Frank Arredondo is a candidate for the Place 5 seat on San Marcos City Council.[/caption]Frank Arredondo is a former mayor of San Marcos, who served in that role from 1973-79. Arredondo said he felt compelled to run for the place 5 seat being vacated by Ryan Thomason after seeing the city’s contract negotiations with the Greater San Marcos Partnership earlier this year.
“Having remembered when I was on council and as mayor, the attempt to try to bring business to San Marcos resurfaced in my mind,” Arredondo said. “I noticed the difference that had occurred [since the GSMP took over economic development duties in the city].”
Arredondo said he did not want the balance on council to shift away from support for the Greater San Marcos Partnership.
Arredondo also said he wants to be a voice for segments of San Marcos “who have felt left out” of city politics. He hopes that by running he will encourage young Hispanics to be more involved at City Hall.
“I want diversity on the council,” he said. “And hopefully through my entry into this race, I can mentor some young Hispanics to become more civic-minded. More community-oriented. To be less selfish and step up and serve on commissions, committees, serve on City Council, run for county government, decide to run for state government.”
In addition to previous service on Planning & Zoning Commission and City Council, Arredondo has served on the Sunset Advisory Committee and the San Marcos Housing Authority. He has also formerly worked with the Department of Housing and Urban Development.
Why are you running?
There were two reasons I ran. San Marcos needs to grow in a defined way. By that I mean, growth is happening up and down the corridor. We need to attract what we want in San Marcos and have it locate where it’s ideal for the community. My first deep interest in San Marcos after I retired was seeing the controversy start to develop over the Greater San Marcos Partnership. I saw the traction the city was starting to get in recruiting businesses and going out [with the help of the GSMP]. The mayor said one time, ‘You don’t get a diploma and tack it up on the door. You take it and you go out and you show employers your credentials, what you can do.’ That’s the difference in pre-GSMP and after the GSMP [was formed]. I like the proactive stance they took. The neat thing was the public-private partnership where government entities put a portion of the money up for the agency to run its business and they brought in private investors, who presumably could say they have a vested interest, but the vested interest is seeing San Marcos grow, not necessarily for them in their own pocketbooks.
When the city, through the council started to question the same level of contribution—they wanted to cut [funding to the GSMP] back and form their own group, I spoke up publicly to the council for the partnership to continue as it has and to increase the funding, in fact.
The last straw was the flood. The letter that residents of Blanco Gardens received that they were going to have to raise their houses or move out—and I’m paraphrasing—[that led me to run].
What is the biggest issue facing the city?
Because we’re on I-35, growth is going to occur. We’re going to be up the creek if [businesses and developers] just come in and buy a property and they have the proper legal representation and just wiggle through our ordinances and our zoning and build what they want. I see that as the biggest challenge. That’s why when [current Place 6 council member Ryan Thomason] decided not to run I thought somebody has to step in who can keep that frame of mind on the council.
You have previously served as Mayor Daniel Guerrero’s campaign treasurer. Some have implied that this means you and Mayor Guerrero are philosophically similar in your decision-making. Do you feel that’s a fair assessment?
Daniel is a Hispanic and I’m Hispanic. I’ve always been for getting young people involved in policy-making positions. When he said he wanted to run he asked for my assistance. But I do not control Daniel. Daniel does not consult me and I don’t ask to be consulted. He was put there because I thought he was the person for the job. It’s up to him to make the decisions. He has information that I never could get. There is information that council receives that is not public. Information they need to act on. I’m not one to second guess Daniel.
How would you have voted on the Cape’s Camp development if you were on council?
Had I been [on council]… I’ve lived in Blanco Gardens. What I knew then, what I know now, I wouldn’t have been for that project. The Casey Development on the other side of the college, when those particular neighborhoods opposed it, the council listened. The Woods—I wasn’t in town when that happened; I was still working in Dallas—Blanco Gardens and the Wallace Addition opposed it. The difference is the ethnicities. One is Hispanic and one is Anglo.
We wonder why voter participation is down. Well the attitude I’ve heard is, ‘Why vote? They don’t listen to us anyway.’
What are your thoughts on the GSMP contract negotiations earlier this year. Was anything left out of the contract that you would have liked to have seen added?
It came to my attention the turmoil between City Council and the GSMP. Having remembered when I was on council and as mayor, the attempt to try to bring business to San Marcos resurfaced in my mind. I noticed the difference that had occurred within the last three years. I didn’t want the balance of the council to change. I’m for San Marcos and I want my grandchildren and the youth of San Marcos to be able to choose to stay in San Marcos when they finish their education, whether that’s high school or college because there’s a living wage job here in San Marcos.
Scott Gregson is running for the Place 5 seat on San Marcos City Council, which came open when current Council Member Ryan Thomason announced he would not seek re-election.[/caption]Scott Gregson became involved in San Marcos in 1996 when he invested in a piece of property in south San Marcos. Gregson said the city is at a turning point.
“I don’t want to be Austin,” he said. “I look at Austin to go see what they did wrong. But we have the uniqueness. “We’ve been [in the middle of the growth in] Austin and San Antonio for years. Now we’re seeing the waves lapping higher on our shores and [similar growth] is coming our direction.”
