Kate Brophy McGee unanimously elected Maricopa County board chair; outlines public-safety tax renewal, eviction-prevention plan

Kate Brophy McGee was elected chair of the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors by a unanimous voice vote on the first day of the board’s 2026 term after Supervisor Debbie Lesko nominated her and Supervisor Stewart seconded the motion. The board approved the nomination with no opposition.

In her inaugural address, Brophy McGee framed public safety as her first priority and told supervisors she will ask voters to renew the county’s one-fifth-cent public safety sales tax. “This tax has provided sustainable public safety funding for nearly 3 decades, and it is my first priority as chair,” she said.

Why it matters: The sales-tax renewal would continue a long-running local revenue stream for the sheriff’s office, courts and public-safety partners. Brophy McGee also used the speech to lay out immediate county initiatives — ranging from eviction prevention and mental-health placements to infrastructure transparency and election process reviews — that the board plans to pursue in 2026.

Key actions and proposals

- Public-safety tax renewal: Brophy McGee said the board will place a measure on the ballot asking voters to renew the one-fifth-cent public-safety tax, a revenue source she described as funding local public-safety mandates for nearly 30 years.

- Eviction-prevention working group: Citing a rise in filings, she said "Our justice courts processed more than 80,000 evictions filings in 2025," and announced the county will join a working group focused on eviction prevention. The effort will focus on the five days before and after a first missed payment and will pilot an intervention with the city of Phoenix in Supervisor Gallardo’s district.

- Mental-health placements and court coordination: Brophy McGee said the county will work with Presiding Judge Pamela Gates to reduce delays in court-ordered evaluations and treatment and to expand placement capacity, noting the county does not alone bear statewide responsibility for more beds.

- Infrastructure readiness and transparency: The chair announced plans for infrastructure readiness assessments and a public "development pipeline dashboard" to give residents a real-time view of development activity and associated infrastructure capacity.

- Elections review and signature rejections: The board earlier commissioned a comprehensive review of election processes that Brophy McGee said is "nearly complete." She asked Recorder Justin Heap for a report on "the nearly 6,000 voters who had their signatures rejected" during the November 2025 canvas so the county can identify eligible voters who may be able to participate in future elections.

- Federal monitor and sheriff oversight: Brophy McGee said the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office has achieved 100% compliance with required policy changes and argued the federal monitor’s role has expanded beyond the original lawsuit’s scope; she called for redirecting monitoring costs to hiring deputies and corrections officers.

What happened procedurally

Supervisor Lesko moved to nominate Kate Brophy McGee for 2026 chair; Supervisor Stewart seconded. The board voted by voice and the motion "carried unanimously." Immediately after the vote, the newly elected chair announced she was appointing Supervisor Debbie Lesko as vice chair for 2026. No formal bond, ordinance or budget vote occurred during the remarks.

Reactions and next steps

Board members offered congratulations and public praise for outgoing Chair Tom Galvin’s prior year of work. Brophy McGee said the board will proceed with the stated priorities, present the elections review at a public meeting when finished and return to the board’s regular agenda later in the day. The meeting concluded after photographs and the chair’s remarks.

Quotes

"This tax has provided sustainable public safety funding for nearly 3 decades, and it is my first priority as chair," Brophy McGee said on the tax renewal.

"Our justice courts processed more than 80,000 evictions filings in 2025," she said when announcing the eviction-prevention working group.

Provenance: The election, nomination and chair address appear in the meeting record beginning with the agenda item announcing the chair election and continuing through the chair’s speech and adjournment.