Thursday, March 28, 2024

Meet your San Pedro Mayoral Candidates

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With the municipal elections right around the corner, The San Pedro Sun would like to take the opportunity to present the Mayoral Candidates to the San Pedro Town public. As such, questions have been issued to all candidates in an effort to learn more about them. In this issue, we feature responses from the candidates from The People’s United Party (PUP) and the United Democratic Party (UDP). The candidate for Vision Inspired by the People (VIP) has declined the opportunity to respond.

Name: Dr. Giovanni Solórzano
Representing Party: PUP
Giovanni SolorzanoWhy are you running, and what makes you a good Mayoral candidate?
I am running because I love my island, and I am confident that I can serve the residents of San Pedro in all aspects. San Pedranos can rest assured that if I am elected my leadership will be inclusive of every single person in the island, for the socio-economic betterment of all.
Which portfolio would you like to fulfill and why?
The portfolio of the mayor is not limited to one aspect, as frontrunner my job would be to ensure that all departments of the council run as efficiently as possible, for the development of the municipality. Financial accountability and transparency would be a priority.
What do you understand to be the responsibility of the Mayor and town council? What do you think is the single most important task you will have to do as Mayor?
The single most important thing to do as a Mayor is to dedicate oneself to the progress for a better San Pedro. Some of the main responsibilities include the maintenance of streets, parks, infrastructure, a cohesive master plan for the development of the town, appropriate garbage disposal, sports and youth activities, social issues , and traffic regulation, most importantly we would like to deliver these activities with a new and innovative perspective.
If the opposition party should win most seats, how do you plan to work with them?
I believe communication is key, and as such I would do the best to communicate with them on the priority areas of the town.
Should you win, what would be your top three priorities for our community?
My top priorities would be planned development, the socio-economic wellbeing of the residents and economic prosperity of the island!
Do you have any final comments for the electorates?
The current council have failed to present financial report as they promised, that shows that there is no independent audited finical report, as well as they have experience negative impact on our economy and investments due to crime, health and the lack of social investments.

Name: Daniel Guerrero
Representing Party: UDP
DANIEL _DANNY_ GUERREROWhy are you running again?
I believe that progress must continue and it will only happen under a UDP government. There are several other projects that are in the pipeline that will bring more development to the island I call home. These developments can only happen under visionary an experience leadership. Over the past years, we worked tirelessly to accomplish what we embarked on, which was a transformation of the island… For this to continue there must be continuity in good leadership.
Which portfolio (s) have you held? What would you consider your greatest accomplishments within those portfolios?
During my three years, I held the portfolios of Finance, Economic Development and Foreign Relation. During the last year, Culture was added to this list of responsibilities. One of the biggest accomplishments in these portfolios was being able to manage the finances in a responsible manner. For that reason, we were able to invest more in areas of education, by helping schools in several of their needs identified by the various administrators of the schools. We are also able to allocate funds to help the police in many areas including the acquisition of a vehicle to help in crime prevention. We were able to assist our social partners in the area of sports, NGOs and other groups as well as our citizenry with their medical needs. Thanks to our responsible financial management, for the first time, cultural exposure, it contributes to the tourism product we offer to our visitors. We were able to do more in infrastructure improvement, investing over $2 million in road rehabilitation.
What do you understand to be the responsibility of the Mayor and town council? What do you think is the single most important task you have done as a mayor?
The responsibility of the mayor and council is endless because we work 24 hours around the clock always involved in almost everything. However, we can summarize it as ensuring that our garbage is picked up, thus making sure our municipality is kept clean, improvements made to our parks and playgrounds, ensure that our beaches are well kept, ensure that we improve our infrastructure and work towards improving the quality of life our people for them to live in a healthy and crime free environment. However, the single most important task is to ensure we can fiscally the affairs of the municipality. All the activities we carry out hang around a cost. We have to ensure that we properly account or our income and expenditure because without proper accounting, things can become catastrophic for any council.
Do you believe that you have worked well with council members of the other party? Do you have any examples of such?
As the mayor of the council for the past 3 years, I have treated all my councilors fairly included the PUP elected councilor. In fact, let the record show that I am the first UDP mayor to give a full portfolio to PUP councilor Wally Nunez. I have maintained an open door policy with him, offering my full support to the initiative he embarked on for the benefit of the municipality. Time and time again, I have offered my full support to Wally, unfortunately he was incapable of understanding and appreciating the level of the openness I had towards his initiatives.
Based on your campaign platform/or that of the slate you ran with, do you feel that campaign promises have been kept? Yes/No? Please explain.
I believe that most of our promises were accomplished, but there is always room for improvement. However, I believe that we complimented our shortfalls with other projects that were adopted that we considered of importance. Like any organization, we make and embark on identified plans, but until you are in the council you realize that new challenges surface. It is the way that we deal with these new challenges, given the resources available, that determines the success of a council. Our report card looks excellent and we are much satisfied with the results. We know that there are rooms for improvement because as the town grows so are he demands. We believe that with the amount of work and investment done, we can safely say that we have seen positive change in our town, and the quality of life for everyone has improved.
How would you grade your performance over the last term? A-F Why?
I don’t believe in grading myself. I have worked tirelessly for this town we call home. Based on our work, the accomplishment and improvement made for this island, the electorate will be able to grade us. The grade will be given to me and my team on March 4th.

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