BY FREDA MIKLIN
GOVERNMENTAL REPORTER
Before serving on the City of Aurora’s Citizens Advisory Budget Committee, Dustin Zvonek ran the Aurora district office for Mayor Mike Coffman when Coffman was a Member of Congress. Before that, he was a policy director at the state legislature for the state senate minority leader.
A husband and a father of three school-age children who attend Cherry Creek Schools in Aurora, Zvonek is running for one of two open at-large seats on the Aurora City Council. Zvonek told The Villager that he raised $90,000 for his campaign during the first quarter of this year, the most ever raised by an Aurora City Council candidate in one quarter.
Originally from Utah, Zvonek graduated from CSU in Fort Collins and has lived in Colorado ever since. He heads up a consulting firm that performs executive management services for non-profits as well as data analytics that determine target audiences.
Zvonek shared with The Villager that the top three issues he plans to address if elected are public safety, bringing jobs to Aurora and transportation. He believes that “the city council needs to set a tone for staff that Aurora is business friendly.” In the area of transportation, Zvonek said that he would like to see the $22 million in sales and use tax collected on vehicles each year dedicated to the city’s capital projects fund and used for road maintenance.
He pointed to the importance of adequate housing in protecting the local economy, adding, “We have to allow developers to build the type of housing the market wants and get control of unnecessary regulations; 25 percent of the cost of a new single-family home is regulatory compliance.”
The candidate told us that, as a member of Aurora City Council, he “will focus on the issues important to the city and bring over a decade of public policy and business experience. The combination of the two will help me get the city back to a place where it focuses on the issues that will make Aurora the great city that it can be.”
One of five announced candidates for the two open at-large seats on the Aurora City Council, Zvonek’s website contains endorsements from 18th Judicial District Attorney John Kellner, as well as his predecessor, George Brauchler, and Aurora Mayor Pro Tem Françoise Bergen. The election in on November 2. His website is www.dustinforaurora.com.
Familiar names listed on Zvonek’s campaign report as having donated the $1,000 maximum allowed by Aurora’s municipal code include CU Regent Heidi Ganahl, former Colorado Governor Bill
Owens, Mayor Mike Coffman, former 18th Judicial District Attorney George Brauchler, banker Earl Wright, developer Buz Koelbel, NexGen’s Charlie McNeil, former CU President Bruce Benson and Marcy Benson.
fmiklin.villager@gmail.com