100 days in office.

Not without his detractors, Barraza and the three councilmen who formed a slate during the election last year are facing a recall effort backed by members of the three city unions, former Mayor Marcelino Varona Jr., and the family of Jeff Gudenkauf, a former council member, who came in third in the mayoral race.

Barraza was accused of a hodgepodge of alleged wrongdoings, including micro-managing the city’s day-to-day business, which is the responsibility of a city manager; creating the position of deputy city manager to further that end; not hiring a city manager in a timely fashion; and “union-busting” tactics such as discontinuing the collection of union dues from members’ paychecks.

“Hey,” he told this reporter after one trying week of tribulations. “If they can put together a successful recall and somebody else wants this job and the $50 per month salary, I’ll gladly step aside and let them have it.”

Barraza was born in Nogales, Sonora, Mexico, on Feb. 26, 1969.

He began public service when he was appointed by Sen. Dennis DeConcini (D-Ariz.) as his Southern Arizona personal representative from 1991 to 1994.

In 1995, Barraza was assigned to Hawaii’s Democratic Sen. Daniel Inouye’s office in the special-assignments division. Then in 1997, he was appointed city administrator for Nogales under former Mayor Cesar Rios.

From 2000 to the present time, he was a principal in Los Corrales Development in Nogales, Sonora.

In December of 2003, Barraza was appointed to the City Council to fill the vacancy created by Kramer when he was named mayor.

Then in September 2004, Barraza was elected to a four-year term to the city council becoming the first City Council candidate in recent memory to garner enough votes to be elected during the primary election.

Barraza resigned in May 2006 to run against Kramer for the mayor’s seat. In September 2006, he beat the incumbent with nearly 60 percent of the vote. He was inaugurated to a four-year-term on Jan. 2, as the 37th mayor of the city of Nogales.

Manuel C. Coppola is editor and publisher of the Nogales International. Contact him at manuel.coppola@nogalesinternational.com.

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