Meet the candidates for Pueblo County coroner

In the November race for Pueblo County coroner, both challenger Zolanye McCulley-Bachica and incumbent Pueblo County Coroner Brian Cotter are running with a wealth of experience.

Cotter has served in the Pueblo County Coroner's office for the past 25 years, eight of which have come as the county's elected coroner.

Meanwhile, McCulley-Bachica has worked in the mortuary business for what she describes as her whole life, stating she began taking phone calls at her grandparents' funeral home pretty much as soon as she could talk. She worked in the funeral home after school throughout her early life and started to collect a paycheck in 2013.

"Now I take my own 2-year-old with me to work," she said. "It really is a family business."

When asked why they're seeking the position, both Cotter and McCulley-Bachica expressed a desire to help and advocate for grieving families.

"Helping people through the worst day of their life isn't morbid," Cotter said. "When a tragedy has happened and you're standing there with the family, they have no idea what to do next or what steps to take, they've been traumatized. And (it's an important duty) to be the one that stands there with them and says, 'these are the steps that we're gonna take next and here are the steps you folks need to take next and keep moving forward, as your emotions permit.' "

McCulley-Bachica said the coroner's position is about bringing comfort and guidance to grieving families who may feel lost.

"We all have a purpose we're given in life," she said. "Mine is to advocate for others. I was an emergency room nurse right up to the birth of my son, I've worked in death care my whole life, I have a business degree, so various aspects of what the office does that can only better the office."

Incumbent Brian Cotter reflects on tenure as Pueblo County coroner

During his tenure serving the coroner's office, Cotter has responded to countless homicide scenes and has traveled across the country, including spending nine weeks assisting the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner in downtown Manhattan following 9/11.

"That was an ... experience, I'm not even going to describe it more than that," Cotter said. "That was something else."

Cotter also assisted in Louisiana following Hurricane Katrina, and in Dallas following a major airline crash.

Locally, he says his biggest accomplishments have revolved around simply building up the department and training staff.

"The workload that my predecessor was building kind of outgrew his system," Cotter said. "He ran a system for 37 years that worked flawlessly for Pueblo, but several things came into play and the workload exploded into something that would overwhelm his system."

When Cotter took over, he said the county did not own a stretcher or even a vehicle that could carry one. At that time, the coroner's office had two small rooms on the third floor of the old county courthouse, which lacked the storage capacity offered even by the current coroner's office on Midtown Circle, which will not house the office for much longer.

County commissioners recently approved a deal to lease a new building for the coroner's office to allow more space for storage, both of biological materials and paper backups of electronic files, as well as a place to perform autopsies in-house. The new building will also allow for continued growth, which Cotter worked with county commissioners to approve after about two years of back-and-forth discussions.

The coroner's office currently rents a room at St. Mary-Corwin Hospital for approximately $32,000 per year, the Chieftain previously reported. The county pays a fee per autopsy performed, and the office performs approximately 300 per year.

Cotter served as coroner during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, which he said "showed the office things they needed to improve upon."

"We were able to get equipment and supplies to help get through that," he said. "We were able to get all of our major expenses, a lot of supplies, and several pieces of equipment ... that the county currently owns now, and have dedicated to this department for such emergencies. The overwhelming majority of that came from federal grant money, CARES Act money, and American Rescue Plan Act money."

Pueblo County coroner challenger Zolanye McCulley-Bachica reflects on work done in the mortuary business

McCulley-Bachica has experienced every aspect of the mortuary business working in the funeral home, she said.

"I pretty much do everything except being the mortician," McCulley-Bachica said. "From doing the pickups, meeting with the families, communications with the doctors offices (and) coroner's office to obtain the death certificate, assisting in the rest of the preparation of someone's loved one, working the funerals, the aftercare with the families, and then the administrative aspect of it.

"I know how to work with people that have just lost a loved one on one of the worst days of their lives."

McCulley-Bachica is also a former Pueblo city councilwoman who served District 4 after she was appointed following the death of former councilman Ray Aguilera.

If elected for a third term, Cotter said he would seek to maintain the growth of the department.

"When something else comes along, and it will someday, I want to ensure that this department is able to deal with it and handle it, that we stay up on our education, our training, and our experience, keeping and training good personnel, that's always a goal," he said.

One of McCulley-Bachica's priorities would be "better communication with the public," she said, particularly in taking a more active role in disseminating and analyzing annual reports prepared by the coroner's office for patterns to address rising issues in the community.

"(Annual reports are) so important to the community, and how that report is delivered, I'd like to see a more detailed report. It might just seem like data to people, but it's not data, these are people," she said.

Cotter stated that the people of Pueblo should reelect him for his "overwhelming experience."

"I'm one of the most experienced, if not the most experienced coroner in the state of Colorado," he said. "I have overseen 7,000 death investigations, I've probably been at 10,000 death scenes," he said.

McCulley-Bachica, who noted she'd be the first woman and first person of color to hold the title of coroner in Pueblo County, said she's running to be "the people's coroner."

"I'm going to be a coroner that is visible. I want people to know who their coroner is and what their coroner does for them. Because it is an important office. I want to bring compassion, humanity, dignity, respect, and knowledge to that office. I think this community, more than ever with what we've been through in the last several years, I'm the coroner for their office."

Questions, comments, or story tips? Contact Justin at jreutterma@gannett.com. Follow him on Twitter @jayreutter1.

This article originally appeared on The Pueblo Chieftain: Brian Cotter, Zolanye McCulley-Bachica vie for Pueblo County coroner