Tim Johnson, owner of the Drunken Mule, has decided to enter the race to be the mayor of the city of Commerce.
“We need some changes in the city,” Johnson said. “It needs change. It needs change in leadership, and it needs new names and faces.”
At a recent Commerce City Council meeting, Johnson attempted to persuade city leaders to allow his business to stay open later to serve alcohol.
“I came to Commerce because I felt like they needed a business like this one,” Johnson said. “When my daughter went to school here, everybody would drive to Rockwall or farther and go out and drink until real late and drive back. I think Commerce needs a place like this because of that.”
Johnson has been in the club business for about 30 years and has owned several different establishments in several cities.
Johnson said he has experienced the most trouble trying to open an establishment of this kind in Commerce. The issues he encountered dealt mostly with the city council and regulations.
“They don’t want this type of business here, but it’s a needed thing for the college here,” he said. “Just seems like everything you want to do over there seems like a fight to do it, and it shouldn’t be that way. They should be wanting new business.”
Johnson said among the many changes he would like to make is to make everything more agreeable for new businesses to come into the city.
“As you can tell, the downtown area has quite a few empty buildings. I’ve talked to outside businesses and stuff, and they don’t want to come in because they feel like Commerce don’t want them,” Johnson said.
He also said he wants to bring organization within the city council to get everyone on the same page, especially when dealing with new businesses.
Johnson said he has a lot of ideas to improve Commerce that he could implement should he be elected mayor.
“We’ve got a lot of things that we would like to get started that will benefit a lot of different people as well as the college and the town,” he said. “But we’re going to keep most of them low-key until we really get into the campaign.”
The office of mayor is not the only seat available on the Commerce City Council. There are two regular council seats open.
In order to run for any of those positions candidates must be a U.S. citizen, 18 years old, not declared mentally incompetent by a court, not a convicted felon, a resident of Texas for at least a year and a resident of Commerce for at least six months.
Elections will take place May 10.