*Results are complete, but unofficial.
Lorenzo Gonzalez was elected to serve his first term as council member for San Marcos City Council Place 5 in the Dec. 14 Runoff Election.
With 424 votes (50.72%), Gonzalez beat his opponent, Roland Saucedo (49.28%), by a margin of 12 votes. The seat was previously held by Mark Gleason, who did not run for reelection.
Gonzalez said his main goal in running for the city council seat was to be more accessible to residents.
“What I’ve been saying all along on the campaign trail is I myself don’t really have a priority or an agenda. My main goal on council is to better communicate what we’re doing as council to the city and being more available to constituents to be their voice on the dais,” Gonzalez said.
According to the city’s website, San Marcos has a population of 86,059 as of Jan. 1, with a projected growth of 145,000 residents by 2035. With that growth in mind, Gonzalez said his priority is to address the lack of affordable housing options in the city.
“I really want to look into opening up the variety of housing that we have; have more infill, have quadplexes, [Accessory Dwelling Unit] ADUs, things like that,” Gonzalez said. “I’m really looking forward to having that conversation with the various commissions… to ease the process so that we can have more availability of different types of housing options.”
Gonzalez said he was grateful to run with three opponents who he had a lot in common with but just different views on how to change the city.
The Nov. 5 election for San Marcos City Council Place 5 was held between Gonzalez, Saucedo, Griffin Spell and Atom Von Ardt.
“I want to meet people where they’re at and hear the concerns and the ideas of all of our constituents and be able to represent them on council. So I mean [to my constituents] definitely reach out to me, if you see me at H-E-B, run into me anywhere I’m open ears and it’s what I ran for,” Gonzalez said.
Saucedo previously told The Star that he decided to run because other elected officials had failed to fulfill their promises to San Marcos residents, and he wanted to step up as a representative of the people.
One of his key priorities was fostering open dialogue between residents and developers to explore alternative affordable housing options.
