Merced mayor prioritizes economic development, road improvement in second term
Merced Mayor Matthew Serratto is ready to get to work in his second term after a strong showing of support from voters on election night.
The two top issues on Serratto’s priority list are improving streets and roads in Merced and a strong focus on economic development.
“Those are my two top priorities for my second term as mayor over the next four years,” Serratto said. “How do we do better on roads? How can we move the needle in a big way with our unemployment rate? The last number is 9.1%, historically it’s about 12.8%. When I started, it was about 10.7%, so we’re doing okay, but we need to do a lot better.”
The support for Serratto was strong in his reelection bid with 8,476 votes, which accounts for nearly 66% of the 12,935 total votes counted as of Friday. Challengers Anthony Levi Martinez has 4,374 votes or 34%.
Serratto, 44, who was first elected to the council in 2016, is chief deputy district attorney in Stanislaus County. It is a position he previously held in Merced County.
The race for three seats in District 1, 3 and 5 on the Merced City Council have incumbent Sarah Boyle out to a big lead in District 5. Boyle has received 1,032 votes or 51% of 2,029 votes counted so far. Challengers Alex Carrillo has received 686 votes or 34%and Felipe Rojas-Flores 305 votes or 15% .
Mike Harris had a strong lead in a three-way race for District 3. Harris has received 800 or 48.08% of the 1,664 votes counted thus far. Next was Sair Lara Rodriguez with721 or 35% of the vote and then Cynthia Kelly with 347 or 17%.
The tightest race is in District 1 where local civil attorney Darin DuPont continued to lead over planning commissioner Walter Smith Dupont has 873 votes or 53.49% of the 1,632 votes counted. Smith has received 753 votes or 46%.
If the results stand up, Serratto believes the return of Boyle and the additions of Harris and Dupont will be good for the city council.
“Sarah is smart, she works hard, she cares, she’s really good with constituent services, and she’s just getting better and better,” Serratto said. “Mike brings a ton of experience. He’s the chair of the planning commission. He’s done a ton of things in his professional, professional career. Darin’s a super smart, young guy. He’s a lawyer, ambitious, he’s going to work really hard and I think he’ll get up to speed really quick.”
Economic development was a key issue during the campaign for all three city council candidates.
“I think we’re at this tipping point, if we don’t really push the pedal down and work on economic development we might have missed opportunities,” Boyle said. “We all know the High Speed Rail is coming in, we just annexed (UC Merced) into the city, we’re going to have develop so much, but what does that look like? We need more industrial area to bring in more of these jobs.”
Serratto also pointed to the construction of the High Speed Rail as a major issue facing Merced from the construction jobs the project will create to the possible relocation of The Boys & Girls Club and the Merced Senior Center and possibly other businesses located near the project.
“How do we manage the High Speed Rail relocation process? You don’t just have the senior center and the Boys and Girls Club,” Serratto said. “You have In and Out, potentially some of the auto dealerships, Costco could potentially be impacted, and other other businesses along 15th Street, possibly Chick-fil-A, instead of being there, might have to look for some another spot too.”
While campaigning and canvassing his district, Dupont said residents shared their concerns for the streets and sidewalks. He said some of the sidewalks near Stowell Elementary were like going over a roller coaster with the unevenness.
“I saw a lot of areas we could improve, which includes making sure our kids and students have a safe route to school, having a good sidewalks to walk,” Dupont said. “A lot of those things impact people day to day.”
Serratto said the city council has previously directed the transportation subcommittee to work with public works department. He says the city needs to look at other cities like Modesto and Turlock, which have done a rood job on improvement roads, to find out what they did to address their issues.
“A big thing for us is building up our internal street capacity,” Serratto said. “It’s probably going to involve hiring half a dozen more people, but we need to do it, and then also make an investment in equipment. It was probably going to evolve a multi-million dollar ongoing investment.”
“I think our council has stepped up to meet housing,” Serratto added. “We stepped up to meet public safety with funding and resources. We stepped up to meet parks in a big way with public resources. Now it is the time to step up with resources for this.”
