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Petitions calling for the recall of city councilman Don Buchanan were
filed with the city clerk on July 24. The petitions contained a general
statement describing the reason for the recall of Buchanan as a
“disrupting force and cause in community affairs and harassment
to the public.
In the spring of 1975, Donald L. Buchanan was elected to the Benson City Council. After he was elected, Buchanan announced that one of his top priorities was to remove Mark Battaglia and his then-partner Roy Skaggs from their positions of Benson Town Attorneys. In particular, Buchanan was upset about the attorneys’ involvement in a housing project on Country Club Drive and he thought that they attorneys had broken some laws. Accordingly, Buchanan filed a complaint with the Arizona Attorney General’s office.
In July of 1976, Buchanan made a motion that the city council not renew the contract with Battaglia and Skaggs. The other council members didn’t agree and Buchanan’s motion failed.
Meanwhile the Attorney General’s office began to investigate Buchanan’s complaints. In December of 1976 Battaglia and Skaggs resigned as city attorneys.
In May of 1977, Don Buchanan was re-elected to the city council but it was a squeaker. He won by only one vote! Just over a year later, a recall petition drive was launched in an effort to remove Buchanan from office.
In its November 16, 1978 edition, the News-Sun carried this acticle:
In May of 2007, Dianne Tipton was elected to the Benson City Council. On June 11, before Ms Tipton was sworn in, the council approved a contract for legal services with Ann Roberts who is Mark Battaglia’s daughter.
Shortly after she officially joined the city council, Dianne discovered a discrepancy between the contract that the council had approved and the contract that Mayor Mark Fenn had signed. Tipton publicly expressed the opinion that Roberts had intentionally changed the wording so that the attorney would make more money.
In a letter to the council dated August 13, Ann Roberts resigned her position as City Attorney of Benson.
In late January of 2008, local resident Carl Haupt began to circulate recall petitions to remove Dianne Tipton from the city council. Haupt claimed that Tipton had mistreated residents of a trailer park that she manages. Haupt was assisted in circulating petitions by James M. Crawford. It took only a couple days to collect the 108 signatures needed to bring about the recall under Arizona law.
Now let’s go back to 1978. It was Crawford who ran against Don Buchanan in the recall election thirty years ago. Crawford is Mark Battaglia’s brother-in-law and he is also the uncle of Ann Roberts.
Click here to see a complete list of people who signed the recall petition of January 2008.
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Some names to note are the entire Crawford family, Jan Daggett and his wife Kay, and Everett Dillon. His wife, Mary, probably would have been delighted to sign the petition if it weren’t for the fact that she is deceased. The wife of a former Benson mayor observed to us that the list of signers includes nearly every “good old boy” in town.
Summary: In 1978 Don Buchanan gets recalled after criticizing Mark Battaglia. In 2008 Dianne Tipton gets recalled after criticizing Battaglia’s daughter.