By Roberto Hugo Gonzalez
A professional engineer by trade in the state of Texas, Julio Cerda won the election to be part as a member of the distinguished Sharyland School District board of trustees. He owns South Texas Infrastructure Group and ROW Surveying Services.
Julio comes to the trustee position with vast experience since he served efficiently the City of Mission first as City engineer for two years and then eight dedicated consecutive years as City manager.
The Sharyland School District, in a way, has also won with Julio’s victory and vision. Julio is eager to start in what he says to be a passion for the betterment of children education atmosphere.
How do you feel being elected to a trustee position? “ It’s exciting because I have 3 kids that attend Sharyland School District and with this new board position now I have 10,000 kids to take care of.”
Julio has never been involved in politics before, but sometime last year when he stepped down from the position of Mission city manager, on the same day friends asked him to run for school board position.
“I told them thank you for the offer, but I need to start my company and make sure that I do well first,” he said.
He pointed out that in November of last year again he had the same conversation with his friends, and he decided to do it this time.
When you told Cuquis your wife about this new endeavor, what was her reaction? “She was happy and told me that would support me one hundred percent.”
In addition, he sad that Cuquis had no doubt in her mind that I was going to pursue some political future.
Julio said that the current board has done a wonderful job, and his plan is to continue working with them. “My basic idea is helping the public, the parents, the kids and making sure that the administration continues to do an excellent job as they have done up to now, I am just making sure that we keep another eye them.”
He commented that his eight years of experience as Mission City Manager allowed him to understand many of the issues of a large public organization. “It is important to be fiscally responsible with people’s money.”
One of the ideas that propelled him to run was to be able to help the people that pay the taxes. “We need to make sure that every single penny of taxes paid to the school district is well spent.”
Julio is married to Cuquis and have three children; Marcela12, Ana Paola 10 and Julio Alberto 6.
Do you have any other political aspiration for the future? Before he answered he smiled and said, “Again remember last year and this time I had no idea what I wanted to do except that I knew I had to start my company. My aspirations now is to provide for the students, and we’ll see what happens in the future.”
The Sharyland School District has a reputation as one among of the best educational systems, will this continue? “Yes, of course, and there is always room for improvement,” he finalized. TBB
