Megaphones on the street and scathing social media posts from local bar and restaurant owners have left their mark on the 2023 San Antonio City Council election.
With the momentous local elections in 2025 approaching, some small business owners who were among the most vocal critics of downtown construction projects are now professionalizing their political efforts.
Aaron Peña, the bar impresario behind Amor Eterno, Gimme Gimme and A Perfect Day in Southtown, registered a political action committee called Business Community PAC on July 15, according to reports filed with the Texas Ethics Commission.
The PAC’s founders include Jody Bailey Newman of Friendly Spot and Chad Carey of the Empty Stomach Group. They are working with San Antonio-based political consulting firm Düable to create a more formal Role in the next city election, which will also include an open mayoral election.
Peña, who was forced to close Squeezebox on the St. Mary’s Strip, and Carey increased their social media presence by organizing local bar and restaurant owners who were losing revenue or forced to close during the city’s lengthy renovation of the St. Mary’s Strip, a $12 million project that began in 2021 and was only officially completed earlier this year.
The business leaders responded by throwing their support behind candidate Sukh Kaur to oust then-City Councilor Mario Bravo (D1) in 2023.
Peña told the San Antonio Report last year about his experience: “I guess I learned how to be civic disruptive, how to figure out what the head of the snake is. And then how do I go about it?”
Now the group hopes to repeat its political success by supporting a mayoral candidate and council members who will hold City Manager Erik Walsh accountable for the failures they see in every city construction project.
“They talk about the failure at North St. Mary’s as if it was a one-time event,” Newman told the San Antonio Report on Monday. “But every project is North St. Mary’s.”
Carey expressed hope that if business owners became more involved in local political campaigns, other entrepreneurs could avoid the challenges he faced.
“In my opinion, the only way that’s going to change the way these projects actually get implemented is if we have a city council and a mayor that looks at Eric and says, ‘Dude, what the hell is going on here?'” Carey said. “Is that true? It’s embarrassing. That’s your job.”
More and more construction sceptics
Both city officials and local business owners say they have learned many lessons from the St. Mary’s Strip project.
The city has tried to hold contractors accountable for project delays, offered millions of dollars in grants to companies affected by construction and tried to provide companies with more frequent updates on project status.
However, smaller businesses still do not feel that the city fully understands the burdens they face due to lengthy construction projects.
When the city announced late last year that East César Chávez Boulevard at Santa Rosa Street and South Alamo Street would be closed for construction, Peña and Newman were among the first to raise concerns about a lack of communication.
This week, their concerns about the project were confirmed when it was announced that the city will not complete a decades-long plan to replace a 100-year-old water main under Alamo Street in time for the Final Four – just the latest example of the city’s failure, they say.
“I think we just have to do this,” Carey said, citing city employees’ “arrogant” attitude toward small businesses. “If anyone did their job the way the Department of Public Works and Development Services does it, they would be fired.”
The bar and restaurant business typically finds owners too busy to engage in politics, the trio says. By bringing in political consultants, they hope to continue organizing small businesses that have not previously engaged in civically active activities.
“If you own a coffee shop, a small bakery or a small hair salon, … you don’t have a lot of time and you don’t know what to do if the building department and the planning authority rip you off,” Carey said.
