Mercedes residents will have to decide who will be their next mayor as two people are on the ballot vie for the position.

Channel 5 News presents candidates in alphabetical order by last name.

Starting off with Velda Garcia. She's a caregiver for elderly patients and has lost both previous races for city commissioner.

Now, she's eyeing the city's top position.

"I'm not afraid to speak up and as you can see, I was arrested in a city meeting," Garcia said. "Since 2019, after my arrest, I just kind of stepped away."

Garcia was one of several other people that were arrested in 2019 during a Mercedes city commissioners meeting. The commissioners were discussing the potential removal of a city commissioner and the city manager.

Garcia pleaded guilty to interfering with a public meeting and was given a one month probation in 2020.

She says she wants the city to look over how it's spending its money.

"Managing the budget, keeping track of the numbers. We're paying these high people, city managers, assistant city managers, secretaries, assistant secretaries, we're paying all of these people, but we're not taking care of our employees," Garcia said.

Garcia believes the city's priorities should be lowering property taxes and bringing in more businesses to the city.

"Lower property taxes, lower our water bill, we're paying a lot of money on consultants," Garcia said. "You pass by Mercedes, the Whataburger is at the outlets, what happened to the people of Mercedes?"

Current Mayor Oscar Montoya is running for his third term.

Under city rules, a candidate can only serve three times, so if elected, this would be Montoya's final term. He wants to continue with the momentum of growth he says the city has been going through.

"I believe the city has shown with the new big box stores that we did," Montoya said. "People have invested in neighborhoods, we went from doing 50 or 60 housing permits a year to 400, 500 a year."

Montoya is the director of the Willacy County Navigation District in Raymondville, manager of the Port Mansfield Public Utilities District and most recently, retired from the Hidalgo County Sheriff's Office as a division chief.

His focus in Mercedes would be to continue his work improving drainage and bring more high demand jobs to the city.

"When we first went in, a nine-inch flood would shutdown most of Mercedes. This last time, we had something like over 20 inches and we were operational the next day," Montoya said. "I believe that industry is the next step. We really need to start looking at industry, at high paying jobs, maybe light industry."

Early voting goes on through Tuesday for county run elections; polls will be closed Sunday. Election Day is Saturday, May 2.

For more election resources, click here.