Your voice: Candidate endorsements
Editor,
If you drive by our home, you will see a John Thomaides sign in our yard. I met John when we moved to San Marcos 30 years ago. As an entrepreneur and owner of Two P’s & Calli’s Boutique, a wife, a Mom and Grandmother, I support John for his desire to be the next mayor of San Marcos.
I served with John on the City Council and I appreciate his leadership, his business-minded approach to solving issues and his collaborative spirit when engaging with the public.
It’s time for a change in the Mayor’s position and I know John is the right choice for San Marcos.
Pam Couch San Marcos
Editor,
Please join me in supporting Mayor Jane Hughson who is running for re-election. I have had the honor of knowing Jane for 30 years and admire her for her lifelong commitment to our community. She has shown her dedication to our community by her years of service in a range of civic and community organizations. Permit me to name a few.
Jane has served on the boards of the Junior Service League, Performing Arts Association, and the League of Women Voters. She has been president of the Hays County Food Bank, Leadership San Marcos, and the Heritage Association.
Jane also is a graduate of the Citizens’ Fire Academy and the Citizens’ Police Academy. Jane is a member of the Friends of the San Marcos Cemetery, and the San Marcos Area Chamber of Commerce and has sponsored a Youth Baseball team for over 30 years.
Jane has also been willing to play a turkey for a good cause. For several years Jane has worn a Turkey costume to promote Turkeys Tackling Hunger, the Food Bank’s annual Thanksgiving fundraiser for which she won the “Turkey of the Decade” award in 2010.
As you know, Jane also has direct experience in local government. She has served on our city council from 1996-2002 and from 2014-2018, and has been serving as mayor since 2018, helping to guide us through the unprecedented challenges we faced in 2020.
Jane Hughson cares about our community and this is shown in her decades of community and governmental service. I hope you will support Jane Hughson for another term as our mayor by adding your voice and your vote to mine on behalf of Jane Hughson’s mayoral re-election campaign. Thank you.
Ed Mihalkanin, San Marcos
Dear Editor,
I have had the privilege of calling San Marcos home for the better part of the last 30 years. I am one of the few fortunate Bobcats who was able to find employment that allowed me to stay and raise a family in the community I grew to love during my time at Southwest Texas State.
For the last several years I have been increasingly concerned about the direction in which our city is being led. Specifically, how the decisions being made directly affect whether my three children will have the opportunities they need to stay in their community or will be forced to leave to find attainable housing and employment.
John Thomaides shares this concern with me. He understands when city leaders refuse to act or, worse, actively resist strategies/ opportunities that would support the creation of affordable housing and good jobs, the overall health and welfare of the community is negatively affected.
John has a proven record of working hard to create policies and platforms that positively affect these, and other important quality of life issues for the citizens of San Marcos.
I trust John as a leader who cares deeply about ensuring every single person in our community has the resources they need to be successful. I trust he will make the right decisions for the right reasons even in the face of opposition because he understands his job is to be the voice for those who are underrepresented. I trust he sees the bigger picture and will not make choices based on the strong, loudly stated opinions of a few but rather on what’s best for those in need.
I encourage everyone to look at his record and to make the only choice on November 8th that will move San Marcos forward. Please help elect John Thomaides as our next Mayor.
Laura Dupont San Marcos
I support environmentalism, housing equity, reproductive rights — and I support John Thomaides for Mayor of San Marcos.
I have known John since moving to San Marcos in 2005. He gives honest answers to questions on the campaign trail, instead of the non-committal responses we have been hearing from others. John not only talks about climate change and its effects, but he has ideas on how to address these issues at the local level, something I haven’t heard discussed by any other candidate. He understands the housing issues of affordability, open-space, safe streets, and public health. I am frustrated by the lack of understanding that I have seen in the current administration on these issues. John‘s answers sometimes go against locally entrenched powers, which many find admirable.
I have heard people claiming John is supported by developers, and I am baffled. The current administration boasts about how many thousands of acres have been annexed in the last two years for single-family suburban sprawl-subdivisions that were built by some of the largest developers in the country. I know these things because, as a former Planning and Zoning commissioner, I saw these proposals approved through the consent agenda. As a local Realtor, these developments contain basically the only types of homes my clients have to choose from. We need better options. These subdivisions are financially and environmentally unsustainable. The property taxes cannot cover the infrastructure maintenance required to provide services to these neighborhoods, and the sprawling design of these developments make them completely car-dependent, increasing the burning of fossil fuels.
Whether we like it or not, our region is projected to at least double in population in the next 20 years. I want a mayor who understands the big picture of San Marcos, Hays County, and our planet. That mayor is John Thomaides.
Gabrielle Moore, San Marcos
