Saying “Hesperia has suffered through aimless leadership and stagnation long enough,” Mark Dundon indicated his impatience with the status quo has formed the basis of his effort to displace current Mayor Larry Bird in this year’s election.
“So, I am running for Hesperia City Council because I have a comprehensive plan of specific steps to bring many jobs to Hesperia, pave more roads, and improve our safety with more police officers and firefighters, as well as traffic measures that will reduce stop sign running,” he said.
For the first three decades of its existence as a municipal entity, Hesperia held at-large elections. But under threat from Hispanic voting rights advocates, the city adopted by-district voting in 2018. That year the council held elections in the Second, Third and Fourth districts. This year, the city is holding elections in its First and Fifth districts. Hesperia does not directly elect a mayor, but rather follows a tradition of elevating one the council’s five members to serve one-year terms as mayor.
Larry Bird, elected to an at-large council position in 2016, was appointed mayor in December 2018 and reappointed to that honorific in December 2019. As a resident of District Five he is now standing for election. Dundon is opposing Bird.
Dundon said he is qualified to hold the position of city councilman. “My education includes a bachelors’ degree in business and a masters’ degree in administration,” Dundon said. “As a business owner, I have run my own real estate and tutoring businesses. As a leader, I have served the Hesperia Unified School District as a governing school board member and clerk for two years. As a professional educator, I have served in several leadership positions where I have learned to very effectively collaborate with people to find our shared need to be successful and steer us toward making the best decisions possible in every situation.”
Dundon said, “There are two major distinctions between myself and my opponent. I am a strong supporter of our Hesperia businesses and will streamline the business and building departments to greatly reduce the burden on our local business owners. To grow our bedroom community into the city it was always meant to be, I will create a business enterprise zone along the freeway corridor with tax incentives and advertising to encourage high paying job growth that will generate the tax revenue we need to improve our safety and pave our roads. There will be no increase in taxes, period.”
The second distinction, Dundon said, consists of the fashion in which Bird involved himself in removing former City Councilman Jeremiah Brosowske from the city council in September 2019, ostensibly on what Bird and councilmen Bill Holland and Cameron Gregg maintained were residency violation grounds.
“I hold our U.S. Constitution and the rights it establishes as our most consecrated guarantees in our American way of life,” Dundon said. “My opponent, our mayor, led the charge with two other Hesperia city councilmembers to vote to overturn the results of the 2018 Election and eject a duly elected councilmember, which violated the 4th and 15th Amendments to our U.S. Constitution and the California Constitution. At the same time, I consider this a crime against our American values, for elected officials to violate their oaths of office and violate the rights of 1,688 Hesperia voters. All Hesperians are victims of this crime that deeply offends me and disrespects our serving military and veterans. I will protect all of our rights, whatever it takes.”
Dundon said Bird, Holland and Gregg “appointed their political ally who lost the election. It is time for the Hesperia City Council to quit playing petty political games and seriously work to improve our city in meaningful ways.”
In enumerating the major issues facing the city, Dundon cited “the skyrocketing crime rate in certain parts of Hesperia, up to a 300 percent increase; few local jobs; stifling, burdensome overregulation of our local businesses; bad road conditions in many parts of Hesperia; corruption within Hesperia operations and leadership; complete disregard for our Constitutional Rights to vote and entitlement of due process of law, including disregard of the voice of the people in election results.”
Dundon said, “All of these issues will be completely resolved if I am elected because I am so frustrated by the continued failures of the Hesperia City Council that are only getting worse and more dangerous. To alleviate the undue burden on our local businesses, I will work to revamp the Hesperia business and building departments to streamline their processes and reduce fees to stimulate our economy immediately. I will work to create a priority list and schedule the funding of public safety improvements and road paving. To transform our city to a prosperous balance of city and suburb, I will work to create a business enterprise zone to entice higher wage businesses to open and expand into Hesperia. In order to accomplish this, I will work to annex more land along the I-15 Freeway corridor, rezone it for business use, and offer tax and other incentives to bring economic prosperity to our community.”
Dundon said, “I know I can do this because I have done it before. As a Hesperia school board member, I added 50 percent more police officers to protect our schools and invested in our infrastructure. I will bring order, mutual respect, problem-solving, and respect for our U.S. Constitution back to Hesperia City Hall to serve our people by delivering prosperity to everyone in a balanced manner that preserves our way of life.
“To correct the corruption within operations and leadership, I will hold all council members responsible for any inappropriate actions and statements as well as replace any city staff who are not willing to perform their duties objectively and by the book,” Dundon continued. “To correct the wrongs of violating a council member’s and 1,688 Hesperia voters’ Constitutional Rights, I will completely obey and cooperate with the coming circuit judge’s ruling on the lawsuit brought forth by the wronged council member that has been ratified by the California State Attorney General.”
In addressing how he proposes for the city to pay for the solutions he suggests, Dundon said, “The growth and expansion of Hesperia’s business tax base produced by the streamlining of the Hesperia business and building offices and the Hesperia Business Enterprise Zone will,” he said, create a revenue stream with “which to sufficiently fund Hesperia’s growing needs in a proper and quality manner.”
He has sufficient previous experience relating to government to be able to carry off the strategy he is advocating, Dundon said.
“For two years, I have served on the Hesperia Unified School District’s governing board,” Dundon stated. “For five years, I served as president or an executive officer for a local chapter of the Association for California School Administrators, in support of government and school-based programs. From Cal State, San Bernardino, I have earned a master’s degree in school and public administration to expand upon what I learned in earning my bachelor’s degree in business.”
Dundon has lived in Hesperia for 22 years. He attended Cal Poly Pomona, where he achieved a bachelor’s degree in business, with heavy course work in finance, real estate, and law. After obtaining his first teaching credential at the University of Redlands, he later added five more teaching credentials and two master’s degrees in school and public administration and special education from Cal State San Bernardino. His teaching credentials are in the areas of mild-moderate special education, moderate-severe special education, multiple subject and single subject in the disciplines of biology, geosciences, and social sciences.
He is currently employed as a teacher and a business owner of a tutoring service.
“I am happily married for 23 years, with 3 children who all attend Hesperia USD schools, including one at Victor Valley College,” he said.
Dundon said, “Throughout my life, I have always felt the need to do meaningful things to help people in significant ways. That is why I became a family man, a teacher, and a school board member. Now, I want to help all the people in our city by improving their quality of life with less crime, more employment, less commuting, more good roads, lower taxes, and more safety for the sake of all of our families.”
-M.G.