Bedford’s 2024 Race for Mayor
March 19, 2024
The direction of Bedford as a city and community will be decided in about a month as voters go to the polls to elect one of three candidates for mayor. Along with voting for two other Council seats and proposed amendments to the city charter, the election is May 4th with early voting running from April 22nd to April 30th, according to the City’s website.
Dan Cogan, is running as the incumbent and, as he claims on his website, he is “Bedford’s youngest mayor,” with six years of council experience to “secure” the City’s future “for all our families.” The second is Jim Griffin, who has re-emerged with his past mayoral and council experience, along with a record of deep community involvement and a platform, he stated, to “foster sustainable economic growth.” The third is a newcomer to Bedford politics, Eric “Big Juicy” Love, who said he’s “100 percent pro-business” and wants to correct “many missed opportunities.”
DAN COGAN
“This is the city I’m raising my family in,” Dan Cogan said in his campaign website, “and I want to make it the best it can be and secure its future for all our families.” His family includes his wife of six years, Sneha, and his young daughter.
For re-election, Cogan conveys his campaign themes of economic development, community participation and family.
Running as the incumbent, Cogan said in his website, “my vision is to see Bedford become a destination for new businesses and young families.” He said he wants to further invest in the city’s parks and offer more family-friendly activities. In addition, he said, during his time on the City Council, “we’ve become stricter with code compliance and updated our codes and ordinances.”
Originally from Ohio, he holds a Bachelor’s of Communication Studies degree from Kent State and a Master’s of Education from the University of Texas, at Arlington, according to a February 1st profile article in the Fort Worth Report. Today, Cogan is a teacher at South Euless Elementary School and has been a Bedford resident for 13 years.
According to City of Bedford records, Cogan first joined the City Council in 2018. He ran for Place 2, the website states, because he was “frustrated seeing the residents’ voices being ignored” and seeing “surrounding cities progress while Bedford struggled to find its own identity.”
When Jim Griffin was mayor, Cogan said in a follow-up email correspondence, “more apartments, storage facilities, pawn shops and low budget motels and hotels” were approved. He added that when Griffin’s $70 million bond for Generations Park at the Boys Ranch was approved, the senior center was “eliminated” and taxes were raised, placing “the financial health of the city in jeopardy.”
In September of last year, Mike Boyter, who followed Griffin as mayor, resigned with eight months remaining in his second term and in October, just a few weeks later, based on city records, Cogan, in his second term as a council member, was sworn in to replace and complete Boyter’s term.
Cogan sees himself as “an energetic leader who puts residents first,” according to his website. One of his priorities if re-elected, the website details, is to “give residents a voice” by “meeting them where they are and listening to their concerns.” He wants the City to have “improved outreach through various social media channels, newsletters and citizen surveys.” As an example of what he and others on the Council have accomplished, Cogan’s website points to Bedford’s new “state and national award-winning communications team” at City Hall with a redeveloped webpage, among other initiatives.
Some of the many other accomplishments Cogan takes credit for during his years on the Council include increasing sales tax revenue by “35 percent over the last five years,” creating “the city’s first TIRZ (Tax Increment Reinvestment Zone) to pay for infrastructure and development improvements,” such as the Bedford Commons and Campus West projects and bringing in Rock Island Auction Company to “relocate their corporate headquarters” to Bedford. To read more about Cogan and his list of accomplishments on the Council, you can visit his website here… https://bit.ly/49WNzN5
Cogan’s campaign website also focused on “revitalizing” the city by making Bedford a “destination,” along with stepping up “economic development” projects to “transform the city.” He also said on his website that he wants to continue to increase sales tax revenue and prioritize support for the police and fire departments.
In addition, Cogan expressed his resolve to continue investing in critical infrastructure, such as roads and buildings to avoid the city falling behind, as we did during the 2005 tax rate rollback that “left our roads and thoroughfares in disrepair.” Cogan said in his website, “we have taken monumental steps in fixing the mistakes of the past” and “with smart budgeting and planning we have invested millions in our city to update our buildings and infrastructure with no new taxes to our residents.”
JIM GRIFFIN
If elected, Jim Griffin said he wants to “foster sustainable growth” through “a low property tax rate while simultaneously nurturing a thriving business landscape.”
On his website, Griffin sets his campaign platform as being “committed to fostering growth of current businesses, attracting new businesses and ensuring fiscal responsibility to keep property taxes low.” He portrays himself as “a seasoned leader” with more than 30 years of “serving the community” and is “dedicated” toward “the betterment of Bedford.”
