San Antonio Mayor Gina Ortiz Jones received a lukewarm reception from the city’s business community Tuesday during her first State of the City address — an annual speech that’s veered into cheerleading territory under some prior mayors.
Some of Jones’ key talking points received only a smattering of applause, and following the presentation, one of the event’s hosts urged the crowd to clap more to show their appreciation for her time.
Hosted at the Tobin Center by the Greater Chamber of Commerce, the annual gathering is largely attended local business leaders and is intended to provide an economic snapshot of the city. Jones avoided boosterism, primarily focusing on fixing the Alamo City’s lagging economic development and speaking in frank terms about problems with education and general poverty that continue to plague the community.
In contrast to other State of the City addresses, Jones — a political outsider with no prior City Hall experience — didn’t hold back from acknowledging that San Antonio is the nation’s third-poorest large city and that its lackluster educational attainment has dimmed its economic prospects. She also warned that city government could be forced to cut programs due to stagnating property and sales tax revenue.
“The significantly lower bond capacity will require us to ruthlessly prioritize,” Jones said. “My buckets, in no particular order, look like streets and sidewalks, flood infrastructure, economic development — and downtown stuff. We’ll just call it that.”
During the 15-minute speech, Jones also made it clear that San Antonio’s current economic state of affairs isn’t something she finds acceptable.
“The state of our city is the choice between status quo, business as usual, or something better,” she said.
To some, Jones’ acknowledgment of San Antonio’s real and lingering issues with education and income inequality could be seen as a welcome change. However, the business and political elites gathered at the event largely kept their heads down, more focused on their Filipino-inspired lunch menu than on applauding the mayor.
During the address, Jones heavily focused on her economic development agenda and suggested San Antonio needed to think about growing its business base in new ways.
“One of the initial conversations I had with Gov. [Greg] Abbott, he said very clearly, ‘San Antonio has to up its economic development game,’ verbatim,” said Jones, a Democrat who served as the Biden White House’s Under Secretary of the Air Force.
“I have found that to be very much the case in my 10 months in this seat,” she continued. “I think there are more things that we can do to differentiate ourselves between Houston, Austin and Dallas — not just in quality of life, but I think also the quality of the sectors that we have here.”
Jones discussed her recent trip to Taiwan, part of a broader mission to lure semiconductor chip manufacturers to the Alamo City. She also touted her Mayor’s Economic Security Advisory Group, which is focused on strengthening San Antonio’s ability to compete in sectors other than tourism, including artificial intelligence, quantum technology, biotechnology and space manufacturing.
While Jones’ message was focused on economic growth, she reiterated that she was elected to serve the broader populace and not corporate interests.
“My administration will continue to prioritize steps that show the people — our neighbors, our bosses, really — that we’re here to serve them, here to engender their trust,” she said.
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