Roger Aceves announces bid for Goleta mayor
GOLETA, Calif. -- Goleta City Councilman Roger Aceves announced his bid for Mayor.
He will be running against incumbent Mayor Paula Perotte. She announced she is seeking re-election last week.
Aceves said he has served the city for 14 years. He has served as mayor twice in 2009 and 2013.
"I know that we have never encountered a year quite like 2020. The escalating COVID-19 crisis has never abated, leading us head-frst into a recession and we are fully engaged in a conversation around race equality and systematic change," Aceves said.
Aceves is opposed to the 1% sales tax hike being pushed forward.
“Before simply throwing an additional cost onto the backs of our taxpayers, we need to find ways to tighten our budgets. A recession is not the time to ask for a tax increase.” Aceves said.
Aceves said he has championed funding for infrastructure projects and points to two priorities: well maintained roads and fire safety, according to a news release.
As a Council member, Aceves said he takes pride in attending local ribbon-cutting ceremonies of new local businesses but he acknowledges as a City, there’s a lot of work to be done to make things easier for local business owners.
“Local businesses need a responsive city that opens doors of opportunity,
rather than simply closing them. We need broader thinking then just ‘we’ve prevented a big development from happening.’ Too often I hear of difficulties and roadblocks that prevent local businesses and landowners from making meaningful improvements to their properties. We need to expedite the permit process for residential improvements and small businesses, making it easier and less costly," he said in the news release.
Aceves said he pushed for the City to create its first Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Officer.
“It shouldn’t have taken us almost 20 years to identify that we need to better address diversity and implicit bias within our staff and City
practices. The light that Black Lives Matter continues to shine on injustice and inadequacies, requires us to not just listen or pass resolutions - but to enact meaningful change.”
Aceves has been re-elected three times since his fest election in 2006 to the Goleta City Council, after serving 32 years in law enforcement.
Aceves currently sits on the Town and Gown, Ordinance, and Public Safety City Committees and is a Commissioner for the Local Agency Formation Commission (LAFCO), where he has served as Chair twice.
