'Solid as a rock': San Antonio Mayor Ron Nirenberg is a normal guy asking for a third term

Heading to San Antonio’s Southwest Side for some door-to-door campaigning, Mayor Ron Nirenberg has a particular date in mind. April 19 is the start of early voting. Then there’s May 1, Election Day, when Nirenberg will learn whether San Antonio voters are satisfied with how he’s handled the pandemic and will award him a third consecutive term. But for the moment, Nirenberg’s thinking of another date: Aug. 20.

“Mark your calendar,” the 44-year-old mayor says. That’s when some hard rock giants of yesteryear — Def Leppard, Mötley Crüe, Poison, Joan Jett and the Blackhearts — are playing the Alamodome. “We haven’t had big names like that in a long time,” he says. Ron Nirenberg — policy wonk, unflappable television presence during the pandemic, one-time head of a university jazz station — rocking out to “Kickstart My Heart”? It seems to run counter to the image Nirenberg has cultivated during his two terms as mayor: stoic, intellectual, decisive, deliberative. That’s how supporters view him. Others in City Hall say he can be stubborn, parochial, mercurial and uncollaborative. A general consensus, however, is that the COVID-19 pandemic has been a major turning point for Nirenberg.