Gregson said he believes the city could lose the “character and charm” that make San Marcos what it is. In order to avoid becoming a homogeneous part of the I-35 corridor, the city needs smart planning and sustainable growth—in development and employment—to retain its identity, he said.
Gregson said his experience in the private sector and on boards and commissions has prepared him for the responsibilities of serving on City Council.
Gregson serves on the Public Utility Advisory Commission, United Way of Hays County, Central Texas Medical Center Foundation board, Central Texas Medical Center hospice advisory board, Central Texas Medical Center Foundation board of directors, LBJ Museum of San Marcos board of directors, Extended Hour Implementation Task Force and the San Marcos Industrial Development board.
Why are you running?
I’ve been in business here for 20 years and I’ve lived in the community here for 15. I’ve been very active in the community through boards and commissions over the last 10. I’ve served on 15 public and civic boards and commissions over that period of time. I’ve got a lot of background, plus my years of experience in the commercial or private sector, I bring a lot of business background and experience. Through my activities [I bring] a lot of leadership. I see the city being at a tipping point. We’re on the cusp of becoming a big city. I think that my concerns are as we continue to grow, I don’t want to be come a homogeneous part of the corridor. I want San Marcos to remain a unique city that we all live here and come here for. That’s important to me. I think we have an opportunity. We could easily lose that unique charm. My vision is for 50 years from now, that we have not just a bigger city, because we will, but we have a city that still has that unique character and charm that we know today. That has a good environment, that has great neighborhoods, so we protect our neighborhoods and we protect and respect our river. That’s the kind of city that I want our children to have the opportunity to live in just as we have.
What is the biggest challenge facing the city?
Our continued unbridled growth. We need to really think how through the continued in-migration of lots of folks—the Greater San Marcos Partnership’s consultants review indicates that folks moving here on average have a lower wage than the people already here—we continue to house, feed, provide transportation solutions for not only ourselves but also the new folks we have. Those are the challenges we face. Those can easily overwhelm us to the point that we do lose that character and charm as a city.
How would you have voted on the Cape’s Camp development if you were on council?
I would have voted against it. It’s something we have to live with. I looked at the police reports [the first weekend the apartments were open]. Shame on us. We’ve got to help that neighborhood and we’ve got to resolve that problem that exists and will exist for some time. But we also have to learn from that experience and as a community don’t do that again. That’s why elections are important. Those votes are really important.
We’ve had Sessom Canyon, the Buie Tract, the Capstone project and now we’ve got Cape’s Camp—the Woods. Those are projects—and we have The Retreat—that are butted right up against neighborhoods. We just need to recognize that if we want to have a great city we’ve got to have great neighborhoods. The way to do that is to make sure we place development where development needs to be. The comprehensive master plan helps us do that, but we need as a community to stick by that plan. I’m a proponent for doing just that. Respecting ourselves enough to do that.
Your opponent is a former council member and mayor, but you have never been elected to office in San Marcos. Do you feel that puts you at a bit of a disadvantage?
I don’t feel like it puts me at a disadvantage at all. I feel like it probably puts me at an advantage from the standpoint that I don’t have the baggage of having dealt with [elected office] in the past. We’re speaking of the same issues we were speaking of when [fellow Place 5 candidate Frank Arredondo] was mayor. If we didn’t fix them then, do we expect him to fix them now? Setting that aside, I have a lot of experience. I’ve run companies with sizable numbers of employees in the private sector. I’ve managed businesses where I know the right questions to ask and the right answers to expect and I know from a management perspective and from a contractual perspective how to hold people accountable so that the community, we get what we paid for.
I have been actively supporting candidates for the last decade, who have been aligned with the thoughts that I’ve talked about during my campaign that are more for protecting established neighborhoods, protecting the environment, respecting and protecting our river and making sure our government has true, open transparency and is focused on spending our tax dollars [to attract] career-type jobs. Not just any jobs.
What are your thoughts on the contract negotiations with the Greater San Marcos Partnership earlier this year? Was anything left out of the contract that you would have liked to have seen added?
The issues [in that discussion] were we give $360,000 to that organization. There are a couple of different elements of that. There’s Adriana Cruz and her staff and that’s the nucleus that forms the economic development team for this city. We’ve agreed to contract that as a vendor-agency relationship. The board side, the other folks are investors…open records, sure. Open meetings? I attended some of those board meetings and there’s just not a whole lot that goes on that’s of any kind of proprietary information. They’ve agreed to run those meetings in the spirit of open meetings. Open records are important. Given our size of investment in the deal, if they’re going to unilaterally change the bylaws then we ought to have some say in that. We should have an approval right of who runs the agency side. We should have a say in that…the contract’s a lot better than it was. It was a very initial experiment when we first started it.
I’ve seen the transitions we’ve gone through with the chamber…I’m not looking at this point in time to re-litigate that issue. Let’s not be in the foxhole shooting each other in the back. Let’s go get jobs and once again make sure that we get what we’ve negotiated. We negotiate a good deal and we get the kind of jobs that make sense for our community. A lot of communities chase these deals around and after the incentive expires those companies either come back with their hand out again or they leave. They go to the next community that’s out trying to get jobs.
