Adriana Rocha Garcia announces candidacy for mayor of San Antonio, is the third council member to enter the race

SAN ANTONIO – San Antonio City Councilwoman Adriana Rocha Garcia (D4) on Tuesday became the third city councilwoman and the first woman to enter the 2025 San Antonio mayoral race.

The South Side councilwoman broke the news in an exclusive interview with KSAT 12 News, saying she plans to file the paperwork to make it official next week.

“Personally, I want to run because I want to help people. And it’s going to be a tough few years ahead for the city of San Antonio. And that’s why I decided to go ahead and run,” said Rocha Garcia.

The third-term counselor is also an associate professor of marketing at Our Lady of the Lake University. She is the chair of the council’s Planning and Community Development Committee and also serves on the Community Health, Economic and Workforce Development and Governance Committees.

She is also the president of the San Antonio Housing Trust.

Rocha Garcia grew up on the southwest side of the city “like the average San Antonian,” she said, with parents who spoke only Spanish.

“I deal with the realities that our residents face,” she said. “I raised a child on my own. I am a single mother. Imagine how many single moms are out there trying to get ahead. I want to be able to work on their behalf and say, “I’ve been there and I want to help you.”

As a councilwoman, Rocha Garcia has a reputation for digging deep into the details of various policies and programs the council adopts, which she attributes to her time as a special projects manager working under former City Manager Sheryl Sculley.

WATCH: Full interview of Adriana Rocha Garcia’s vision for San Antonio

Rocha Garcia’s vision for the city “would be to be transformational, not just transactional. We have, yes, a lot of work ahead of us, but we are also at this pivotal point in our city’s history where we must do everything to be recognized as the city of the future.”

But it’s a vision that Rocha Garcia will have to balance with some of the economic challenges he expects to face. The city’s sales tax and CPS Energy revenues are down, she said, though KSAT was not immediately able to independently confirm the latest status of the two revenue streams. While an April council presentation showed the city received less sales tax than expected, its share of CPS Energy’s revenue at the time was higher than expected.

At the same time, Rocha Garcia expects less money to flow from the federal government, particularly pandemic relief funding through the American Rescue Plan Act.

Rocha Garcia also said conversations about updating property assessments less often could affect the city’s budget and its bond rating.

But she believes that crime is the biggest challenge facing the city.

“Whether it’s raised or not, just the perception of crime is enough to scare people,” Rocha Garcia said.

Although the May 3, 2025 election is still nearly nine months and a presidential race away, Rocha Garcia is the fourth person to announce his candidacy.

With Mayor Ron Nirenberg untermed in the spring after his fourth two-year term, the mayor’s seat will be wide open for the first time since Phil Hardberger left office in 2009, when there was a two-term limit.

Councilman John Courage (D9), Councilman Manny Pelaez (D8) and tech entrepreneur Beto Altamirano also launched campaigns. Councilwoman Melissa Cabello Havrda (D6) has said she plans to run, but has not made a public announcement yet.

Former Texas Secretary of State Rolando Pablos has created his own nonprofit think tank in what political insiders see as a pseudo-entry into the race.