Luke Diaz (Mayor of Verona, Wisconsin, candidate 2024)
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Luke Diaz ran for election to the Mayor of Verona in Wisconsin. Diaz was on the ballot in the general election on April 2, 2024.
Diaz completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey in 2024. Click here to read the survey answers.
[1]Biography
Luke Diaz provided the following biographical information via Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey on March 20, 2024:
- High school: Oconomowoc High School
- Profession: Technical Writer
- Prior offices held:
- Mayor of Verona (2018)
- Incumbent officeholder: Yes
- Campaign slogan: Keeping our sense of community even as we grow
- Campaign website
- Campaign Facebook
- Campaign X
- Campaign YouTube
- Campaign YouTube video
Elections
General election
General election for Mayor of Verona
Luke Diaz ran in the general election for Mayor of Verona on April 2, 2024.
Candidate | ||
Luke Diaz (Nonpartisan)  | ||
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Endorsements
Ballotpedia did not identify endorsements for Diaz in this election.
Campaign themes
Ballotpedia survey responses
See also: Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection
Luke Diaz completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey in 2024. The survey questions appear in bold and are followed by Diaz's responses.
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I am Luke Diaz and I was first elected as a Verona alder in 2013 and was first elected Mayor of Verona in 2018. I am a former Epic employee of 11 years. I live in Verona with my wife Cheryl and son Tristan, and works in as a Technical Writer and Quality Assurance Specialist. Parenting is the most difficult and most rewarding thing I've ever done.
- Keeping our sense of community even as we grow. I want Verona to be a great place to live for all Verona residents.
As Mayor, I support:
- A Vibrant Downtown – Our downtown is important and all Verona residents benefit when our downtown does well
- Quality city services - It's critical that the city provides quality services, everything from fire protection to snow plowing to city parks.
- Community spaces like our parks. This includes building new pickleball courts.
- Maintaining our good relationship with the Verona school district. When our schools do well, that means our community is doing well.
- Protecting the Environment – a lot of green initiatives are worth doing on their own, but they have a side benefit of saving money or even generating a little money. As Mayor, I will:
- Invest in renewal energy – we have our first solar panels going up in 2024 (finally).
- Protect Verona’s natural areas - we have wondering natural resources and trails around Verona. I will protect and expand these areas.
- Conserve energy – this is the responsible thing to do and it can help us save money.
- Expand the use of electric vehicles - the technology is getting better and it's good to green our fleet to reduce emissions.
- Fiscal Responsibility – no matter what you’re trying to do at the city level, you need a solid fiscal foundation.
As Mayor, I will:
- Minimize city borrowing
- Keep the city’s aa1 bond rating – the city achieved this improved rating in 2023, and I am proud of this accomplishment and plan to keep it.
- Be careful with our budgeting – this includes appropriately funding equipment replacement funds and contingency funds.
Community, transparency, fiscal responsibility, protecting the environment, making housing more attainable to middle-class families, economic development, especially to small businesses and companies that provide family supporting jobs.
There's tons of people I admire and respect, but I'm not sure there's anyone I model myself on precisely as an elected official. There's definitely elected officials doing great work but we all have our own styles.
I'm not sure. I have books that I liked and read a lot growing up but I'm not sure they explain my philosophy.
There's not a ton of municipal policy in the Lord of the Rings, but it was definitely influential on me growing up.
There's not a ton of municipal policy in the Lord of the Rings, but it was definitely influential on me growing up.
A sense of duty. Everything else flows from that. There is power that goes with the office of Mayor, but there is also duty and responsibility. I have a responsibility to Verona and its residents. This means that I need to do things the right way instead of doing things the easy way.
This sense of duty means making sure we're being transparent and quickly responding to open records requests.
One quality that I think makes me a successful officeholder is how steadfast I am or perhaps you could say stubborn instead. Doing the right thing isn't always easy. Finding solutions to difficult problems isn't easy. It's important to be able to stick to your values and morals to do the right thing.
To do right by their community. As I said earlier, I do think every community needs to be fiscally responsible and have a strong fiscal base for whatever platform they are trying to run. It's critical to work on fundamental issues like attainable housing, protecting the environment, and public safety.
I want Verona to be even better than when I started.
I think the Berlin Wall coming down, I was around 8.
Delivering papers. Not long, the paper went out of business shortly after opening.
Do I have to pick just one? I could easily go on for a while, so I will just list all the books I really like.
Lord of the Rings trilogy JRR Tolkien; Dresden Files series by Jim Butcher; Discworld Series by Terry Pratchett; The Expanse series by James S. A. Corey; A Canticle for Leibowitz; The Art of Legislative Politics by Tom Loftus; The Three Body Problem trilogy by Liu Cixin; 1984 by George Orwell; A Sand County Almanac by Aldo Leopold; Rivers of London series by Ben Aaronovitch; Black Company Chronicles series by Glen Cook; The Water Knife by Paolo Bacigalupi; Raven Tower by Ann Leckie
Lord of the Rings trilogy JRR Tolkien; Dresden Files series by Jim Butcher; Discworld Series by Terry Pratchett; The Expanse series by James S. A. Corey; A Canticle for Leibowitz; The Art of Legislative Politics by Tom Loftus; The Three Body Problem trilogy by Liu Cixin; 1984 by George Orwell; A Sand County Almanac by Aldo Leopold; Rivers of London series by Ben Aaronovitch; Black Company Chronicles series by Glen Cook; The Water Knife by Paolo Bacigalupi; Raven Tower by Ann Leckie
The Cruel Wars by The Longest Johns
I have some issues with my vision that have been corrected but are often difficult to deal with.
Refer to my answer to "What characteristics or principles are most important for an elected official."
I think you have to start with fiscal discipline. However, you have to go beyond that and make sure you are providing good city services and community spaces that make the city a great place to live.
The people.
Dealing with our success. Right now Verona and all of Dane County is growing and there is a tremendous demand for housing. We need to make sure enough housing gets built in order to keep prices in a range that regular people can afford. However, we also need to keep our sense of community as we grow. That's a challenge when dealing with rapid growth. It's key that we continue to build out community spaces and support community groups.
Professional with lots of dialog back and forth. It would be nice if the state would get shared revenue back to the levels they used to be (when adjusted for inflation). There are a lot of critical services that get delivered to people at the local level.
Professional with lots of dialog back and forth. I think the federal government should be heavily investing in our communities. The federal government should be focused on big projects that benefit communities and that only they can afford to do. However, they should also listen to people and make sure they are delivering projects that actually benefit the communities they are in.
Professional. Law enforcement is a part of the community and they are supposed to protect the community. The Mayor's office and law enforcement should have a good relationship to be able to deliver these results to the community and keep *everyone* safe.
Both of those things are good and essential to democracy.
Note: Ballotpedia reserves the right to edit Candidate Connection survey responses. Any edits made by Ballotpedia will be clearly marked with [brackets] for the public. If the candidate disagrees with an edit, he or she may request the full removal of the survey response from Ballotpedia.org. Ballotpedia does not edit or correct typographical errors unless the candidate's campaign requests it.
See also
2024 Elections
External links
Footnotes
- ↑ [Email with Wisconsin Elections Commission Election office, "Candidate list," March 13, 2024]
