Mayor Mark Pulido and Frank Aurelio Yokoyama
CERRITOS – Being longtime friends and sharing fresh ideas for the city where they were both raised, it was inevitable that Mayor Mark Pulido and Frank Aurelio Yokoyama would team up in their campaign for two of three seats in the Cerritos City Council being contested in the March 3 elections.
Pulido is seeking a second four-year term while Yokoyama is hoping to get elected for his first four-year term in the City Council. Nine candidates, including an incumbent (Pulido) and two former council members (Jim Edwards and Grace Hu), are contesting the three council slots.
Incumbents Bruce Barrows and Joseph Cho are vacating their seats because council members are limited to two consecutive terms.
The “homegrown team” of Pulido and Yokoyama shares goals of improving public safety and reducing crime, improving streets and parks, and balanced budgets and fiscal accountability for the city of Cerritos.
Both 46, Pulido and Yokoyama were raised in Cerritos and are now raising their respective family in the city they call their hometown.
Pulido, who is district director in the office of Congressman Alan Lowenthal, takes pride in being the first Filipino-American to serve as mayor of Cerritos. During his one-year term as mayor, Pulido led efforts that resulted in a 35-percent drop in residential burglaries; fought to repair streets, sidewalks and trim more than 15,000 trees; and balanced the budget while preserving programs and services.
Pulido was elected to the Cerritos City Council in March 2011. Before that, he served for 10 years as member and later president of the ABC Unified School District Board, where he was elected in 2001 and again in 2005 and 2009.
Pulido earned his bachelor’s degree from UCLA, where he served as president of the Student Council, and his master’s degree from the University of Chicago.
Pulido’s candidacy is being endorsed by Lowenthal, former Mayor Laura Lee, and School Board member Celia Spitzer, among others.
Yokoyama, a successful attorney and real estate broker, earned his bachelor’s degree in business administration from UC Berkeley and his law degree from the Harvard Law School.
In endorsing Yokoyama during a fund-raiser at The Corner Place restaurant in Cerritos last Friday, Tina Cho, a member of the Cerritos College Board of Trustees from 2007 to 2012, said: “City Hall has been run by the same people over and over again. We have to have people with new ideas, people who understand the importance of hard work. Frank is open, honest, and intelligent. I know that he is very much willing and able to make Cerritos a very vibrant city.”
Pulido, on the other hand, said: “I owe so much to Frank for all the hard work we’ve been doing together for the city of Cerritos. We now have the opportunity to serve together and work together to turn this city around.”
If elected, Yokoyama pledged to make community safety a top priority, protect the quality of life for all residents, collaborate with school leaders to better serve students and residents, strengthen the local economy, and fix streets, sidewalks, trees and parks.
Yokoyama said he represents the diversity of the city of Cerritos, being a son of a Japanese father, Tom Yokoyama, and a Filipino mother, Chit Aurelio Yokoyama, and being married to a Korean-American, Wendy Ha.
Yokoyama has served the Cerritos community for many years as a former planning commissioner, a youth sports coach and an active member of the PTA of his two children’s schools.
Yokoyama is endorsed by Congressman Alan Lowenthal, Council Member Joseph Cho, and School Board Vice President Olympia Chen, among others.