Candidate for
Council Member; City of Chula Vista; Seat 4

BIOGRAPHY

Steve Castaneda was born in San Diego, California on August 24, 1959. He has been a resident of Chula Vista since 1992 with his wife of twenty years and eleven year old son. He graduated from Helix High School in La Mesa, and attended National University, Grossmont College and Miramar College.

Steve is a dedicated community volunteer who has coached Little League baseball and golf clinics for children. He volunteered with the Otay River Valley Park Committee to plan preservation and clean up efforts, and picked up trash and debris along the river.

Steve is the current Chair of the Chula Vista Planning Commission, serving since 1998. He led the Planning Commission in the successful fight to establish a Greenbelt around the City of Chula Vista. He is the Chair of the Citizens' Law Enforcement Review Board, serving since 1996. He is a member of the Mobile Home Rent Review Commission since 2002 and a 1998 Commissioner on the Resource Conservation Commission where Steve worked to strengthen the city's environmental review process. He served on the Historic Preservation Ordinance Committee in 2003 and helped craft the city's first historic resources ordinance to protect Chula Vista's historic structures and places.

Steve's priorities are his fight to permanently dedicate and preserve parkland in Chula Vista, establish a Greenbelt around the city and insist upon a sensitive balance of public and private uses of our South Bay waterfront that favors the maximum access for our community. He opposes housing on the bay front and is the only candidate to go on record supporting a land swap between private property owners and the Port of San Diego to ensure maximum preservation and public access.

From 1980-1981 Steve served as a police officer for the San Diego Police Department.

From 1981-1987 Steve was a United Food and Commercial Workers Union member employed by Vons Grocery Stores.

From 1987-1992 Steve worked as Policy Advisor and Community Representative for San Diego City Councilmember Ron Roberts. He was responsible for issues including growth management, coastal preservation programs and transportation planning. He successfully fought to oppose San Diego Port District plans to develop Spanish Landing Park on San Diego Bay. He worked on the permanent preservation of Fomosa Slough. In Point Loma, he worked closely with the community to develop and implement the Sunset Cliffs Natural Park Master Plan, the first effort to preserve and protect natural habitat along the Peninsula's pristine coastline.

From 1992-1995 Steve worked as a Legislative Specialist at the Transportation and Land Use Committee of the Intergovernmental Affairs Department for the City of San Diego. There he worked to strengthen penalties for the construction of illegal seawalls and to eliminate loopholes in the city's Local Coastal Program which allowed construction of over-sized structures.

Since 1996, Steve has been a partner in Profile Research and Marketing, consulting on transportation and land use issues for public and private sector clients. He worked with Chula Vista to determine impacts from the Brown Field expansion project. He advised the auto wrecking industry to relocate operations away from residential communities and sensitive habitats. He wrote a statewide transportation plan for welfare to work and farm worker populations to expand services and the use of public transportation. His local business contracting program for the City of San Diego earned the U.S. Small Business Administration's "Program of the Year" for the San Diego County Hispanic Chamber of Commerce.

As a Chula Vista Planning Commissioner, Steve has a long record of protecting single-family neighborhoods. As a Chula Vista Councilmember, Steve will make the city strengthen and enforce its Growth Management Ordinance and will work to preserve the rich quality of life Chula Vista has long enjoyed and can continue to expect under his safeguard.