San Marcos mayor leads the city, oversees policies and works with city council to manage services, development and community programs.
The candidates include incumbent Mayor Jane Hughson and San Marcos Consolidated Independent School District (SMCISD) Board Trustee Miguel Juan Arredondo. The two previously faced each other in 2020, which ended in a runoff victory for Hughson.
Jane Hughson
What made you decide to run for mayor this election?
“Unfinished projects. The last time we did the comprehensive plan, we had a huge rewrite of the land development code, I wanted to see that through.”
What are your qualifications for office?
“City council experience, mayor experience. I have been president of five local organizations… I also am on the boards of several multi-county organizations.”
What is your biggest priority if you are elected?
“People run for office because they want to help people and that’s what I want to do also. I hope [to continue] our housing rehabilitation program.”
How will you balance the desires of the permanent residents versus the needs and desires of the university students?
“We have a lot of private developers who are coming in and building housing that is designed for students. We’ve got a lot of people coming in and building housing for those that are past college age that want to work their way into buying a home.”
How will you address the rising cost of housing in San Marcos?
“We want to make sure that we’re doing the training and offering what we can so that people can have one good full time job at a living wage with health benefits, as opposed to working two or three part-time jobs. That way, you come closer and often achieve being able to afford housing.”
What steps will you take to ensure that the SMPD continues to operate effectively?
“I will support the police and what they need by adding more staff, more police officers — you’ve got to train. You’ve got to make sure that you talk about how everybody there is going to [communicate].”
As San Marcos and the surrounding communities continue to grow at a rapid rate, what will you do to ease growing pains in the community?
“I don’t know that that’s a promise anyone can make, because more people means more people at the river, more people in our parks, more people at the library.”
How would you balance the desire of people to access the river with the health of the environment and our waterways?
“What we’re look at is ways to limit access to the river, I hate to even say that. We want people to be able to enjoy our river, but we’ve got to get more organized about it. We’re looking at actually charging, same as New Braunfels does.”
Miguel Juan Arredondo
What made you decide to run for mayor this election?
“I just believe fundamentally that we need new ideas and a different kind of leadership at city hall.”
What are your qualifications for office?
“I’m serving my ninth year as an elected official on SMCISD’s Board of Trustees. I think that breadth of experience lends itself for me being uniquely positioned to lead our community.”
What is your biggest priority if you are elected?
“San Marcos is a low-income community, about 70% of our citizens live paycheck to paycheck. About 70% are also renters because they can’t afford homes. That needs to change.”
How will you balance the desires of the permanent residents versus the needs and desires of the university students?
“As mayor, my hope is that we start looking at that as a more symbiotic relationship. We should look at it holistically and not perpetuate the us versus them mentality because everyone calls San Marcos home for a period of time.”
How will you address the rising cost of housing in San Marcos?
“Supply and demand is a real thing, so to address our housing affordability crisis, we need more access and more housing in general. Allowing that type of development in our community, allowing for more variety of diverse housing options.”
What steps will you take to ensure that the SMPD continues to operate effectively?
“I think we’re on the right path, but we have to stay committed to investing in public safety and making sure that we have the necessary resources to deploy accordingly.”
As San Marcos and the surrounding communities continue to grow at a rapid rate, what will you do to ease growing pains in the community?
“Growth is inevitable. I mean the fact that at 4 p.m. or 5 p.m. most of our city is crippled in gridlock should be the canary in the coal mine. We need to do more when it comes to infrastructure.”
How would you balance the desire of people to access the river with the health of the environment and our waterways?
“If it is our city’s intent to protect the river and decrease pollution or the waste from single use containers, then I fundamentally believe that we need to offer San Martian’s an alternative to the river. Expanding water recreation activities separate from the river would be something that I would pursue.”
