House Engrossed

Darrell Covert; death resolution

State of Arizona

House of Representatives

Fifty-sixth Legislature

Second Regular Session

2024

HOUSE RESOLUTION 2001

A Resolution

on the death of darrell covert.

(TEXT OF BILL BEGINS ON NEXT PAGE)

Darrell Covert passed away on June 20, 2023 at the age of sixty-nine.

Darrell Covert was born in Phoenix to Jim and Gladys Covert on February 12, 1954. At the age of fifteen, he became the youngest certified mountain search rescuer. He went on to graduate from Scottsdale High School in 1972. From a young age, Darrell was an active member of TARS (Teenage Republicans) and helped with many local and state political campaigns.

After attending college, Darrell graduated from the Phoenix Police Academy and joined the Scottsdale Police Department, where he served for three years. Eventually he decided to embark on a path better suited to his talents and became a realtor, just as both of his parents had been.  Darrell excelled in this profession and earned many awards, including realtor emeritus status with Realty Executives toward the end of his career.

Darrell was widely known for his strong passion for cars, which included racing and discussing cars. With his very first car, a 1967 Ford Mustang, he raced in parking lot slaloms. Darrell later rekindled his love of cars with a 2004 Z06 Corvette and became a national racing champion in Topeka, Kansas.

Darrell became an avid supporter of the Republican Party and helped with Newt Gingrich's congressional campaign. He was a delegate to the 2016 National Republican Convention. Darrel went on to serve as chairman of Legislative District 17 from November 2019 to March 2022, and he continued in that role from March 2022 to November 2022 after the district became Legislative District 13. Deeply committed to the principles and standards of the Republican Party, Darrell received the Reagan Award in 2020.

In March 2017, Darrell was diagnosed with multiple myeloma and he underwent a stem cell transplant that summer, at which time he was deemed cured. However, the illness returned and, despite his valiant efforts to fight, he succumbed.

Darrell will be greatly missed by his wife, Rita, whom he met in high school and to whom he was married for forty-five years, their son, Sean, his older brother, John, and his many friends and colleagues in the Greater Phoenix area.

Therefore

Be it resolved by the House of Representatives of the State of Arizona:

That the Members of the House of Representatives express sincere regret at the death of Darrell Covert and extend their deepest sympathies to his surviving family members.