Griffin served twice on the City Council, from 2000 to 2005 and from 2010 to 2012, according City of Bedford records. In 2012, he was elected as Bedford’s mayor for seven years, according to city records, and resigned during his third term, in 2019, to run unsuccessfully for the District 92 seat in the Texas House of Representatives. Under his administration as mayor, in 2017, the City held and passed the $70 million bond election for what is now the Bedford Center YMCA and the Generations Park, at the Boys Ranch development.
Griffin noted in an email correspondence that he is returning to politics because he “truly enjoyed serving the citizens of Bedford as mayor and connecting with them on a deeper level.” He is “motivated by a concern for the direction of our city over the past four years,” he said. City leaders, he continued, “seemed disconnected from the preferences and best interests of our citizens,” which have resulted “in a palpable loss of momentum and missed opportunities.” He added that his “robust network” of contacts on “the local to national level” would enable him to “leverage opportunities arising from the exponential growth and momentum our state is currently experiencing.”
As mayor, Griffin detailed, that he would meet with shopping center retailers on how “to revitalize storefronts.” For instance, as mayor before, he said he “proposed an initiative for local artists to showcase their work in vacant spaces within the shopping center located behind Twisted Root,” which “increased activity to that center.”
“I am committed to working closely with developers” to drive commercial growth, he said, “that not only contributes to sales tax revenue but also generates new property taxes.” Griffin added that he would “seek opportunities to repurpose older and underutilized properties, a strategy that proved successful during my previous term as mayor,” referring to Chick-fil-A, as an example. He stated, “I am poised to address these challenges head-on!”
With an MBA from the University of South Florida in business and finance, Griffin was a consultant at Verizon with a 30-year tenure, according to his LinkedIn page.
Griffin, along with his wife of 45 years, Wynette, have been residents of Bedford for 35 years and have an adult daughter, Liz.
According to his website, his Facebook page and the Star-Telegram, Griffin has served as a community volunteer with the HEB Chamber, HEB Education Foundation, Northeast Leadership Foundation, Bedford Library Foundation, Bedford’s Planning and Zoning Commission, 6Stones, as a Trinity High School mentor, president of the Mid-Cities Basketball Association, chairman for the HEB Economic Development Foundation and chairman of the Finance Committee at the Woodland Heights Baptist Church.
To read more about Griffin in his own words, you can visit his website here… https://bit.ly/3IEtOhh
ERIC “BIG JUICY” LOVE
The City, Eric Love said, “has failed to execute” when it comes to business development and expanding the base for sales tax. “There have been many missed opportunities” he explained in an email correspondence, using “all the empty retail spaces,” as an example, and said as mayor ”I would actively seek out companies” to locate here.
At the time of writing this article, Love did not have a campaign website, but through an email correspondence he said that with Bedford’s “central location to DFW International Airport” and the close proximity to AT&T Stadium and the Cowboys, the largest sports franchise in the world, that Bedford should be “proactive and pursue [these] businesses.”
A Euless native and Trinity High School graduate, Love has been a Bedford resident most of his life, where he lives with his wife, Lisa. Love has one son and three daughters who all live in the DFW area. However, he placed an emphasis on “Big Juicy,” his English bulldog who, he said, he “loves dearly” and is his “sidekick and right-hand man.” Big Juicy, he said, “is trademarked as ‘Fort Worth Famous Big Juicy.’” Love added that his second dog, a Shih Tzu, is named “Ollie.”
For 18 years, he worked as a patrol sergeant with the Tarrant County Sheriff’s Office from where, he said, he was “recruited” by a locally-based private security company. Working there as a vice president, he said, “My private business experience has disciplined me on the importance of executing a plan.” He declared, “I can do this for Bedford. I am a good mediator, great negotiator” and “I understand business.” “I’ve done it!”
The proposed Bedford Commons development project, Love further addressed, “has the potential to bring in new opportunities for business, employment and tax revenue.” For the project, which has seen multiple proposals come and go, would, in his view, be developed into a “restaurant and entertainment venue exclusively.” He would also like to see the project include “upscale green space,” but no mixed-use or residential components. Again, he emphasized, Bedford Commons is a central location in close proximity to the airport and AT&T Stadium. “The tax advantage for the city can be incredible!” he stated.
Love said that his “100 percent pro-business” and “100 percent no-tax-increase vision” is what differentiates him in this mayoral race. “That revenue is the people’s money.”
He said he left the security firm in 2019, when the company was sold for a large sum to co-found Project Love Love with his wife. The Project, he explained, “focuses on food insecurities” and “homelessness in Tarrant County.” It also provides “Christmas for student parents,” he continued, allowing them to “select gifts for their children from their Project Love Love bus.” Additionally, Love said, he is a “charity auctioneer at Cars for Kids,” which benefits children across the country.
Love concluded his comments saying that his mayoral campaign, waged exclusively on social media, is “self-funded.”
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Community journalism for Bedford based on the premise that an informed community is an empowered community.
